At the end of last year I was promoted within my organisation, to start a brand new department that could have a huge impact on the operational performance of the company.
I have a vision that I am trying to instill in my team, that I believe will achieve the results in the long term. This is all surrounding, people, processes etc.
I have none, or very limited, historic data and as such am unable to compare performance over a long period of time, taking into account for natural variance etc.
Maybe I am looking for some reassurance, however how do I know that what I am doing is right in the long term? I truly believe that certain procedures, policies and behaviours will achieve the desired results, however over the short term I do not have stats to back it up.
Small goals
I would be surprised if you couldn't define smaller intermediate goals, or be able to draw inferences from the direction that the numbers are heading. It may take a little imagination to come up with ways to measure outcomes. You may have to use proxies, for example, to get a handle on some of your impacts.
Accounting for natural variance is the realm of statistical analysis. I think every manager should have a solid grounding in statistics. Unfortunately, I don't have a recommendation for any particular resources to obtain that solid grounding, as I'm only just starting that particular journey myself.
Apart from that, I can't really offer any more specific advice because you haven't really given any specifics as to the nature of your situation.