QuoteProject
...the most important things we need to manage can't be measured.
W. Edwards Deming
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

True value often lies beyond quantifiable metrics.

This quote by W. Edwards Deming emphasizes the importance of aspects in life and work that are significant yet cannot be quantified or measured. It suggests that reliance on metrics can overlook essential factors like creativity, quality, and relationships, which are crucial for effective management and decision-making.

Themes

ManagementMeasurementValuesQualityLeadership

In practice

Example use cases

During a business meeting, to highlight the importance of team morale over just performance metrics.

More from W. Edwards Deming

Competition should not be for a share of the market-but to expand the market.
W. Edwards DemingRead
The job can't be finished only improved to please the customer.
W. Edwards DemingRead
Don't expect smart people to listen to you without proof.
W. Edwards DemingRead
Quality begins with the intent, which is fixed by management.
W. Edwards DemingRead
Learn the basics of analytics and people will love you. If you don't have time to learn, hire someone.
W. Edwards DemingRead
Just because you can measure everything doesn't mean that you should.
W. Edwards DemingRead

Similar quotes

Remember how often you have postponed minding your interest, and let slip those opportunities the gods have given you. It is now high time to consider what sort of world you are part of, and from what kind of governor of it you are descended; that you have a set period assigned you to act in, and unless you improve it to brighten and compose your thoughts, it will quickly run off with you, and be lost beyond recovery.
Marcus AureliusRead
You don't come to live here unless the delusion of a reality shaped around your own desires isn't a strong aspect of your personality. A reality shaped around your own desires - there is something sociopathic in that ambition.
Zadie SmithRead
Compassion is the key in Islam and Buddhism and Judaism and Christianity. They are profoundly similar.
Karen ArmstrongRead
February 1997 - National Prayer Breakfast in Washington attended by the President and the First Lady. "What is taking place in America," she said, "is a war against the child. And if we accept that the mother can kill her own child, how can we tell other people not to kill one another."
Mother TeresaRead
The idea of interdependence is central to Buddhism, which holds that all things come into being through the mutual interactions of various causes and conditions.
Daisaku IkedaRead
The natural function of the wing is to soar upwards and carry that which is heavy up to the place where dwells the race of gods. More than any other thing that pertains to the body it partakes of the nature of the divine.
PlatoRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.