The Tyranny of Metrics
- ISBN-10
- 0691191913
- ISBN-13
- 9780691191911
- Category
- Business & Economics
- Pages
- 248
- Language
- English
- Published
- 2019-04-30
- Publisher
- Princeton University Press
- Author
- Jerry Z. Muller
Description
Today, organizations of all kinds are ruled by the belief that the path to success is quantifying human performance, publicizing the results, and dividing up the rewards based on the numbers. But in our zeal to instill the evaluation process with scientific rigor, we've gone from measuring performance to fixating on measuring itself. The result is a tyranny of metrics that threatens the quality of our lives and most important institutions. In this timely and powerful book, Jerry Muller uncovers the damage our obsession with metrics is causing--and shows how we can begin to fix the problem. Filled with examples from education, medicine, business and finance, government, the police and military, and philanthropy and foreign aid, this brief and accessible book explains why the seemingly irresistible pressure to quantify performance distorts and distracts, whether by encouraging "gaming the stats" or "teaching to the test." That's because what can and does get measured is not always worth measuring, may not be what we really want to know, and may draw effort away from the things we care about. Along the way, we learn why paying for measured performance doesn't work, why surgical scorecards may increase deaths, and much more. But metrics can be good when used as a complement to--rather than a replacement for--judgment based on personal experience, and Muller also gives examples of when metrics have been beneficial. Complete with a checklist of when and how to use metrics, The Tyranny of Metrics is an essential corrective to a rarely questioned trend that increasingly affects us all.
Get the book
Other editions
Similar books
-
Taxation for Decision Makers, Binder Ready Version
By Shirley Dennis-Escoffier, Karen A. Fortin[LO 8.2] The Timberlake Corporation has an opportunity to sell its manufacturing facility to Carroll Corporation for $4,500,000. The property has a basis of ...
-
Taxation for Decision Makers, 2019 Edition
By Shirley Dennis-Escoffier, Karen A. Fortin[LO 9.2] The Timberlake Corporation has an opportunity to sell its manufacturing facility to Carroll Corporation for $4,500,000. The property has a basis of ...
-
Taxation for Decision Makers, 2020
By Shirley Dennis-Escoffier, Karen A. Fortin[LO 9.2] The Timberlake Corporation has an opportunity to sell its manufacturing facility to Carroll Corporation for $4,500,000. The property has a basis of ...
-
Keeping House in Lusaka
By Karen Tranberg Hansen1934. Memorandum on the Native Tribes and Tribal Areas of Northern Rhodesia . Lusaka : Government Printer . Timberlake , Michael , ed . 1985.
-
Encyclopedia of Community: From the Village to the Virtual World
By DAVID LEVINSON, KAREN CHRISTENSENTimberlake, L. (1987). Only one Earth. London: BBC Books: Earthscan. Tinker, I. (1987). Street foods: Testing assumptions about informal sector by women and ...
-
Taxation for Decision Makers 2006
By Shirley Dennis-Escoffier, Karen FortinThe Timberlake Corporation has an opportunity to sell its manufacturing facility to Carroll Corporation for $ 4,500,000 . The property has a basis of ...
-
Handbook of Organizational Performance: Behavior Analysis and Management
By William K Redmon, Thomas C Mawhinney, Carl Merle JohnsonTimberlake (1980, 1984) promulgated a behavioral-regulation analysis of learned performance that emphasizes the importance of behavioral.
-
Money and the Rule of Law: Generality and Predictability in Monetary Institutions
By Peter J. Boettke, Alexander William Salter, Daniel J. Smith190; Timberlake 1993, pp. 356–357). By increasing fiscal expenditures, President Carter may have successfully cornered the Fed into delaying tighter ...
-
Economic Politics: The Costs of Democracy
By William R. Keech, William R Keech( Timberlake , 1993 , p . 4 ) The same was true of the second Bank of the United States , which was chartered in 1816. However , under the leadership of ...
-
Handbook of Organizational Performance: Behavior Analysis and Management
By William K Redmon, Thomas C Mawhinney, Carl Merle JohnsonSchlinger, H. and Blakely, E. (1987). Function-altering effects of ... Timberlake, W. and Allison, J. (1974). Response deprivation: An empirical 48 HANDBOOK ...