This powerful little quote from Edward Deming sums up one of
the most important distinctions between high achievers and
the also-rans in life.
Too many of us dream big dreams and work hard every day,
without measuring to see if we are making any progress!
Logically, if you are building a business, saving for
retirement, trying to improve your health, or to achieve any
other goal in life, you need to know if it's working!
And yet, many professionals and business owners forget this
key step. They "try" an advertising campaign or "try" a new
sales person. They "try" changing their hours or raising (or
lowering) their prices, but without adequate records and
good testing, they don’t really know what works and what
doesn't. As a result, too often they keep on working hard,
but are spinning their wheels, wasting time and going
nowhere.
The key to making progress is to get very, very good at
measuring what works (so you can do more of it) and
measuring what does not work (so you can stop it).
Successful people track daily performance. They use charts
and graphs to track their results. They compare results from
one year to the next, and measure their productivity against
their colleagues and competitors.
Almost any graph or list or chart is better than none. I
find many people "wait until I have time" to design an
elegant spreadsheet or database, and that's usually a
mistake. Start with a piece of paper (perhaps a calendar),
and a pen. Chart your results day by day, and periodically,
stop to compare. If you like what you see, keep doing it. If
not, make some changes. It really can be that simple.
Quotes of the Week
"Do not go where the path may lead; go instead where there
is no path and leave a trail." -- Ralph Waldo Emerson
"Being on the tightrope is living; everything else is
waiting." -- Karl "The Great" Wallenda
"Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss it you will land among
the stars." -- Les Brown
"In the end we shall have had enough of cynicism and
skepticism and humbug and we shall want to live more
musically." -- Vincent van Gogh
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