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38 Spectacular W. Edwards Deming Quotes

W. Edwards Deming was an American engineer, statistician and professor. Deming was credited with Japan’s economic post-war boom that drove them through success in the 1950s and 1960s. With 14 key principles to transform your business effectiveness as presented in his book, ‘Out of Crisis,’ here is a look at some of the more notable W. Edwards Deming quotes.

“A bad system will beat a good person every time.”

“A leader’s job is to help his people.”

“A system must have an aim. Without the aim, there is no system.”

“All anyone asks for is a chance to work with pride.”

“Defects are not free. Somebody makes them, and gets paid for making them.”

“Each system is perfectly designed to give you exactly what you are getting today.”

“Eighty-five percent of the reasons for failure are deficiencies in the systems and process rather than the employee. The role of management is to change the process rather than badgering individuals to do better.”

“If someone can make a contribution to the company he feels important.”

“If you can’t describe what you are doing as a process, you don’t know what you’re doing.”

“If you wait for people to come to you, you’ll only get small problems. You must go and find them. The big problems are where people don’t realize they have one in the first place.”

“Improve quality, you automatically improve productivity.”

“In God we trust; all others bring data.”

“It is not enough to do your best; you must know what to do, and then do your best.”

“It is not necessary to change. Survival is not mandatory.”

“It would be a mistake to export western management to a friendly country.”

“It’s not enough to do your best; you must know what to do & then do your best.”

“Lack of knowledge… that is the problem.”

“Learning is not compulsory… neither is survival.”

“Management by results – like driving a car by looking in rear view mirror.”

“Management of outcomes may not be any more than a skill. It does not require knowledge.”

“Managing by results only makes things worse.”

“People need to know what their jobs are.”

“Profit in business comes from repeat customers, customers that boast about your project or service, and that bring friends with them.”

“Put a good person in a bad system and the bad system wins, no contest.”

“Quality comes not from inspection, but from improvement of the production process.”

“Quality is pride of workmanship.”

“The customer is the most important part of the production line.”

“The greatest waste … is failure to use the abilities of people…to learn about their frustrations and about the contributions that they are eager to make.”

“The only useful function of a statistician is to make predictions, and thus to provide a basis for action.”

“The worker is not the problem. The problem is at the top! Management!”

“Two basic rules of life are: 1) Change is inevitable. 2) Everybody resists change.”

“Understanding variation is the key to success in quality and business.”

“We are being ruined by the best efforts of people who are doing the wrong thing.”

“Whenever there is fear, you will get wrong figures.”

“You can expect what you inspect.”

“You can not achieve an aim unless you have a method.”

“You must not run your Organization as a functional hierarchy. You must understand it as a System.”

“You should not ask questions without knowledge.”

Here is a look at the 14 Points as explained by W. Edwards Deming and shared by the Deming Institute.

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