W. Edwards Deming > Quotes

“In God we trust; all others bring data.”
― W. Edwards Deming

“Without data, you're just another person with an opinion.”
― W. Edwards Deming

“Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival.”
― W. Edwards Deming

“If you can't describe what you are doing as a process, you don't know what you're doing.”
― W. Edwards Deming

“A bad system will beat a good person every time.”
― W. Edwards Deming

“It is not enough to do your best, you must know what to do, and then do your best.”
― W. Edwards Deming

“Experience by itself teaches nothing... Without theory, experience has no meaning. Without theory, one has no questions to ask. Hence, without theory, there is no learning.”
― W. Edwards Deming, The New Economics for Industry, Government, Education

“Every system is perfectly designed to get the result that it does.”
― W. Edwards Deming

“The worker is not the problem. The problem is at the top! Management!”
― W. Edwards Deming

“In God we trust; all others must bring data.”
― W. Edwards Deming

“It is not necessary to change. Survival is not mandatory.”
― W. Edwards Deming

“If you can't describe what you are doing as a process, you don't know what you are doing”
― W. Edwards Deming

“A goal without a method is cruel.”
― W. Edwards Deming

“dissatisfied customer does not complain: he just switches.”
― W. Edwards Deming, Out of the Crises

“You don't know what you don't know.”
― W. Edwards Deming

“She learns, after she finishes the job, that she programmed very well the specifications as delivered to her, but that they were deficient. If she had only known the purpose of the program, she could have done it right for the purpose, even though the specifications were deficient.”
― W. Edwards Deming, Out of the Crises

“Inspection to improve quality is too late, ineffective, costly.
Quality comes not from inspection, but from the improvement of the production process.”
― W. Edwards Deming, Out of the Crisis

“It is not enough to just do your best or work hard; You must know what to work on.”
― W. Edwards Deming

“The transformation can only be accomplished by man, not by hardware (computers, gadgets, automation, new machinery). A company can not buy its way into quality.”
― W. Edwards Deming, Out of the Crises

“    Beware of conference-room promises. (Ronald Moen.)”
― W. Edwards Deming, Out of the Crises

“it will not suffice to have customers that are merely satisfied. Customers that are unhappy and some that are merely satisfied switch. Profit comes from repeat customers—those that boast about the product or service.”
― W. Edwards Deming, Out of the Crises

“Quality is pride of workmanship.”
― W. Edwards Deming

“As long as management is quick to take credit for a firm’s successes but equally swift to blame its workers for its failures, no surefire remedy for low productivity can be expected in American manufacturing and service industries.”
― W. Edwards Deming, Out of the Crises

“Performance of management should be measured by potential to stay in business, to protect investment, to ensure future dividends and jobs through improvement of product and service for the future, not by the quarterly dividend.”
― W. Edwards Deming, The Essential Demming (PB): Leadership Principles from the Father of Quality

“Any substantial improvement must come from action on the system, the responsibility of management. Wishing and pleading and begging the workers to do better was totally futile.”
― W. Edwards Deming, Out of the Crises

“Management of a system, cooperation between components, not competition. Management of people.”
― W. Edwards Deming, The Essential Demming (PB): Leadership Principles from the Father of Quality

“Short-term profits are not reliable indicator of performance of management. Anybody can pay dividends by deferring maintenance, cutting out research, or acquiring another company.”
― W. Edwards Deming, Out of the Crisis

“Failure of management to plan for the future and to foresee problems has brought about waste of manpower, of materials, and of machine-time, all of which raise the manufacturer’s cost and price that the purchaser must pay. The consumer is not always willing to subsidize this waste. The inevitable result is loss of market. Loss of market begets unemployment.”
― W. Edwards Deming, The Essential Demming (PB): Leadership Principles from the Father of Quality

“Many customers form their opinions about the product or about the service solely by their contacts with the people that they see—contact men, I will call them.”
― W. Edwards Deming, Out of the Crises

“To manage, one must lead. To lead, one must understand the work that he and his people are responsible for.”
― W. Edwards Deming, Out of the Crisis