Tuesday, 10 October 2017

Your knowledge is of a meagre and unsatisfactory kind

When trying to impress or surprise, or sometimes appal, I mention that I hold a Joint Honours degree in Maths and Physics.

Undertaken following a series of perfectly avoidable mistakes, I was entirely unsuited to the course, and it subsequently hasn’t afforded me much advantage in life.

But it entrenched my passion for number, I won’t accept anything but a fair test, and, well, I love the process of science.

That’s beautifully expressed by Lord Kelvin; “…when you cannot measure it, when you cannot express it in numbers, your knowledge is of a meagre and unsatisfactory kind; it may be the beginning of knowledge, but you have scarcely, in your thoughts, advanced to the stage of science, whatever the matter may be.”

(Or rather more drearily by Peter Drucker: “If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it”.)

Observing engagement and communication strategy, there is a consistent lack of measurement.

There may be lack of capability. There may be a lack of curiosity. There may not be the clout to get the budget or time to make the measurement. There’s perhaps an unwillingness to lift the lid.

But this I know. Lift that lid. Take a look. Measure effects. See what you find. Draw conclusions. And apply what you’ve learnt. Your clout-o-meter will rise, fast.

Look at what’s most important to your employees.

See how is best to reach them

Assess if what you propose to do will make an impact

Find out if you are cutting through.

All of this – and much more in your interactions with your people - is observable, quantifiable and therefore improvable.

Do more measurement.

But… you can go too far.

Hold in mind Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle “the more precisely the position of some particle is determined, the less precisely its momentum can be known, and vice versa”:

(Or, more mundanely, as Goodhart’s Law: When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure)

Don’t get bogged down in the number. The number is there to justify the means, to target the message, to precisely focus the efforts.

Always remember that it is the powerful word, the galvanising mission and the human interaction that wins.

That’s what changes behaviour, generates ideas and unites people to a cause. That builds momentum.


Do more measurement (but always know your place).

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