The Tyranny of Metrics / / Jerry Z. Muller.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter EBOOK PACKAGE COMPLETE 2019 English
• VerfasserIn: Muller, Jerry Z.,
• Place / Publishing House: Princeton, NJ : : Princeton University Press, , [2019]; ©2019
• Year of Publication: 2019
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (248 p.)

How the obsession with quantifying human performance threatens business, medicine, education, government-and the quality of our livesToday, 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-and this tyranny of metrics now threatens the quality of our organizations and lives. In this brief, accessible, and powerful book, Jerry Muller uncovers the damage metrics are causing and shows how we can begin to fix the problem. Filled with examples from business, medicine, education, government, and other fields, the book explains why paying for measured performance doesn't work, why surgical scorecards may increase deaths, and much more. But Muller also shows that, when used as a complement to judgment based on personal experience, metrics can be beneficial, and he includes an invaluable checklist of when and how to use them. The result is an essential corrective to a harmful trend that increasingly affects us all.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Preface to the Paperback -- Introduction -- I. THE ARGUMENT -- 1. The Argument in a Nutshell -- 2. Recurring Flaws -- II. THE BACKGROUND -- 3. The Origins of Measuring and Paying for Performance -- 4. Why Metrics Became So Popular -- 5. Principals, Agents, and Motivation -- 6. Philosophical Critiques -- III. THE MISMEASURE OF ALL THINGS? Case Studies -- 7. Colleges and Universities -- 8. Schools -- 9. Medicine -- 10. Policing -- 11. The Military -- 12. Business and Finance -- 13. Philanthropy and Foreign Aid -- EXCURSUS -- 14. When Transparency Is the Enemy of Performance: Politics, Diplomacy, Intelligence, and Marriage -- IV. CONCLUSIONS -- 15. Unintended but Predictable Negative Consequences -- 16. When and How to Use Metrics: A Checklist -- Acknowledgments -- Notes -- Index