Are You Making Decisions in a Fog?

摘要

Just as water makes up two-thirds of the world's surface, measurement constitutes an enormous part of the scientific method and scientific problem solving. Scrupulous pursuit of scientific knowledge entails recognizing and formulating a problem, collecting data through observation and experiment, and formulating and testing hypotheses. Measurement is required to monitor and improve processes in scientific and commercial settings, but not all measurement methods are created equal. Many are highly variable, unrepeatable or imprecise. Six Sigma projects, for example, have identified the inadequacies of many measurement systems. Given the wide disparities among measurement systems, Lord Kelvin might have taken it one step further and said measuring inaccurately or inadequately could be worse than not measuring at all. If you use inaccurate or inadequate measurements you believe to be satisfactory, you may forge blindly ahead and make erroneous decisions. If you are to avoid making decisions in a fog, you must understand measurement is a process that must be continually measured, monitored and improved.