Human Intelligence and The Tyranny of Metrics
Damn the metrics!
That’s not what Jerry Muller has to say in his important book The Tyranny of Metrics (Princeton University Press.) But he does challenge many sacred cows in the fields of performance review, outcome analyses and project evaluation. From his book:
“[T]he gathering and publication of performance data serves as a form of virtue signaling. There is no real progress to show, but the effort demonstrated in gathering and publicizing the data satisfies a sense of moral earnestness. In lieu of real progress, the progress of measurement becomes a simulacrum of success.”
Throughout the book he examines fields in which he sees the application if what he calls “standardized measurements” or “numerical targets” doing real harm. These are fields which need extraordinary #humanintelligence: for example education, healthcare, and policing. It’s not just that the fixation on metrics misrepresents the success or not of a project, person or department. It’s also that the application of numbers-based outcome measurements is a kind of laziness. A true assessment of how a teacher is doing in a classroom, for instance, requires time spent observing the teacher in action. The success of patient care needs to be assessed through in-person evaluation, not through emailed “on a scale of 1 - 10” feedback forms. Again, from the book:
“Trying to force people to conform their work to pre-established numerical goals tends to stifle innovation and creativity—valuable qualities in most settings. And it almost inevitably leads to a valuation of short-term goals over long-term purposes.”
He also examines the professional class that develops and evaluates standardized measurements. “Metric fixation leads to a diversion of resources away from frontline producers toward managers, administrators, and those who gather and manipulate data.” In other words, we invest in the gathering of misleading data and not in the people doing the work.
Human intelligence, or #hi, is a catch-all category for the many brilliant things we humans do that aren’t’ well measured by numbers. Numbers have no nuance and very little context. They do not admit contradiction. But we humans do, and we take actions of great consequence to serve the long-term purpose even when the short-term outcome may appear to be waste of time.
the teacher who works with the student everyone else has given up on.
the nurse who creates a social gathering for patients under her care.
the cop who goes off his normal route to check up on someone he helped yesterday.
The numbers do not exist to measure the value of acts like these. Let’s stop pretending they do.
Have you had the experience of misplaced “standardized measurement” in your life?
