Goodhart’s Law states that when a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure, and this is unfortunately true more often than not. Thankfully, W. Edwards Deming and his colleagues have developed a body of work known as Statistical Process Control, which offers a number of principles to help solve Goodhart’s Law at the organisational level. Donald Wheeler’s formulation of the law, which states that metrics should be difficult to distort, data should be difficult to distort and people should be given space to improve the system, is a particularly useful one, as it offers a more actionable and solvable version of Goodhart’s Law. Read full article here
Culture
The Priest in the Arena
The phrase “man in the arena” has been popularized in recent years, but a lesser known, more dangerous archetype is the “priest in the arena”. This figure is responsible for a process called theocratic capture, where an institution surrenders to a cult demanding unaccountable authority, fueled by claims to privileged knowledge. These cults often target powerful institutions and attempt to monopolize conversations with scaremongering tactics and hostile treatment of allies. It is important to identify and stop theocratic capture before it can gain control. Read full article here
Merv
May 29, 2023
