248 Quotes by W. Edwards Deming

Competent men in every position, if they are doing their best, know all that there is to know about their work except how to improve it.

Does the customer invent new product or service? The customer generates nothing. No customer asked for electric lights. There was gas and gas mantles, which gave good light.

The aim proposed here for any organization is for everybody to gain – stockholders, employees, suppliers, customers, community, the environment – over the long term.

Manage the cause, not the result.

Rational behavior requires theory. Reactive behavior requires only reflex action.

Forces of Destruction: grades in school, merit system, incentive pay, business plans, quotas.

Any substantial improvement must come from action on the system, the responsibility of management. Wishing and pleading and begging the workers to do better was totally futile.

Innovation comes from people who take joy in their work.

It is important that an aim never be defined in terms of a specific activity or method. It must always relate to a better life for everyone.