The Multifaceted W. Edwards Deming

The great moral teachers of humanity were, in a way, artistic geniuses in the art of living.

— Albert Einstein

The foundation of W. Edwards Deming's teaching and practice is his System of Profound Knowledge. His teaching cannot be separated from Deming the person — his genius, knowledge, values, and experiences over a long life. "I was there," he often said about how his stories and examples got into his books and teaching. Detailed discussion of his system begins in chapter 4. The first three chapters in this overture are intended to give a greater appreciation for the man and his concerns and visions for the leadership of organizations and for individuals living their lives and interacting with the various institutions of society. His teaching is relevant to all of us, in all of our roles in society.

Deming never labeled himself except for on his business card, which identified him as "Consultant in Statistical Studies." This self-description doesn't capture the breadth and depth of the man and his contributions. They were many and diverse. He was a multifaceted person who wove his many areas of expertise, experience, and knowledge into the fabric of his life. In order to know Deming and his work, the impact that it had, and its relevance to leadership in organizations and in living, I think it is worthwhile to take a look at these facets and to understand him by way of the analogies that follow.

A Doctor Fighting Deadly Diseases

Deming's aim was to diagnose and cure organizations of what he called "deadly diseases." This included bringing organizations to economic health and individuals to spiritual and psychological health by attaining dignity and joy in work. The following quote by Henri Amiel, the Swiss philosopher, poet, and critic, seems to apply to Deming: "To me the ideal doctor would be a man endowed with profound knowledge of life and of the soul, intuitively divining any suffering or disorder of whatever kind, and restoring peace by his mere presence."

This is a description that I am sure Deming would have liked to have seen applied to managers as professionals, with the diagnostic skill of a physician. The physician understands the body as a system where the health of the whole body depends on the healthy functioning of the parts and their relationships. Likewise, the health and proper functioning of the organization as a whole, especially as a social system, depends on the functioning of individuals and the quality of their interactions with each other.

In his book Out of the Crisis, Deming diagnosed the deadly diseases and the interrelated management practices that afflict most businesses, as well as other organizations in the Western world. He began that particular chapter by quoting Hosea 4:6: "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge." In summary, he explains that our ills are due primarily to the following:

1. Lack of constancy of purpose, knowing what business you are in.

2. Emphasis on the short term, the immediate, rather than thinking long-term to keep the organization viable. Short-term thinking, such as focusing on maximizing this quarter's sales and profits, is promoted by the pressures produced by management by objectives (MBO), also known as management by results (MBR).

3. Management solely by use of visible figures, ignoring figures that are unknown or unknowable, also called management by numbers (MBN).

4. The annual performance review, with its reliance on rating, ranking, and grading is short-term thinking that requires visible figures and fosters internal competition for the few top ratings at the cost of cooperation and teamwork.

6. Mobility of management and other employees.

These practices create internal conditions that present obstacles to the organization's potential for success. They produce competition between individuals and units that interfere with the cooperation and sharing necessary for an organization to perform as a unified whole. They cause loss by degrading the organization's ability to optimize its resources. It was management practices such as these that caused him to say that management is living in an age of destructive mythology.

A Moral Philosopher

Deming did not label his teaching as moral philosophy, yet he followed the tradition of economists such as Adam Smith, whom Robert Heilbroner named one of the "worldly philosophers." The Adam Smith Award was given in 1990 to both Dr. Deming and Malcolm S. Forbes Jr. It is the highest honor given by the Association of Private Enterprise Education to recognize an individual who has made a sustained and lasting contribution to the perpetuation of the ideals of a free market economy as first laid out in Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations. The recipient of this award is one who through their writing, speaking, and professional life has acquired an international reputation as an eloquent scholar and advocate of free enterprise and the system of entrepreneurship that underlies it.

The following description by John Maynard Keynes, a British economist, applies to economists regardless of theoretical orientation. It surely seems to apply to Deming.

The master-economist must possess a rare combination of gifts. He must be mathematician, historian, statesman, philosopher — in some degree. He must understand symbols and speak in words. He must contemplate the particular in terms of the general, and touch abstract and concrete in the same flight of thought. He must study the present in light of the past for the purposes of the future. No part of man's nature or his institutions must lie entirely outside his regard.

His contributions and his stature are so valued in Japan that the Union of Japanese Scientists and Engineers (JUSE) in 1951 instituted the Deming Prize. It has been suggested that Deming should have been nominated for the Nobel Prize in Economics since his theory of variation and its application to the reduction of cost and waste are essential to sound manufacturing economics.

Deming's association with economists goes back many years. In 1937, he organized a series of lectures by his colleague, the statistician Walter Shewhart. In her book about Deming, The Man Who Discovered Quality Andrea Gabor reported that W Allen Wallis, who would become assistant secretary of state in the Reagan administration, told her that he [Wallis] and the economist Milton Friedman both attended Shewhart's lectures. Deming sometimes humorously remarked, "Milton Friedman once attended a class of mine. Neither he nor I knew why he was there." While Deming believed in free enterprise, I think his comment implied in a friendly way that he did not share Friedman's strict conservative view. Friedman is said to have greatly respected Deming. I think Friedman's attendance at his lecture further validates Deming's credibility with some economists.

A Sage, Prophet, Master

A sage is defined as a profoundly wise person. To be sagacious is to have keen perception, discernment, penetrating intelligence, sound judgment, and foresight. Deming's life and work are in the tradition of sages and spiritual leaders who for millennia have addressed the perennial problems that have characterized human living. "The Way of the sage is to act but not to compete," according to Lao-tzu. "Lao" means venerable or old. "Zi" or "tzu" means master. Deming was Lao-tzu in that he saw no advantage to destructive adversarial competition, no need to have losers in order to have winners, whether in business, education, or life. Rather than obsession with increased market share, he thought that management should focus on expanding the market with innovative and high-quality products and services. Competition, said Deming, should be against the past, to improve, not to destroy. He worried about America's balance of trade and its competitive position in the world. He warned, "Problems of the future command first and foremost constancy of purpose and dedication to improvement of competitive position to keep the company alive and to provide jobs for their employees."

The word "guru" often is an abused and misplaced label. In Sanskrit, the syllable "gu" means shadows or darkness, and "ru" means to dispel. I think that the label applies to Deming since he tried through his teaching to dispel the darkness of ignorance and enlighten the minds of others.

Dr. Deming went to Japan after WWII to assist in the design of a census. While working with the Economic and Scientific Staff of General MacArthur's Headquarters, he saw much suffering. His daughter, Linda Deming Ratcliff, told me she thinks that this reminded him of the hardships of his own youth. He had survived and prospered and believed that if he passed on the knowledge he had acquired and developed over half a century, he could help the Japanese do the same. In 1950, he began teaching his theories and methods to engineers, scientists, and top management that helped to put Japan on the road to success in exporting. Although unknown to most businesses in America, Deming was viewed in Japan as a master and a visionary for accurately predicting their success in manufacturing and export from the lessons he taught. Much as in the myth of the hero, Deming was seen as an authority figure and sage by the Japanese scientists and engineers who knew him.

Daniel Boorstin, Librarian of Congress Emeritus and Pulitzer Prize-winning historian, wrote in U.S. News & World Report that Deming was "one of nine turning points in history," a recognition he deserved for his early work in Japan and later for "America's belated embrace of a prophet." Boorstin also wrote that Deming was tough on American business managers since they were "several decades late to class."

Fifth Business

In his novel Fifth Business, Robertson Davies created the term "fifth business" to apply to the individual in a drama (novel, play, or opera) who is behind the scenes but who is necessary to get things done. This person is necessary to make the plot work because he or she knows something that others do not know. That person is not a prima donna or self-centered; in fact, this person is humble despite his or her important role. Davies also provides this description of a person in the role of fifth business, which I think applies to Deming: "He was a genius — that is to say, a man who does superlatively and without obvious effort something that most people cannot do by the uttermost exertion of their abilities."

Deming received many accolades and honors, yet he was humble. He took great joy and satisfaction from helping others learn and in learning from others. This was much more important to him than the formal recognition that society bestowed upon him in great abundance over the years in the form of awards. On October 21, 1989, in Dearborn, Michigan, on the sixtieth anniversary of the Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village, Dr. Deming was presented with the Edison-Ford Medal "in recognition of his lifelong contribution to the spirit of American ingenuity, innovation and enterprise." Following remarks by Dr. Boorstin, whose praise of Deming appeared to embarrass him, the audience anticipated some words of wisdom from Dr. Deming, perhaps some new insights into the complexities of management. After receiving the medal, Dr. Deming told two stories. First, he said, "I appreciate this honor. I feel like the dog a woman entered every year in the Philadelphia dog show. The woman was asked why, year after year, she entered the dog in the show since the dog has no chance to win a prize. 'Well that's true,' said the woman, 'but it gives him a chance to associate with some good dogs.'" Then Deming added, "I know just how the dog felt." He then told this second story: "I also feel like the horse doctor. A little girl was late coming home from school. Her mother was very much worried. Finally the little girl showed up at home with the explanation. She was on her way home from school when a horse took sick, and she heard somebody say they had sent for the horse doctor. 'And, Mamma, I had never seen a horse doctor, and I wanted so much to see a horse doctor. And, Mamma, when he came, he was only a man, only a man.'"

This was typical of Deming's humorous way of showing his humility. In the video The Deming of America, there is a poignant scene in Dr. Deming's modest basement office of his home in Washington, DC. Priscilla Petty, the video's producer, asked Dr. Deming how he felt when he received the Second Order Medal of the Sacred Treasure from Emperor Hirohito. He replied, "I felt unworthy ... it was a matter of luck."

David Halberstam, in his book The Reckoning, described Deming this way:

Among the many things the Japanese liked about Deming was that he lived so modestly. The productivity teams had visited many American cities, and they were often entertained at the rather grand homes of American businessmen. Yet here was, to them, the most important man in America living in an ordinary house. The furniture was simple and the rooms were rather poorly lit, with a certain mustiness to them. That impressed them all the more. Deming's passion was for making better products, or more accurately, for creating a system that could make better products. It was not for making money. He clearly had little interest in material things. He was the kind of American they had always heard about, a spiritual man, not a materialistic one. The Japanese who trekked to see him were aware that he could have profited immensely in those days, selling himself and his services to Japanese companies. The subject just never seemed to come up. There was another way in which he differed from the other Americans they were visiting. The others would lecture them, and the lectures were, however unconsciously, an exercise in power. Deming listened as much as he talked.

Halberstam continued that Deming:

... was often brusque with his fellow countrymen and scornful of them. He hated waste, and felt that America had become a wasteful country, not only of its abundant natural resources but also of its human talents ... He had little tolerance for fools ... specially those who pretended to care about his principles but had no intention of changing their ways.

During the 1980s, there were many authors and journalists who wanted to interview Deming for a book or article. It usually was not the case that the writers wanted to explore with Deming his ideas and their implications for society. Deming was willing to engage in conversation with those truly interested and somewhat aware of his views and theories. If they came to him unprepared, they were subject to what Deming's friend the late Professor David Chambers called "Deming's melt-down technique." I remember one time when an author who was writing a book about the Ford Motor Company had scheduled two hours with Deming. Shortly after the interview started, it was clear to Deming that this person knew nothing about Deming's ideas. For the next two hours, Deming taught this author by a method of interrogation. After the two hours, the interviewer, quite shaken up, said that the interview was over and he was leaving. Deming said not to leave since "now we are ready to talk." The interviewer left, and Deming said to me, "Perhaps I was a little too rough on him."

A Virtuoso in the Art of Living

Virtuoso has the same root in Latin, virtus: strength, as virtue — virtuous, morally excellent, decent, ethical, just, right-minded. A virtuoso is one skilled in the arts and sciences, or having a taste for the fine arts, a master, an authority, educated, with exceptional knowledge, accomplished and distinguished in any intellectual or artistic field of endeavor.

Dr. Deming was a religious and spiritual man who appreciated what human talents can contribute to living. He was a music theorist and composer who expressed his faith through his liturgical music. In his spare time, he rearranged "The Star-Spangled Banner" to make it easier to sing. His daughter, Diana Deming Cahill, told me, "My father played our piano daily. He wrote eight compositions. One uses only the three notes that he and I heard the monks chant at a Tokyo temple."

Composing music and playing the piano weren't the only activities that allowed him to continually navigate between theory and action. "My father was a skilled carpenter. He taught us the proper way to use and handle tools," wrote Diana. Deming's System of Profound Knowledge, as with his music and carpentry, also is a continual movement between the invisible world of theory and its application to the visible world of living.

He saw wisdom for living in scripture and began some chapters of his books directed to management, Out of the Crisis and The New Economics (Second Edition), with a quote from the Bible that characterized the aim of his teaching. One can see his concern with language and communication from these examples:

"Understanding is a wellspring of life unto him that hath it; but the instruction of fools is folly." — Proverbs 16:22 (Out of the Crisis, chapter 8, "Some New Principles of Training and Leadership," p. 248)

"Who is it that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge?" — Job 38:2. (Out of the Crisis, chapter 1, "Chain Reaction," p. 1)

"My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge." — Hosea 4:6 (Out of the Crisis, chapter 3, "Diseases and Obstacles," p. 97)

"A wise man will hold his tongue till he see opportunity: but a babbler and a fool will regard no time." — Ecclesiasticus 20, v. 7 (The New Economics, 2nd ed., chapter 8, "Shewhart and Control Charts," p. 172)