A book about finding the value of intangibles in business by Douglas W. Hubbard

Worth the Read?

“When dealing with numerical data, approximately right is better than precisely wrong.”

Carl G Thor

My rating of this book is not based on the quality of its writing or content but rather on how practical and valuable it has been in my life. Not an easy read.

It’s a great book, but it may not be worth the time if you aren’t struggling with the problem it addresses.

March 22, 2024

Reflections and Random Thoughts

One of the first things that came up for me was that not only do “big companies” not know how to measure, but they don’t even try! And here I thought it was just me that couldn’t figure things out.

Insights

Key Take-Aways

Measurements inform decisions. Decisions always have some level of uncertainty. Reducing the amount of uncertainty is the point.

Value of Measurement Matters. If you don’t compute the value of measurements, you are probably measuring the wrong things the wrong way.

Step one: Determine what you already know … even when you think you know nothing

Something Actionable

Review what I’m measuring, i.e., KPI, and consider the value of the measurement. Stop measuring the low-value measurements.

Keep a list of the decisions I’m trying to make.

What Everyone Else Thinks

In any case, I’m reading the 3rd Edition. It was initially published in 1962. It has 563 reviews on Amazon (in Jan of 2025) and a rating of 4.5 but only 3.9 on Good Reads with over 3600 ratings and 257 reviews. You can read the Amazon reviews here, and the Goodread reviews here.

Many of the poor reviews complain about the difficulty of reading the book and too much repetition. And, as usual, the folks who complain about the physical quality of the book they received.