I see TBM's quoting Tommy Monson all the time on facebook but then I later find out it wasn't a tommy original. Do you think Tommy stole this quote from somewhere else. It's from preach my gospel.

"When performance is measured, performance improves. When performance is measured and reported, the rate of improvement accelerates." (Thomas S. Monson)

If you know anything about it that would be great.

I doubt that it was his, but the leadership was spraying it all over us several years ago in a televised leadership meeting that was aimed at improving the Home Teaching stats. Soon it appeared on all manner of handouts and chalkboards. It was just before the "new paradigm" buzzword was used ad Nauseum.

So then, who does the measuring? I support self-government and self measurement.

When you report on your HomeTeaching to the EldersQ Pres, or to you HP Group Leader they report it to the Bishop.

Then it is reported back in Priesthood meeting that only a certain percentage was done.

Haha, Google it. Be sure to use the quotes. :-)

And it does get attributed to Monson on several sites.

Tom seems to have a lot of experience in business, including degrees in business.

I know, isn't it uncanny. I was surprised at the number and types of sites and papers that quoted him as the original author. Paul Dunn makes up stories as a story teller, Tommy Monson plagiarizes business principles as a businessman.

Software engineering has been struggling with the implementation and management of the process improvement crap for twenty years. Over emphasis most often does not improve in the direction you want, it causes behavior changes that give you the numbers you are looking for. It is very tough to measure something without changing the thing you are measuring. Physicists say it is impossible.

I heard it all the time through various jobs I've worked at.

"That which is measured improves. That which is measured and reported improves exponentially."
Karl Pearson 1857-1936

I've heard it as "Pearson's law" before but Monson seems to own the quote now by changing it just a little.

Supposedly Lord Kelvin (as in the scientist) said,
"If you can not measure it, you can not improve it."

It is an old business adage. I'm sure there are lots of variants of it out there.

FIRST OF ALL: Eliminate slogans, exhortations, and targets for the work force that are essentially asking for zero defects and new levels of productivity. Such exhortations only create adversarial relationships, as the bulk of the causes of low quality and low productivity belong to the system of operations and thus lie outside the power of the work force to correct.



PAY HEED LITTLE TOMMY:

Eliminate work standards (quotas) on the factory floor. Qoutas are a very poor substitute for actual leadership.



AND HERE IS WHERE THE "CULT" MASQUERADING AS A CORPORATION MANIFESTS ITS GREATEST FAILING AS A REAL BUSINESS.

Eliminate management by objective. Eliminate management by numbers, numerical goals. Substitute leadership.

Sincerely yours,
W.E.Deming

HE IS talking about Viagara.

Thanks for all the info.

Just an update on this. The reason for this is my facebook friend was asking if it would be ok to put this quote in a report for school.

So under her facebook status I posted the Pearson quote and said it would work well with her report.

I wonder what she will say when she sees this quote is not a tommy original.

I know this is a little after the fact, but the Oct 1970 Conference Report for the LDS church (page 107) reads: "A cardinal principle of industrial management teaches: 'When performance is measured...'

So yes, Thomas Monson said it, but he was quoting the principle (most likely based on Karl Pearson's quote)

Well said, Scott. It's not plagiarism when you make reference to an old business adage (of which there are several variations).

TSM has an MBA and no doubt studied performance management as part of that degree.

Presumably quoting a principle first coined by Carl Pearson, later known as Karl Pearson (1857–1936) an English academic.

Trouble is that the church likes to make it appear as though this were a 'revelation' TSM received. The quote by TSM was printed and widely distributed to stake presidents in the 1980s/90s along with a free copy of the book "7 Habits of Highly Successful People".

Here's where he originally said it. http://scriptures.byu.edu/gettalk.php?ID=1811

He quoted someone else, not at all saying it was his statement. He's been misquoted from there as his statement. Oops.

Although, he did say it that way. So I think the concept is certainly not his, but those words are. I take back my oops.

"Numbers provide the illusion of reality." Eliot Eisner, Stanford University.

Mormons and their trite wanna-be platitudes.

IE, the dumb quotes that don't have much thought behind them, other than to give Mormons the warm fuzzy's to make them perk up, "Oh it's so true."

Puke

A cardinal principle of industrial management teaches: "When performance is measured, performance improves. When performance is measured and reported, the rate of improvement accelerates."

https://archive.org/details/conferencereport1970sa

Conference Report April 1970 p. 107