Top 25 W. Edwards Deming Quotes

Words matter. These are the best W. Edwards Deming Quotes, and they’re great for sharing with your friends.

When a system is stable, telling the worker about mista

When a system is stable, telling the worker about mistakes is only tampering.
W. Edwards Deming
Lack of knowledge… that is the problem.
W. Edwards Deming
It is not necessary to change. Survival is not mandatory.
W. Edwards Deming
The prevailing system of management has crushed fun out of the workplace.
W. Edwards Deming
Whenever there is fear, you will get wrong figures.
W. Edwards Deming
The prevailing – and foolish – attitude is that a good manager can be a good manager anywhere, with no special knowledge of the production process he’s managing. A man with a financial background may know nothing about manufacturing shoes or cars, but he’s put in charge anyway.
W. Edwards Deming
You should not ask questions without knowledge.
W. Edwards Deming
In 1945, the world was in a shambles. American companies had no competition. So nobody really thought much about quality. Why should they? The world bought everything America produced. It was a prescription for disaster.
W. Edwards Deming
‘Quality’ means what will sell and do a customer some good – at least try to.
W. Edwards Deming
I predicted in 1950 that in five years, manufacturers the world over would be screaming for protection. It took only four years.
W. Edwards Deming
Rational behavior requires theory. Reactive behavior requires only reflex action.
W. Edwards Deming
The average American worker has fifty interruptions a day, of which seventy percent have nothing to do with work.
W. Edwards Deming
Profit in business comes from repeat customers, customers that boast about your project or service, and that bring friends with them.
W. Edwards Deming
If you can’t describe what you are doing as a process, you don’t know what you’re doing.
W. Edwards Deming
It is not enough to do your best; you must know what to do, and then do your best.
W. Edwards Deming
We are here to make another world.
W. Edwards Deming
American management thinks that they can just copy from Japan. But they don’t know what to copy.
W. Edwards Deming
The big problems are where people don’t realise they have one in the first place.
W. Edwards Deming
Quality is everyone’s responsibility.
W. Edwards Deming
No one knows the cost of a defective product – don’t tell me you do. You know the cost of replacing it, but not the cost of a dissatisfied customer.
W. Edwards Deming
My mother was my biggest role model. She taught me to hate waste. We never wasted anything.
W. Edwards Deming
Learning is not compulsory… neither is survival.
W. Edwards Deming
Any manager can do well in an expanding market.
W. Edwards Deming
Declining productivity and quality means your unit production costs stay high but you don’t have as much to sell. Your workers don’t want to be paid less, so to maintain profits, you increase your prices. That’s inflation.
W. Edwards Deming
I am forever learning and changing.
W. Edwards Deming