Re: Why Penn CISO's Firing is Bad for All of Us

[Rich Kulawiec <rsk () gsp org>]

On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 03:00:42PM +1300, Nick FitzGerald wrote:
> Sounds to me like an engineer's take on George Bernard Shaw's famous 
> lament on progress:

It does, and I keep that quote just as handy.

Let me share one other with you, one that I find quite useful almost
every day:

        The first step is to measure whatever can be easily measured.
        That is okay as far as it goes.  The second step is to disregard
        that which can't be measured or give it an arbitrary quantitative
        value.  This is artificial and misleading.  The third step is
        to presume that what can't be measured easily really isn't very
        important.  This is blindness.  The fourth step is to say that
        what can't be easily measured doesn't exist.  This is suicide.

        --- social scientist Daniel Yankelovich describes the "McNamara
        fallacy".  Quoted by Jay Harris, former publisher of the San Jose
        Mercury News, in a speech explaining why he resigned his post.
        [http://www.poynter.org/centerpiece/harris.htm]

---Rsk
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