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There's a big difference between something being discernable and something being measurable. For instance -- suppose you join a company and you can tell the culture is messed up from day 1. You go to the CEO and tell them as much. Should they ask: "can you prove it? where's the data?" or should they say: "tell me more, help me understand."

.. Obviously the latter. If you can perceive it, it's a valid belief. Obviously it is _somewhat_ subjective, but even subjective things can be true, and from someone with good judgment, they usually are. You probably don't need to go run a survey or something to prove it -- just make a convincing case, in words.

Every case is like this one. You can make changes and see that you've had an impact without ever getting distracted by finding a way to put it into numbers, quantification, and measurement.



So you make a change to the culture - did it help? What does help mean here? Happier staff, better retention?

> You can make changes and see that you've had an impact

Well the obvious counter here is how do you see you've had an impact when the impact is so hard to measure?

> You probably don't need to go run a survey or something to prove it -- just make a convincing case, in words.

And yet I've seen the huge issue of wordsmiths with nothing to back it up with taking over and ruining teams.


This is all hypothetical, but suppose it makes for happier staff. Do you think you can best discern the happiness of the staff by.. sending out a survey? Or maybe you'd be able to tell by the feeling of the room in the cafeteria, or the tone of your conversations, or the enthusiasm they seem to show at their jobs, or the messages they send you?




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