William Edwards Deming

William Edwards Deming ( 1900 - 1993 ) was an American statistician whoadvocated the use of closely monitored reports about the state of factory machines tokeep production quality high for the least amount of investment. His system was particularly elegant and effective, in that thenumber of required observations was surprisingly low in order to determine if a machine needed to be adjusted or replaced, or ifan entire batch of product should be discarded or accepted.

Post war Japanese factory owners were the first to adopt Deming's ideas where theywere put to dramatic effect, rapidly turning the Japanese economy around. In the ensuing decades, American manufacturers slowlyjoined the bandwagon, and saw their own production increase as well. The Japanese were so impressed with Deming's genius thattheir industrial association gives out an annual Deming Prize to the individual most responsible for improvements in industrythat year.

Over the course of his career Deming received dozens of academic awards, and upon his death in 1993, the William EdwardsDeming Institute was founded as a think tank in Washington D.C. topromote his ideas.

See also W. Edwards Deming .

External Links

• Deming Institute