If you were to pick one basic of performance excellence at which most organizations stink, it would have to be management by fact. I remember Curt Reimann, former head of the Baldrige program, saying that the measurement Category consistently produced the weakest responses. We think we know what’s going on, but when you look for facts to support our thinking, you often come up empty.

Peter Senge called this a “leap of abstraction.” “Leaps of abstraction occur when we move from direct observations to generalizations without testing,” he wrote in The Fifth Discipline (Broadway Business, 2006). You are making a leap of abstraction if:

• You assume you know exactly what your customers require but have never formally asked them or checked your assumptions with them
• You make the same assumptions about your employees
• You fix a problem without identifying the source of the problem or measuring the process
• You blame people for mistakes without understanding the system or measuring the process
• You develop a strategy with little knowledge of competitors, the market, risks, or internal capabilities
• You grab a popular new program in the hope that it might turn your organization around

Most leaders and managers are so used to mistaking leaps of abstraction for truth that they feel very comfortable with their view of their organization. Asked to support that view with information and data, they tell stories. Pressed for proof, they point out that it’s their job to know. Suggest that they are managing by assumption rather than fact and they claim their assumptions are the facts.

How do you know if you’re making leaps of abstraction? First, according to Senge, ask yourself “what you believe about the way the world works—the nature of business, people in general, and specific individuals. Ask ‘What is the data on which this generalization is based?’ Then ask yourself, ‘Am I willing to consider that this generalization may be inaccurate or misleading?’ It is important to ask this last question consciously because, if the answer is no, there is no point in proceeding.”

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