The Tyranny of Metrics

Why this matters here

Jerry Muller’s The Tyranny of Metrics argues that overreliance on quantified performance can distort judgment—what is easy to count crowds out weaker but consequential signals, and gaming the measure replaces the underlying purpose. How Serious Systems Learn uses that trap for loop collapse: evidence outside the instrumented frame loses legitimacy even when local teams can still see breakdown. Muller critiques metric fixation across institutions; the book asks when measurement discipline improves while corrective learning stalls at the boundary of what is reportable.