BeyeNETWORK: Management by Spreadsheet

A highly placed official at a multibillion-dollar organization stated to his staff: “We run our organization on spreadsheets. Finance has their spreadsheet. Engineering has their spreadsheet. Accounting has their spreadsheet. Marketing has their spreadsheet. And we don’t even know what the actual corporate numbers are. Everybody has their own spreadsheet, and no two people have data on their spreadsheet that is in any way related to the data on another person’s spreadsheet. So how do we make decisions around here? We make decisions based on popularity. John is a nice guy and does well at parties, so I think I like his data. Judy, on the other hand, is a gossip. So I don’t like her data. Is this any way to make decisions? We are making decisions of millions of dollars based on spreadsheets that may or may not have some basis in reality!”

BeyeNETWORK: Management by Spreadsheet