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Showing posts from January, 2013

Measurement: Bill Gates’ Plan to Fix the World’s Problems

Bill Gates: My Plan To Fix the World’s Biggest Problems** Measure Them!   This is the headline of the lead article in the Review section of the weekend edition of the Wall Street Journal   written by Bill Gates, co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and co-founder of Microsoft.      The article was accompanied by a large picture of transparent globe wrapped by a tape measure covering most of the first page of the section.   Its message is the theme of Made2Measure. Because it comes from Bill Gates, we tend to listen. “In the past year,” Gates writes, “I have been struck by how important measurement is to improving the human condition. You can achieve incredible progress if you set a clear goal and find a measure that will drive progress toward that goal .. .This may seem basic, but it is amazing how often it is not done and how hard it is to get right.” He writes specifically about foreign aid among other areas like education, health care and agriculture .   “Histo