Anthony Stafford Beer

“The system of transportation is not coherent; it is not treated as integral. Roads compete with railroads and airlines in chaotic fashion, and at immense cost to the nation.”

“Clearly, if it is possible to have a self-regulating system that implicitly arranges its own stability, then this is of the keenest management interest.”

“The problem with managing either a business or a prison by periodic rather than continuous inspection is that the "variables" are likely to be seriously out of control before the discrepancy is noted.”

“The development of the Watt governor for steam engines, which adapted the power output of the engine automatically to the load by means of feedback, consolidated the first Industrial Revolution.”

“Management problems are not respecters of the company organization, nor of the talents of the people appointed to solve them.”

“It is terribly important to appreciate that some things remain obscure to the bitter end.”

“A slowly moving queue does not move uniformly. Rather, waves of motion pass down the queue. The frequency and amplitude of these waves is inversely related to the speed at which the queue is served.”

“The whole picture is complicated by the stockists and merchants who will try to exploit any shortages that may appear.The result is this. The feedback information from the industry's environment consists, first and foremost, of a forward order load. Much of this "demand for steel" will be bogus.”

“Certain management policies-stretching of credit resources, for example-may lead to great progress in good conditions; but, like the Grand Prix car in comparison with the Land Rover, they may not be robust enough to survive when the going gets tough.”

“There is, then, a logical priority about the arrangements, and logic has nothing to do with time.”

“The aim of management science is to display the best course of action in a given set of circumstances, and this must include all the circumstances.”

“A stochastic process is about the results of convolving probabilities-which is just what management is about, as well.”

“It is the concept of likelihood that a real understanding of probability resides, and we must learn how to measure it.”

“According to the science of cybernetics, which deals with the topic of control in every kind of system (mechanical, electronic, biological, human, economic, and so on), there is a natural law that governs the capacity of a control system to work. It says that the control must be capable of generating as much "variety" as the situation to be controlled.”

“The strategies that managers employ are at least as important as the facilities at their disposal.”

“Too close a view may interfere with one's grasp of an overall problem or concept”

“Policy-making, decision-taking, and control: These are the three functions of management that have intellectual content.”

“Hence we may recognize the subject of management cybernetics — which is seen as a rich provider of models for doing OR.”

“If cybernetics is the science of control, management is the profession of control”

“{{w|The purpose of a system is what it does}}. There is after all, no point in claiming that the purpose of a system is to do what it constantly fails to do.”