How many times did you asked for a quantitative measure to an expert and got a response like:

It depends: [business, medicine, law, politics... or any other subject] is not an exact science!

Disappointing! You are spending your time (an possibly your money) with somebody with large expertise on a subject and get absolutely no information!

If you hate such a response this book is for you. If you already gave that response to somebody this book is for you too!

How to Measure Anything

by Douglas W. Hubbard

The book teaches you how to measure, estimate and assess intangible and uncertain values. Hubbard does that by applying well founded statistics and probability concepts in a simple, understandable way with practical examples of real situations.

The book requires no mathematical background and explains, using a captivating style many quantitative techniques like bayesian analysis, risk theory, Monte Carlo method, just to cite a few.

Hubbard keeps its promise: after reading it you will be able to apply those techniques to assign measures and values to things that you have always considered “unmeasurable”.

But, even if you have a math background and already know all those techniques, this book still provides a tremendous value: it helps you to reformulate your questions as a path of plain, simpler questions guess the measure you need. Next time you get an “It depends” response you will be able to drive the expert up to supplying the information you need.

This is a book that every decision maker shall read!