Quantity is the Best Quality

You may have heard the story of the pottery class experiment on quantity versus quality? Or maybe the version using a photography class example? In both stories the lesson was the same; quantity beats quality.

In the pottery class version of the story the class was divided into two groups. One group would be graded on quality, the other on quantity. The pottery produced by the quantity group would be weighed. 50lbs for an A, 40lbs for a B, and so on. The quality group would make and turn in only one piece. The better the piece, the higher the grade. It turns out the best pottery came from the quantity group. The volumes of pottery produced allowed this group of students to iterate and learn from their mistakes. The group focused on quality was left with little more than theories on how to make great pottery, and crappy pieces to show for it.

The story was retold in Atomic Habits by James Clear. This version of the story took place in a photography class. One group of students would be graded on the quality of a single photograph. The quantity group would be graded on how many photographs they turned in. Like the pottery story, the best photographs came from the quantity group. Those students had the opportunity to iterate and learn. And in this version, the quality group was left mostly with theories on what makes a good photograph and a crappy photographs.

In another version of the pottery example, the students held a contest at the end of the class where judges ranked the top three pieces. According to this version, the top three pieces all came from the quantity group. I don’t know if either versions of our quantity versus quality stories are true, but at the end of the day you can sit around theorizing, or you can get out there and do stuff.