Harvey balls
Graphic symbols used to compare quality / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Harvey balls are round ideograms used for visual communication of qualitative information. They are commonly used in comparison tables to indicate the degree to which a particular item meets a particular criterion.
For example, in a comparison of products, information such as price or weight can be conveyed numerically, and binary information such as the existence or lack of a feature can be conveyed with a check mark; however, information such as "quality" or "safety" or "taste" is often difficult to summarize in a manner allowing easy comparison – thus, Harvey balls are used.
In addition to their use in qualitative comparison, Harvey balls are also commonly used in project management for project tracking; in lean manufacturing for value-stream mapping and continuous improvement tracking; and in business process modeling software for visualisation.[1]
Harvey L. Poppel is generally credited with inventing Harvey balls in the 1970s while working at Booz Allen Hamilton as head of their worldwide IT consulting practice.[2][3]