I had a conversation recently with someone in a senior position within his department. He was lamenting, yet accepting, that his job kept him very busy (60-80 hours a week). I casually asked what work they were doing, and quickly noticed some circularity of reasoning that, if further explored, might have been able to reveal [...]
Change Management and the 5S Framework
July 12, 2010 By 7 Comments
A couple weeks ago, I wrote a post about Rube Goldberg Leadership, in which I related management and leadership practices to the 7 Wastes concept found in Lean thinking. That proved to be a fairly popular post by my modest standards, so I thought I’d take another swing at relating some more intangible activities to [...]
The Problem is Knowing What the Problem is.
June 21, 2010 By 2 Comments
Often, when talking to managers about some challenge they are facing, I’ll get a brief history of what they are dealing with, including what was done by the last manger(s) and what inititaive(s) were tried in the past, with little or no success. Sometimes, they’ll even go on at length about exactly what was done, [...]
Positive Deviance: Transformation’s Fuel?
June 18, 2010 By 8 Comments
I Attended a presentation tonight from the Positive Deviance Initiative. According to their website: The Positive Deviance Initiative (PDI) is a network organization which is dedicated to amplifying the use of the Positive Deviance (PD) approach to enable communities worldwide to solve seemingly “intractable” problems which require behavioral and social change. While most of the [...]
Embracing the New Fear
June 14, 2010 By 1 Comment
Inefficient Problem Solving: Doing Something Doesn’t Mean Doing Anything.
June 4, 2010 By 4 Comments
When the answer to a problem doesn’t present itself immediately, taking the spray-and-pray approach can be disastrous. In such instances, people are usually more concerned with looking like they are doing something, so they simply get busy doing anything. Studying the problem is, in many cases, not allowed due to the need to appear busy. When people are busy doing anything, they are focusing their energies away from identifying the root cause and creating long-term, sustainable solutions. [Read more]
Best of MFP: To All Employees: Get up and Get out
May 27, 2010 By 13 Comments
On three separate occasions throughout my career, I’ve had my boss tell me: 1) That I produced more work, more quickly, than they had expected, however, 2) I seemed to spend a lot of time away from my desk. Despite my productivity, I was chastised for being “too chatty” or “spending too much time talking [...]
Best of MFP: Leadership: Not for Followers.
May 24, 2010 By 5 Comments
Are those who are labeled “Leaders” truly leaders, or do they follow? There are many people in leadership positions, who have achieved that rank through their ability to implement their superiors’ decisions. In the act of doing so, these people demonstrate their ability to do what is required of them, and do it well. It’s [...]
Focus on the Problem: Your Customer is a Lens
May 20, 2010 By Leave a Comment
“Focus on the customer” might be an overused phrase. It also might be entirely wrong. At the very least, it’s inaccurate. Consider this familiar, but still powerful, example: You work in a hardware store. One day, Bill comes in and indicates he wants a drill. What does Bill need? You might be tempted to say [...]
Operations, Change, Innovation, Strategy, Culture and Waste: How it All Fits Together
May 13, 2010 By 4 Comments
There are limitless writings on each of these topics. Obviously, each one contributes to the degree of success, or failure, an organization experiences, but how do they all fit together? Each one has an affect on the others, but how can this dynamic be represented? My answer is that each of these elements can be [...]
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