“gemba walk” (lean thinking term) to go to the actual place where value is added + “walkabout” (Australian aborigine) a short period of wandering bush life engaged as an occasional interruption of regular work
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Operational excellence cannot be achieved through top-down directives or piecemeal implementation of tools. Something more is required. The Shingo Model for Operational Excellence appears to be one of the best approaches available. It has two elements: 1) the “house” (the principles, the “what”), and 2) the “diamond” (the method, the “how”). The “who” is everyone, beginning with top management. Achieving operational excellence requires a widespread commitment throughout the organization to execute according to the principles of operational excellence. I’m going to describe my understanding of the 10 guiding principles (described in the house element) two at a time and also describe how top management might use these to transform culture using the diamond element of the model.
At the base of the house you find the categorical element of cultural enablers. There are two guiding principles - Lead with Humility and Respect Every Individual. Here’s my understanding of these principles.
Lead With Humility
Humility is an enabling principle that precedes learning and improvement. A manager must be willing to seek input, listen carefully, and continuously learn. He (or she) does not know it all and readily admits that. In an environment where the manager leads with humility, people feel respected and energized and will more likely give freely of their creative abilities.
Dr. Deming saw this when he worked with Japanese leadership beginning in the 1950s. He saw that a Japanese man was never too old to learn. He learned something new from everyone, and this is how Dr. Deming made you feel when he spoke with you one on one. He was learning from you, not the other way around. At the end of each day he would retrieve scraps of paper from his pockets. On the paper were notes he had taken during the day, things he had learned. I once heard him exclaim, “look at all that I have learned today!”
I recently had the good fortune to hear a presentation by Dwight Davis, Associate Vice President at Utah State University on the topic of “leading with humility”. Mr. Davis said, “Humility is a key element in building teams, unifying organizations, unleashing employee capabilities, optimizing relationships, designing systems of accountability and achieving a culture of discipline. Humility simply enables individual and organizational learning and improvement.”
To describe what humility looks like, Mr. Davis shared a video clip from a girls college softball team in central Washington. Here’s the link to the clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEDBnKahuNs In his opinion, and in mine, the story is a good example of humility on the part of the two girls from the opposing team.
Some other quotes related to leading with humility:
“The full test of a really great man is humility.” - John Ruskin
“Humility is certified to in the process of time. It comes by experience, sometimes painful.”
“Humility means thinking less about yourself, not less of yourself.”
“The most important part of leader standard work is to learn every day. The first step to learning is to admit that you do not know it all.”
“Humility is the root of synergy.”
“You cannot have a perfect day without doing something for someone who will never be able to repay you.” - John Wooden
Respect Every Individual
The choice of wording is important. ”Respect for people” (as a group) is not sufficient. Respect must be something that must be felt by every person in the organization. It also means respect for all individuals in all categories of stakeholders, and in the community that is served. Respect is only a slogan unless leadership takes seriously its responsibilities in protecting both the environment and the health and safety of all of the organization’s stakeholders.
I like to read and re-read the series of REAL LEAN books written by Bob Emiliani. In these books, Bob points out that “respecting every individual” is one key and critical ingredient that is missing in the approach taken by many who say they are practicing lean. His term for what they are doing is “fake lean” and I think that’s about right. For these managers, they see lean as a tool for achieving short term achievements, often at the expense of individuals.
Dr. Deming’s 14 Points for management are the natural conclusions from an understanding of what he called the “system of profound knowledge”. This system -appreciation for a system, understanding variation, psychology and theory of knowledge, supports the principle of “respect every individual” in several ways. I see a strong connection between “understanding variation”, “appreciation for a system” and “psychology” in this regard. Some people consider Dr. Deming’s work on understanding the difference between common causes and special causes of variation to apply to understanding how to improve a process that has measurable results. However the most important application has to do with the management of people. Respecting every individual means stepping back and looking at why people behave the way they do. Are they part of a common cause system? Is it a special cause? What is due to the system that they are reacting to and what might be due to the actions of the individual. In my experience, people react rationally to the system they are in. When we attribute causes to the individual, when if fact they are due to the individual/system interaction, we are not truly respecting every individual.
Supporting Principles
There are four supporting principles related to these two guiding principles:
Nurture long-term relationships - I think of Dr. Deming’s advice about supplier relationships, developed on trust, for the long haul, not on short-term price alone
Develop people - Through people development, the organization creates the “new scientists” that will drive the future improvements.
Empower and involve everyone - When improvement efforts are limited to management and a few key personnel, improvement opportunities for the organization are limited.
How does this relate to the “how”? - the Diamond Element
I’ll trace my understanding of how this works to affect and transform the culture in an organization. When individual leaders (top management) in an organization think in terms of the guiding principles of “respect for every individual” and “lead with humility”, they will design systems that are far different than managers who are not guided by these principles. For instance, their idea generation and testing system would be much more than a suggestion box in the cafeteria, or questions asked of employees once per year in an engagement survey.
The tools they would select would be used to enable the systems they designed which, in turn would drive an organizational focus on the principles. The tools would be used to achieve results (such as ideas tested and implemented), and the results would be used to refine how the tools would be used - Plan, Do, Study, Act. The results that are achieved would affirm the guiding principles, which would drive a focus on the results.
Over time and through the application of the guiding principles, the culture will change to one that achieves operational excellence. Culture is the sum of the behaviors that are exhibited in the organization (from the board room to the patient bedside). Two things drive behaviors: 1) systems and 2) what is measured.
Here’s another example. I once stayed at a hotel in Seattle and when I checked in I noticed some printed materials at the desk describing the hotel’s commitment to the environment and the options that hotel guests had to participate in the effort (these printed materials were tools - part of a larger system). When I got to my room, there was a card on the door that I could use to signal to the housekeeping staff if I chose not to have towels or linens exchanged (another tool). At the end of the day, the housekeeping staff had left a coupon that I could exchange for something to eat or drink in the hotel cafe since I had made the “correct” choice of not requiring clean towels or linens (yet another tool). These tools comprised a system that was intended to drive my behavior. I believe the system was designed using the principle of “respect for every individual” (respect for the environment which affects us all). I am guessing that the hotel gathered data from this system and looked at the results and made adjustments to the tools (and therefore the system) as necessary. Plan, Do, Study, Act.
Guiding principles are universal truths. They are like the laws of physics, like gravity. They govern the consequences of those who understand them and of those who do not. Managers who do not follow the principles of “respect for every individual” and “lead with humility” suffer the consequences in terms of the results they get and the culture they design - intentionally or unintentionally. For instance, they may find that their employees are not engaged, or middle management is not “on board”, or they use terms such as “get the right people on the bus”. The culture they have (exhibited by the behaviors they see) is a direct result of the systems that they designed (or allowed to prevail) which are a direct result of the principles they use.
If management wants better culture and better results, they need to understand and apply the guiding principles of “lead with humility” and “respect for every individual”. It’s that simple, and that hard. To understand and apply these guiding principles means letting go of practices in the past. Letting go of the incorrect notions we have been taught in management schools, by well-meaning managers who came before us (who were only doing their best) is what I believe Dr. Deming meant when he described the “transformation of management”.
In his 1993 book, The New Economics for Industry, Government and Education, Dr. Deming writes, “Once the individual understands the system of profound knowledge, he will apply its principles in every kind of relationship with other people. He will have a basis for judgement of his own decisions and for transformation of the organizations that he belongs to. The individual, once transformed, will: set an example; be a good listener, but will not compromise; continually teach other people; and help people to pull away from their current practices and beliefs and move into the new philosophy without a feeling of guilt about the past.”
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