Lonnie had been working hard to change the way his team responded to problems on the manufacturing floor.
“I keep telling them that we need to be proactive,” he said. Lonnie wasn’t defensive, but you could tell he wasn’t having any fun.
“So, tell me what happens?” I asked.
Lonnie shook his head. “It’s just day after day. The problems jump up. You know, it’s not like we don’t have a clue. We know what problems customers are going to have. Heck, we even know which customers are going to call us. We just don’t ever get ahead of the curve.”
“Lonnie, being reactive is easy. It doesn’t require any advance thinking, or planning, or anticipating. Being reactive just happens.
“Being proactive, however, requires an enormous amount of conscious thinking. It doesn’t just happen. You have to make it happen. You have to make it happen by design.
“At the beginning of the day, I want you to gather your team together. Show them a list of the work you are doing for the day and for which customers. Then ask these two questions.
What could go wrong today?
What can we do to prevent that from going wrong?
Lonnie smiled. “That’s it?” he asked.
“That’s it.” -TF
No offense intended, but won’t it be even more effective to gather the team todether each morning and say what could be outstanding today for our customers and create some scenarios on how to make that happen? Using a positive pro active approach to the day and how we best serve our clients. I’d rather my team focus on what one thing if done today could move theor objective forward and focus on gettting that accomplished. It’s just a thought, and my opinion that a positive approach always brings with it solutions to what can be rather than fear of what could happen. T Suits
Trudy,
I like the way you think. Those two questions are actually extracted from a larger coaching model. The larger model asks three additional questions. Here are all five questions (intended to be used “before the game.”)
1. What do we expect?
2. What do we do well?
3. What could go wrong?
4. What can we do now to prevent that from going wrong?
5. When will we meet again?
I was introduced to this model by a group of firefighters who used these same questions, both before and after a fire. Perhaps the model makes more sense when you understand its original context.