Category Archives: Systems

People System

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I nodded. “So, shifting things around inside your system requires that you be alert to the immediate proximity, but also for unintended consequences in a remote part of the system.”

Luke agreed. “It is easy to see when it is a defined step in the system. We can always move things around. But, I saw something else.”

“Pray tell?” I said.

“We have workflow systems,” he started. “In our workflow we can identify discreet steps that are contained. A step starts here, a step ends there. This step impacts that step and impacts another step way over here. But there is another, more complicated system I have to pay attention to. My people system puts players in proximity that have to work together. Working relationships are like steps in a system. If I change a person out, I change the working relationship. A new relationship emerges that starts from scratch and has to be built around these two questions. In this working relationship, what is the accountability for one person to the other person? And, in this working relationship, who has the authority to make what decisions? So, steps in a workflow are easy. People in a workflow, not so much.”

Unintended Consequences

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“I thought we had it fixed,” Luke shook his head. “We had a problem. We solved the problem. We implemented the fix. But, the fix caused two other problems.”

“It’s always something,” I smiled. “What did you just learn?”

“I learned that the steps in our process are not just a sequence of things one after another. The steps have an order, but each step has an impact on things around it.”

“And?” I asked.

“Two things,” Luke replied. “Each step has an impact on the work flow with what immediately precedes and comes after. But, a step might have an impact on something far away, that you cannot see or that you might not connect.”

“So, how do you most effectively make a change in your system?” I wanted to know.

“Obviously, our attention is riveted to the immediate area, but we also have to widen our picture to include the whole system and have metrics at key points that let us see unintended consequences.”

Progress

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“Does it ever end?” Conrad shook his head.

“How so?” I asked.

“First, I was dealing with Joe. Joe was weird. It took me a while to figure Joe out. And, finally, when I did, Fred came on the team. Not only did I have to figure out Fred, but now I had Joe AND Fred to deal with and how they work together. I finally get Joe and Fred in hand, then Sally came along. I have three individuals and six working relationships if you don’t count me.”

“That’s it?”

“No, that’s not it,” Conrad replied. “I now have eight people on the team. We finally figured out the best sequence, created a system in which to do the work. I thought I had it all figured out.”

“So, what happened?”

“We had the system working well, when we determined there was more than one system, lined up side by side. We have a marketing system, a sales system, a project management system, purchasing system, an operations system, quality control system. And, these systems no longer worked independently, they impacted each other with work handoffs and capacity mis-matches.”

“What have you learned, so far?” I wanted to know.

Conrad smiled. “As time goes by, you get to trade in one level of problems for another level of problems.”

“And, that, my friend, is progress.”

Multiple Paths

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“Stop with the frantic heroic efforts,” I said. “That is supervisor strategy. You’re a manager, now. Your strategy is a system focus. Stop working harder and longer and start working smarter. How can you see the work as a system?”

“You mean starting with when we get the work order from sales?” Paula wanted to know.

“That’s the way your team sees the work,” I disagreed. “As the manager, you have a larger scope than the team. You know the work starts way before the team gets it. The work starts back in sales, informal discussions about unsigned contracts in the hopper. Your system has to account for all the anticipated work volume AND the unanticipated variability in the work volume.”

“I can sit in on the sales meeting and get some visibility on projects in the works,” Paula nodded. “But, then what happens when the project gets delayed or completely scuttled?”

“Variability means variable,” I replied. “As the manager, you have to make contingency plans, multiple paths to the goal, anticipate what might happen and be ready to call an audible. A system not only has to account for the same characteristics of every project, but also has to account for the individual nuances that are different about every project.”

Go Find Out

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“So, what you are saying is that I am stuck with the team I have?” Paula floated, uncertain in her conclusion.

“Yeah, pretty much,” I nodded. “Unless you think you should fire them all and do the work by yourself.”

Paula huffed a little sigh. “So, if I am stuck with the team I have, where do I start? I mean, sometimes things get tight out there. We have deadlines and things going wrong. Sometimes, we need extraordinary effort just to get to the end of the day.”

“You seem to think it takes heroic effort to just keep up with the work on the schedule? That if you worked a little harder, or worked a little longer, you could stay above water?” I asked.

“But I can’t,” Paula protested. “I can’t yell at them any more than I already do and I can’t work overtime more than one hour per shift.”

“What if you could dispense with the heroics?” I wanted to know. “What if you could still meet your schedule, but things were dull and boring? What would have to change?”

“Not going to happen,” she put her hands on her hips. “We start the day, then get a priority rush job right off the bat, throws everything off schedule. I mean, if I knew we were going to get a rush job, I could have re-shuffled some of the work, pulled someone off another project. But, I never know.”

“And, why don’t you know?” I asked. “The day before, could you meet with the sales team and find out the unreasonable promises they were making with customers? You are the manager. You have the authority to re-shuffle resources to accommodate a rush order, if you only knew about it. So, get out of your office and go find out.”

Beyond Limits

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“So, you identified a situation that would stress-test your system. Your system is optimized at a certain volume with a standard lead time. Your team has the necessary skills, rhythm and practice to meet the expectations of sales. But, sometimes your system is stressed by the insertion of a large order, additional volume, at an expedited pace, tight timeframe. Your sales department has a sudden interest in this new customer, has overpromised and received your thumbs up, because even you don’t want to disappoint. Your apple cart is about to be turned over. You think if you work harder, dictate some unauthorized overtime, press your team to their limits of exhaustion, that you will be successful.”

Naomi quietly listened, picturing this chain of events. She had seen this before. The pictures in her mind created a simultaneous, imagined tension. Unfortunately, it was a familiar feeling. It was pressure, an undercurrent that occasionally erupted in short tempers, discourteous exchanges in her team, a contemptuous roll of the eyes.

“When all is within limits, things under control, your system within limits, tempers jovial, what could you do with your team, not to operate harder and longer, but differently and more effectively? How could prepare the team to add the occasional variable that leaves the apple cart firmly on its wheels? What can you do today that others won’t, so that tomorrow you can do things that others can’t?”

Utter Disarray

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“But, don’t we ever get to a point where we are finally, once and for all competent?” Naomi turned her head and looked at me sideways.

“Just so, so, but then it changes,” I replied.

“I mean, we have been working on this new workflow for about a year,” she proudly proclaimed. “We shifted things around until we had the right sequence. There is zero idle time between work steps. Our expected output is right in line with our goals. I believe the team, myself included, is now competent in this new workflow. It took us a while to get here, but I think we made the grade.”

“Competence is not judged by looking at the past,” I said. “We think we understand the world that way, but we don’t live in the past, we live in the NOW. And, we live in anticipation of the future. We may have been competent yesterday, but today is a new day, with new challenges, problems and decisions. You believe your team, including yourself, is now competent in your new workflow. Until when? What could change that puts your fine tuned workflow into utter disarray?”

Not a Matter of Counting

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Duncan was temporarily reflective. “Yes, we did get behind on our efficiency project. I guess we do need to start over, collecting our metrics again, to see where we are. I think I can pull somebody off, after their shift to begin the count.”

“Do you really thinking counting is going to get the project back on track?”

“It’s a start,” Duncan shrugged.

“Starting the count is doing. Your efficiency project isn’t off the rails because you stopped counting. Your efficiency project disappeared because of the way you think. In the beginning, you were focused on daily improvement of throughput, finding out why things got stuck in your system, how to expedite an order without gumming up the works. Then, something happened that changed the way you think. You got busy. You may have thought that busy-ness was more important than efficiency. You thought that if you could just get all the projects out the door today, we could get back to our efficiency focus tomorrow. Free beer tomorrow never comes.

“Change the way you think first. When you get busy, think how much more important it is to look at your throughput. It is not a matter of finishing all the orders today, so we can get back to efficiency tomorrow. It is all about a focus on efficiency so we can build our capacity to get everything out the door today. It starts by changing the way that you think.”

What Changed?

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“But, this has worked, over and over for the past ten years. I am not sure why this project failed,” Jordan explained.

“First of all, the idea that originated ten years ago is not the same idea that has worked all along,” I replied. “You have modified and tweaked that idea each time there was a subtle shift in its application.”

Jordan was complaining. In this case, at this time, he would rather complain than consider a new idea he didn’t like.

“Each time you tweaked the idea,” I continued, “the shift was so subtle that you hardly noticed. And, your idea worked until it didn’t. Something has changed. Something has changed internally, externally or both. What was it?”

Little Boxes All Look the Same

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Most companies read all the books and hire all the best consultants so they can pursue the path to be the best. When I visit the offices of most CEOS, they have the same books on the shelf, the same slogans on the wall. It looks like a desperate attempt to be be as good as everyone else.

Your company can’t be high performing AND be like everyone else. To be a high performing company, you have to be different. What are the important differences between high performing and everyone else? What are the important differences that matter?