Category Archives: Systems

Proud of the Chaos

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“How do you involve Edmund in the decision making about solving the problem?” I asked.

“As soon as we have the project specs,” Ruben explained, “when we know the outputs and the deadlines, we call a meeting. Edmund is the supervisor, so once we get into production, he is the one to call the shots. So, he is there, at the meeting. He sees all the elements we see, he just cannot connect them together.”

“And?”

“We have developed a very thorough system that identifies the constraints and keeps them productive. The metrics are easy to follow and the system makes our throughput very predictable. But Edmund fights the system, ignores the system and almost weekly causes a production snafu that could have been prevented.”

“How does he explain the snafu?”

“Usually he manages to jump in and pull the project out of the fire, but not without some overtime and not without putting the project in jeopardy. It’s almost like he is proud of the chaos and being the hero.”

Resistant

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“He resists everything,” Ruben explained. “We cover the same solutions to the same problems. At the time, Edmund finally agrees, but I sense, he agrees only because he can’t argue the logic. He goes along with the solution, but two weeks later, the same problem pops up and we start all over again.”

“So, you have to step in and it takes up your time?” I asked.

“Worse than that. It’s almost underhanded. Behind the scenes, it’s like he wants the solution to fail. He doesn’t openly sabotage the new method, and I haven’t caught him bad-mouthing the process. Sometimes, it’s just the way he rolls his eyes in the meeting.”

It’s Your Committee

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From the Ask Tom mailbag:

Question:

I need to design an SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) for procurement of goods and services and inventory management.

We have the Factory Manager and the Purchasing Manager who are more interested in establishing their supremacy.

We need to design a clear cut process that supports our systems.

Response:

The Factory Manager and the Purchasing Manager are only doing what you told them to do. The Factory Manager is to produce a high quality product as efficiently and profitably as possible. The Purchasing Manager is to purchase raw materials and services that meet the minimum specification at the lowest possible cost.

Sometimes those agendas are in conflict. This is actually normal.

However, it is your responsibility to integrate these two agendas, meet their essential requirements and orchestrate the solutions where there are differences.

  1. Convene a committee. Make it clear that it is YOUR committee and that while you are asking for input and analysis, YOU will make the final decisions as to what will be included or excluded from the SOP.
  2. The committee will contain three or five individuals. The Factory Manager, the Purchasing Manager and an additional Administrative Manager at their level. If the Factory Manager and the Purchasing Manager each need an assistant, then you have five on the committee.
  3. The Factory Manager and the Purchasing Manager will be tasked with separately creating a list of requirements and submitting them at a meeting (without you) to be conducted by the Administrative Manager. The Administrative Manager will be tasked with collecting those requirements, holding a discussion and writing the first draft of the SOP.
  4. You will review the first draft and submit your written comments back to the committee so the Administrative Manager can complete the final draft.
  5. You convene a meeting to congratulate the team for producing the SOP.
  6. Schedule a review meeting for 90 days to review how the SOP has worked and solicit input for additional changes. The SOP should be calendared for review every 6-12 months.

Keep us updated. -TF

Not the Time to be a Superhero

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“You have two out of five manager positions in place on a daily basis, so when you have a problem, you think you are fixing it when you are NOT fixing it,” I offered.

“What do you mean?” Derrick asked.

“When you have a problem, you think you are fixing it. In fact, you have a supervisor in play to make sure the problem gets fixed.”

“So, the problem is fixed,” Derrick insisted.

“No, the problem is fixed, but the system is still broken. You are missing three of five Managers, so you are not paying proper attention to your systems.

“You see, Derrick, when you have a problem, everyone scrambles to fix the problem. Even experienced Managers put on their superhero cape and leap in front of their biggest customer to save the day.

“What they need to focus on,” I continued, “is not the problem. They need to focus on the system. Why didn’t the system prevent that problem? Or at least mitigate the damage from the problem? Their role is NOT to fix the problem, but to fix the system.” -TF

Predictability and System

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“I understand how we calculate profit, but what does that have to do with my organizational chart?” Derrick asked.

“You design a predictable profit into your price, but what is it that keeps your profit predictable when you actually deliver your product or service?” I replied.

Derrick was thinking. “It becomes predictable when we are able to do the same thing over and over, the same way, with the same methods, in the same amount of time, with the same amount of scrap.”

“And how do you make all that happen over and over?”

“Well, we have designed a system and we train everyone to work the system.”

“And so, if something is happening with the predictability of your profit, what’s wrong, where do you look?” I continued.

“Something has to be wrong with the system,” Derrick nodded.

“So, where do you look?” I insisted.

“We should try to find out what’s wrong with the system.”

“Remember, I said that your problem is seldom a what, almost always a who?”

Derrick grinned. “So, that’s why you want to look at the org chart.”

People System

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Kristen put away the psychological profile. “Okay, you’re not going to look at this. You want a job description. But I can’t just write a job description, you really want a system?”

“Yes, a system,” I replied. “Take these elements, put each element into a circle, then put arrows between each circle. You may add and take away elements. This picture will represent your system.

  • The work
  • Roles doing the work
  • Roles making sure the work gets done
  • Job description for each role, broken into Key Result Areas, including tasks, goals and time span
  • Ten questions specific to each Key Result Area (6 Key Result Areas = 60 written questions)
  • Job posting
  • Resume review
  • Screening phone calls
  • Telephone interviews
  • Face to Face interviews
  • Skills Testing
  • Selection Matrix
  • Reference checks
  • Background checks
  • Offer (contingent)
  • Drug Testing
  • Offer (confirmation)
  • Orientation
  • Training
  • Productive work
  • Assessment
  • Training (more)
  • Career pathing

“Tweak your system, work your system.” -TF

Far Down the Urgency Scale

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“You are right,” Kristen relented. “I really am too busy. My priorities are focused on short term fires. I feel like all I do, all day long, gets consumed with management issues and keeping people motivated. I don’t have time to work on basic stuff like writing job descriptions. When I look at doing that, it is so far down my urgency scale, I almost think writing a job description is silly.”

“What would be the payoff?” I asked.

“The payoff? I can’t even think about the payoff. I could write a job description and then I would have a job description, but I would be further behind dealing with all the crap,” she explained.

“Kristen, you are not unlike most managers,” I nodded. “If you could truly focus on getting the right people, most of the crap you deal with would largely go away.

“Stop working on crap and start working on systems. Your life will only improve when you start working on systems.” -TF

The People System

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From the Ask Tom mailbag:

Question:
You have talked about Managers and systems. And you’ve described the most important system for a Manager as the People System. What’s inside that system?

Response:
There are three primary accountabilities for any Manager.

  • First, is that the Manager is responsible for the output of the team. I don’t listen to excuses that some team member failed to perform, or some other team member fell short. I hold the Manager accountable for the output of the team.
  • The ingredients that support that output are the ability of the Manager to assemble the team together. This has a great deal to do with identifying and selecting talent.
  • Once assembled, the Manager must lead the team to work together, competently and with commitment in pursuit of the goal.

Failure in any part of this system falls to the Manager. -TF

A Bonus Problem

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“This has nothing to do with bonuses,” Dean protested.

“As I look at these goals, each attached to a bonus, every team has an internal goal, based on some efficiency. The highest efficiency for each team can best be achieved by ignoring the goals of the other teams.

“Here is the central question,” I continued. “Do you think the company can be most effective by making each of its internal departments most efficient?”

“Well, yeah,” Dean replied.

“It seems counterintuitive, but for the company to be most effective, some of the departments may have to be less efficient.”

Dean looked puzzled.

“Look, Dean, of your four departments, which is the slowest, the department that everyone has to wait for?”

Dean looked at a chart with his four teams. Red, blue, green and orange. “It’s the green team. They’re the bottleneck. We would put more resources in there, but they are too expensive. We just do the best we can.”

“And when everyone is focused on their own stuff and not paying attention to the green team, what happens?”

“Well, the blue team feeds them work. But the blue team works most efficiently in batches, so they feed zero work for two days, then dump a bunch of work on the green team at the same time. The green team can only work so fast, so everything stacks up there and everything goes late.”

“So, why doesn’t the blue team work in smaller batches and feed work sooner?” I asked.

“Well, if the blue team works in smaller batches, they can’t produce enough to make their goal. And their goal is tied to their bonus.”

“So, you have a bonus problem.” -TF

For More Than a Day

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“What would be the benefit of drawing a flow chart of this system?” I asked. Valerie had solved the problem, but I wanted her to transform the solution into a system that could be used again.

“For starters, drawing a picture of the system helps me get it straight in my own mind, and makes it easier to explain it to someone else,” she replied.

“And what if one of your team members has a suggestion for improvement?”

“They can go right to the spot on the picture and we can talk about it.” Valerie was already pulling a piece of paper to the table.

“Valerie, what’s different about your supervisor solving this problem yesterday and the work you are about to do now, as a manager?”

“Well, my supervisor solved the problem to get us out of a jam, yesterday. I am working on a system to prevent the jam from happening again. My supervisor was working for one day. I am working on the future.”