Leave the Emotion In

Have you heard this one? The one where the manager says, "let's leave the emotion out of it and look at the facts...we need answers, not more problems because somebody's feelings were hurt."

If you came to me and said, "I love my job," would you expect me to reply: "Can we leave the emotion out of it?" Of course not. In fact, I'd probably write a celebratory blog post about it, and if it happened more than once - I'll make a case study out of it for the next Lean HR Summit. If that goes anywhere, maybe I can write a book about it and get credit for the newest Lean Tool!

All kidding aside, who are we as managers to tell people how to feel, or worse, when to feel? My observation is that, as managers, we don't know how to face conflict that involves emotion and since we don't know how to do it we demand our team to do the same. Why?

Do we avoid emotions in the workplace because it takes an extraordinary amount of calories to deal with them? Does this phenomena stem from the tendency for us to be fixers? When somebody is not feeling good about things, do we see an opportunity to fix the emotion? Knowing that the fix is probably more on the person feeling the way they do, do we tend to let it slide, since the work to be done would consume more calories than we can afford it? Fixing emotions is a tough slog through the mud, is it not? And if we fix the emotion, did it fix the problem? Most likely not, but do emotions belong in the realm of problem solving?

Most people, as I've suggested will say, "No, leave it out!" Unless of course, unfavorable emotions cause a person to get into trouble - then we have a low calorie solution for dealing with those feelings: HR. This, we were trained to do, and we are good at it. Unfortunately, even this low calorie solution is a form of ignoring how people feel about themselves, their work, their team and the big picture and only looking at the fix, the result - we need an immediate outcome, we need to fix the bad behaviors and emotions for the sake of the organization, or so it would seem:

"A leader gets results through people. People must be treated as individuals. Good leadership prevents many problems, but the leader must know how to handle those that do arise." - JRT Manual.

Can we ignore how people feel? If we ignore their emotions are we honoring them as individuals? If not, are we treating them like people? Aren't people without emotions considered to be sociopaths? Is that the model team member we want on our team? If not, then why do we ask them to leave their emotions out? How does this square with the hallowed "respect for people" principle? What are we saying to our team when we tell them to leave emotions out? I wonder how many Leansters are guilty of violating the RFP pillar in this manner?

"Complete facts must be known or obtained. Opinions and feelings must be found out and considered along with the facts. It is necessary to look at an individual because people are not alike." - JRT Manual.

Do I want to make my decisions based on anger alone? Fear? Love? No. But I should try to understand how people are feeling about things. If we don't, then we tend to jump to conclusions when presented with a problem. The Job Relations skill helps provide a framework around not jumping to conclusions, while simultaneously listening, gathering facts, and considering the feelings and emotions around a matter. The JR approach, while not the ONLY way to go about this, is one of the few sources where we see emphasis on the consideration of facts AND feelings. Only then can we make whole decisions that are aligned with the Respect for People pillar:

"Decisions are made on the basis of facts properly evaluated and related. And decisions do not make a solution." - JRT Manual

Even if we consider emotions, treat people like individuals and make sound, whole decisions, that doesn't mean the problem is gone. We need to check our decision(cause of the solution) for results(effects of the decision leading to the solution):

"The leader must know his responsibility to check the results of the decision. It is necessary to watch the timing of action and follow-up, and watch for effect on the objective, on the individual, on the group, and on production." - JRT Manual

Lean Thinking, if there is such a thing that can be captured in two simple words, is not the scientific, objective enterprise we would like it to be. The sole reason for this lies within the multi-million person workforce - EVERYBODY is an individual. If people were robots, we wouldn't have to be subjective. To approach each person as if they are more or less the same pair of hands to utilize or the same brain to manipulate is a lethal mistake. Purely objective engagement allows us to pull in everybody without consideration of them as individuals. How efficient would we be at motivating each and every person to reach their full potential? Purely subjective engagement may keep us in the dark and unaware of the facts. How effective will our problem solving actually be?

Seek Out Inspirations for Flow

Sometimes we find inspiration for flow in places we wouldn't otherwise look. Over the years, I've tried to apply lean thinking, elimination of waste, simplification, respect for individuals, etc. to my political thinking. The short story is - I can't subscribe to U.S. political thinking anymore, in almost every instance of political creation in world history, the result is a path towards destructive win-lose thinking. Fredric Bastiat says it best:

Life, faculties, production—in other words, individuality, liberty, property—this is man. Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place. 

When under the pretext of fraternity, the legal code imposes mutual sacrifices on the citizens, human nature is not thereby abrogated. Everyone will then direct his efforts toward contributing little to, and taking much from, the common fund of sacrifices. Now, is it the most unfortunate who gains from this struggle? Certainly not, but rather the most influential and calculating.

Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else. 

People are beginning to realize that the apparatus of government is costly. But what they do not know is that the burden falls inevitably on them. 

Now, legal plunder can be committed in an infinite number of ways. Thus we have an infinite number of plans for organizing it: tariffs, protection, benefits, subsidies, encouragements, progressive taxation, public schools, guaranteed jobs, guaranteed profits, minimum wages, a right to relief, a right to the tools of labor, free credit, and so on, and so on. 

But how is this legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime.

Bastiat described this French political climate in early 19th century in , The Law. This win-lose, zero sum game of destruction doesn't sit well with me, not at all.

Enough doom and gloom. There is a silver lining...the concept of the flow of ideas, information and things will lead to the betterment of society. Constructive win-win thinking comes from respect for individuals, sharing your views with others and mentoring those that are willing to adopt and adapt to their own personal situation. This is what lean is about for me, and lean thinking has changed the lens I use for looking at the purpose of government beyond the local level.

Pleased to share with you, if you are open to the idea - The Foundation for Economic Education. Not Economics in the sense you hear about on Fox or MSNBC, where Statist Capitalists are pitted against Statist Socialists, essentially yelling at each other how they should go about their legal plunder. Nope, we are talking economics in the sense of what individuals do, making choices, humans taking action. The materials and philosophy here may not sit well with your current political paradigm, but I challenge you to take it in and process without prejudice, like you say you do when you are problem solving.

The current issue of The Freeman is all about FLOW...put your lean thinking cap on and use it!

Hidden Benefits of Job Instruction - Part 1

There are several basic things you do when practicing the skill of instruction:

1) Creating Timetables

2) Writing Job Breakdown Sheets

3) Readying the workplace with correct tools, materials, equipment, etc.

4) Organizing the workplace as it will be used,

5) Training using the 4 step method

6) Following up with people and adjusting plans

Let's focus on some of the hidden benefits of each of these Job Instruction components that come with experience in using the skill of instruction. First, what is the primary purpose of Creating Timetables? The primary reason we use a time table is to plan our training. A timetable plan is a record of our answers to the following questions:

Who will get trained?

When they will get trained?

What will they be trained in?

Who will train them?

But there are more benefits than just having a plan to operate to. When used with a bias towards continuous improvement, these planning questions are asked in response to workplace problems such as quality, productivity, delivery, safety or cost related problems that can be solved through standardization and training.

First Benefit to using Timetables: What gets your attention, gets done.

When your team sees you developing a plan that includes their personal skill develop, you are apt to get their buy-in. When you tie completion dates, improvement of quality, reduction of cost and improvement safety to their training and their development you will get more buy-in. And when you include them in the development of Job Breakdown Sheets - you are sharing in the ownership of the process with your team. Use the Timetable as a planning and management tool for your team and you will see things get done. Make it a part of your KPIs and you will see good things happen. Use the timetable as a rally tool around problems that involve training. This is not limited to operations departments...you can apply this skill to engineering teams, marketing, sales and other support functions. The objectives may change, but the skill of planning does not.

Second Benefit to using Timetables: Demonstrate Return on Training Investment.

If you use the timetable to help the team spot problems, record them and plan for solving them through training, you can demonstrate to others that training can pay off. Example: scrap is on the rise again on one of three shifts. A discussion with all of the shift leads reveals that adjustments are made by the operators during operation. Adjustments cause the product to drift out of spec from time-to-time. A review of the Job Breakdown Sheet reveals that the key point regarding the adjustment isn't specific enough to keep the process in control. The Job Breakdown Sheet is updated and the supervisor notes on the Timetable when each of the operators on the shifts will get retrained on the updated process. Too many times, these types of corrective actions go unaccounted for. By formalizing the planning, standardization and improvement cycle of how people train we can see in concrete terms how training pays off.

Third Benefit to using Timetables: Demonstrate a commitment to development of your people.

When people see that there is a plan for them, when they see that you are thinking about them and taking action, what do you suppose is going through their mind? For some they may feel uneasy. For others, they may be excited. A few may mutter, "It's about time!" If you follow through on your plan, in the long run the team will realize that we are in this together and for each other.

Summary: If you use a time table, you are modeling one of the high quality leadership behavior traits: duty. We need tools to help us do what is required of us for the benefit of our team. A time table is a concrete way of illustrating just how we are trying to compete in this world: by maximizing the potential of our people.

In Part 2 of Hidden Benefits, we'll uncover some of the gems found when writing Job Breakdown Sheets.

JBS - How to To Tear Down a Lean Pillar

I've been hearing a lean term lately that I thought was mercifully dead and buried many years ago. You have seen it, heard it and probably used it. I know I did, and regretfully so. This term has been emphasized and expounded in Lean presentations by high priced Lean Senseis. The term has been codified by multi-national corporations as part of their lean curriculum and embedded within their corporate universities. Recently, looking through two published lean books, I found the term was listed, fully defined and book-ended with Japanese words and origins - a pretense used liberally in lean circles with little understanding of the history around continuous improvement  Unfortunately,  for many people the term is within our lexicon forever. Have you figured out the term yet? Be patient...

Following is a one step Job Breakdown Sheet that will reveal the term for you:

Job: How to Tear Down a Lean Pillar

Important Step: Present Lean Manufacturing concepts to a team of people who could benefit by it.

Key Point #1: Point out that the organization is made up of Lean Champions,
Key Point #2: and Lean Concrete-Heads,

Reason: Most of us want to improve and will, but there are also a few people on the team that will be an impediment to progress. They must be removed from the process.

"Concrete heads." There is nothing quite like launching a Patriot missile into the Respect for People pillar, is there?

When you act like a frustrated child and call people names - what do you suppose people are hearing?

First, you only know how to engage one type of person and not others. You have more than followers to lead, remember, even leaders sometimes resist change or resent criticism, how will you influence them?

Second, you are demonstrating your insincerity when you say that Lean is about involving everybody in the organization yet are inexplicably declaring before the world that some are to be excluded . Yes, there are people who will resist change and resent criticism, but they do change, they have changed and eventually will again when the right motivation is found.

Third, you are modeling the wrong behavior - giving up. No doubt, as a leader they will test your mettle. Will you resist the challenge and resent the criticism that you can't figure out a way to get a person's involvement - or will you seek out and develop new and creative leadership skills?

TWI - It's all about YOU!

Interesting day today...I delivered an "appreciation" session to a team where I presented the benefits of Job Instruction. In our world today, we tend to get hyper fixated on the need for mutual benefits and for good reason. When we work together as a team, we feel good about the results for all involved. That is a BIG deal.

TWI guys will inevitably break BIG things down into their smaller components. How about the notion of mutual benefits? Well, for starters, mutual benefits implies that  more than one person realizes a benefit. O.k., let's look at two people who are using Job Instruction: the leader and the team member.

I'll use the comments I received after the session. First, the leader explained that she was very excited about using JI because now she could see a way to get through to the person she was training. Her explanation was that the team member just wasn't getting it and this would help her, "get it". That sounds like a one-sided benefit. Where is the mutual benefit?

While the team member is most likely to "get it", actually the primary aim of practicing Job Instruction is to make the leader more capable. Capable of what, though? Could she think of any benefit that she might realize by practicing Job Instruction? This question prompted a different discussion, one that lead us to why TWI is a leadership development tool first, and a tool to help people get it - as a result of practicing the skill.

In this world of collective thinking, we cannot forget that groups of people are made up of unique individuals.  Put another way, you cannot have a group without individuals, so do you want your group full of undeveloped people? Who would you prefer develop those individuals? Undeveloped leaders? As much as we would like to do things for others, with no regard for ourselves, we cannot truly see mutual benefit until we have discovered ways to help ourselves first. This is an important concept of leadership that we cannot forget. The unique concept behind TWI J-skills is that they are all about YOU!

Sincerity vs. Manipulation

Getting ready for the 2013 TWI Summit this year in Savannah, Georgia...part of my prep is to review some of the books on my top shelf. One of them was pretty obscure up until a year or so ago: The Amazing Oversight. It took me about a year to find it when I was reading up on the descendant of Job Methods, Work Simplification, which was popularized by the likes of Allan Mogenson, Ben Graham and Lillian Gilbreth.

It was very exciting to discover that TWI never died, but took on new forms in the U.S and subsequently discovered an entire new group of writers out there taking leadership to another level.

In this collection of articles about how leadership often overlooks the need to truly involve people, I particularly liked the article, "Improvement Must be Managed" by Herbert Goodwin. In it, Goodwin lays out themes and principles of good improvement programs. There are also some pointers on things to stay away from. Here is my favorite passage:

"A sure way to lose respect is to try to manipulate people into thinking our idea is theirs. The 'tell them' approach of the authoritarian is held in low regard, but the insincerity of the manipulator who tries to 'sell' his own ideas by subterfuge rarely meets with anything by stiffening resistance. None of us likes to be 'taken in' or treated as a fool, and we resent those who try."

How many times have you heard, or have encouraged somebody to do exactly what is described above? I am guilty. Goodwin continues:

"People do not resist change as much as they do the methods of change. Actually, it can be shown with a high degree of certainty that most of us like to change and we are particularly enthusiastic about changing when we are involved in developing the innovation. We must remember that the inference of all change is criticism of things as they are and none of us likes criticism, be it constructive or otherwise. On the other hand, if everyone associated with a given activity is involved in the efforts to improve it and the managerial leader sincerely recognizes that his people can and do have ideas to contribute to the total effort, the negative aspects of the implied criticism disappear within the positive satisfiers of recognition through involvement."

How many times have you seen people embrace a real problem, come up with their own idea, put it into action and it actually stuck? When I adopted the sincerity vs. manipulation philosophy, I saw this occur more often.

This is not to be confused with somebody stealing your idea, or materials, and passing them off as their own. Although most people would encourage to share ideas with other people, there usually is a mutual benefit in doing so: stealing is the last thing that comes to mind when both parties win. For example, I made available to the public the original property of U.S. Taxpayers, the TWI materials, for people to learn from. There is a mutual benefit in doing this; some have downloaded, used the materials and shared what they learned. We both learn from this experience. Others have simply downloaded the materials and passed them off as their own. That's fine too, they are public domain materials after all - but there is no mutual benefit, which is unfortunate - this win/lose behavior doesn't maximize every person's potential to be the best they can be.

The future of TWI will be one where people collaborate in a sincere way, helping each other, bringing mutual benefit to those involved.  Some would tell you that "mutual benefit" is the real meaning of kaizen which is what I hope to contribute to and share in at the TWI Summit.