Yearly Archives: 2007

Cool Workspaces

Posted on August 15, 2007 by John Hunter

Beautiful work spaces acknowledge the people that work in those spaces and show a respect for employees as people. Photo by Michael Moore of the VW Phaeton assembly plant in Dresden (more photos of the plant) via: 10 Seeeeeriously Cool … Continue reading →

Posted in Creativity, Management, Respect | 2 Comments

Stop Demotivating Me!

Posted on August 14, 2007 by John Hunter

Esther Derby has the right idea in Stop Demotivating Me!. Some of my previous posts on this topic: Stop Demotivating Employees – Problems Caused by Performance Appraisal – Why Extrinsic Motivation Fails… Esther’s article points out a number of problems … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Management, Psychology, Respect | 7 Comments

Six Sigma in Software Development

Posted on August 13, 2007 by John Hunter

Six Sigma makes inroads in software development organizations “A lot of big companies are developing their own software engineering variance of Six Sigma training,” said Siviy, “putting software-specific examples into the normal Six Sigma curriculum.” However, she said, it’s early … Continue reading →

Posted in Design of Experiments, IT, Management, Six sigma, Software Development | Comments Off on Six Sigma in Software Development

Corporate Blogging

Posted on August 10, 2007 by John Hunter

Good article on the topic of company blogs and the new thinking needed to manage given the new communication system created by the internet, blogs etc.: Company bloggers can help put out fires [broken link has been removed]: “Our legal … Continue reading →

Posted in Creativity, Innovation, IT, Management | 4 Comments

Great Marissa Mayer Webcast on Google Innovation

Posted on August 9, 2007 by John Hunter

Marissa Mayer speech at Stanford on innovation at Google (23 minutes, 26 minutes question and answers). She leads the product management efforts on Google’s search products- web search, images, groups, news, Froogle, the Google Toolbar, Google Desktop, Google Labs, and … Continue reading →

Posted in Google, Innovation, Management, Popular, quote, Software Development, webcast | 6 Comments

Data Can’t Lie

Posted on August 9, 2007 by John Hunter

Many people state that data can lie. Obviously data can’t lie. There are three kinds of lies: Lies, damn lies and statistics – Mark Twain Many people don’t understand the difference between being manipulated because they can’t understand what the … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, Management, Psychology | Tagged , , , | 13 Comments

Lean Dentist Podcast

Posted on August 8, 2007 by John Hunter

This podcast by Mark Graban with Dr. Sami Bahri, “The World’s First Lean Dentist” is well worth listening to. It offers a wonderful example of how to apply lean ideas (I really appreciate how obvious the focus on learning and … Continue reading →

Posted in Health care, Lean thinking, Management, webcast | Comments Off on Lean Dentist Podcast

Workplace Management by Taiichi Ohno

Posted on August 8, 2007 by John Hunter

Workplace Management by Taiichi Ohno is an excellent management book. Taiichi Ohno is known as the father of the Toyota Production System (TPS), also called lean manufacturing. He dictated the text to the Japan Management Association (in a series of … Continue reading →

Posted in Books, Deming, Lean thinking, Management, Systems thinking, Toyota Production System (TPS) | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Hiring: Silicon Valley Style

Posted on August 6, 2007 by John Hunter

Interviews on how to hire in Silicon Valley. I especially like Guy Kawasaki’s comment – “the key to getting great people to work for you is to have a great product. That is why Google does so well. That is … Continue reading →

Posted in Career, Google, IT, Management, Software Development, Systems thinking, webcast | Tagged , , | 4 Comments

Help Wanted: Lean Manufacturing Experts

Posted on August 4, 2007 by John Hunter

Is There A Lean Employee Deficit?: Two recent articles in respected manufacturing publications highlighted a topic of interest for us at Ultriva: The difficulty of finding and retaining manufacturing talent. The first was an article from the American Society for … Continue reading →

Posted in Career, Lean thinking, Management | 2 Comments