Monthly Archives: September 2009

Five Managerial Fallacies Concerning Layoffs

The Top Five Managerial Fallacies Concerning Layoff Survivors by David Noer, author of Healing the Wounds: Overcoming the Trauma of Layoffs and Revitalizing Downsized Organizations. The overwhelming consensus of downsizing research is that layoffs do not achieve their going in … Continue reading

Posted in Deming, Management, Psychology, Respect | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

Credit Card Company Tries Providing Value

Most credit card issues seem to use business models based on tricking customers into paying high fees. PartnersFirst is focusing on providing value to customers. A Different Kind of Credit-Card Company PartnersFirst is a different kind of credit-card company. Started … Continue reading

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Extrinsic Incentives Kill Creativity

If you read this blog, you know I believe extrinsic motivation is a poor strategy. This TED webcast Dan Pink discusses studies showing extrinsic rewards failing. This is a great webcast, definitely worth 20 minutes of your time. “you’ve got … Continue reading

Posted in Creativity, Deming, Management, Performance Appraisal, Psychology, quote, Science | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Management Improvement Carnival #76

Kevin Meyer is hosting the Management Improvement Carnival #76 on the Evolving Excellence blog, highlights include: The World Used to be Flat (Indexed): Question what is accepted as fact, ubiquitous in effect, and practiced by people. Traditional accounting…? The Retrospective … Continue reading

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Finding Savings with Six Sigma

I don’t see any evidence six sigma is making a comeback but magazines like to talk about new ideas rather than just explore what continues. They like to discuss common cause variation as though it were special cause. Six Sigma … Continue reading

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How ‘Buy American’ Can Hurt U.S. Firms

How ‘Buy American’ Can Hurt U.S. Firms Canadian communities angered by perceived American chauvinism have started a Buy Canadian campaign to exclude U.S. bidders from municipal contracts. “If that sticks, well, there goes 25% of my business,” said Mr. Pokorsky. … Continue reading

Posted in Competition, Economics, Lean thinking, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

An Introduction to Deming’s Management Ideas by Peter Scholtes (webcast)

An Introduction to Deming’s Management Teaching and Philosophy by Peter Scholtes – webcast from the Annual W. Edwards Deming Institute conference in Madison, Wisconsin, November 9th, 2008. My previous post on this speech: 6 Leadership Competencies. Next month, the Annual … Continue reading

Posted in Creativity, curiouscat.com, Deming, Education, Innovation, Lean thinking, Management, Performance Appraisal, Popular, Process improvement, Psychology, quote, Respect, Science, Systems thinking, webcast | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Understanding How to Manage Geeks

The unspoken truth about managing geeks [the broken link was removed] by Jeff Ello IT pros are sensitive to logic — that’s what you pay them for. When things don’t add up, they are prone to express their opinions on … Continue reading

Posted in IT, Management, Psychology, Respect, Software Development | Tagged , , , , , | 6 Comments

Management Improvement Carnival #75

Agile Lessons from a Management Guru by Ahmed Yousuf – “Agile methodologies have a fundamentally different approach to quality – an approach that is inherent in this teaching from Deming. Quality cannot be achieved by testers inspecting work done by … Continue reading

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Loan Default Rates Continue to Increase

Chart showing loan default rates for real estate, consumer and agricultural loans for 1998 to 2009 by the Curious Cat Investing Economics Blog, Creative Commons Attribution, data from the Federal Reserve. Default rates on commercial (up another 151 basis points) … Continue reading

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