Yearly Archives: 2009

$60 Million Bonus – For all Staff

Posted on February 15, 2009 by John Hunter

This is similar to a story I posted last November: Family Business Gives $6.6 million in Bonuses to Workers. I both cases long time owners sold their company to a foreign buyer and then gave a significant amount of the … Continue reading →

Posted in Respect | Tagged bonus, respect for people | 1 Comment

Helping Employees Improve

Posted on February 12, 2009 by John Hunter

One aspect of managing people is to provide positive feedback and show appreciation. Doing so is important. People benefit from encouragement and reinforcement. In addition to just telling them, take action to show your appreciation. The Dilbert workplace is alive … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Fun, Management Articles, Popular, Respect, Software Development, Statistics, Toyota Production System (TPS) | Tagged continual improvement, curiouscat, managers, managing people, Psychology, respect for people, tips | 2 Comments

Management Improvement Carnival #54

Posted on February 10, 2009 by John Hunter

In the webcast, Corey Ladas discusses lean thinking in software development, Deming and quality, customer pull vs Kano model and gemba. 7 Practical Ways to Respect People by Ron Pereira – “Some think that to be respectful you can never … Continue reading →

Posted in Carnival, Management | Tagged Carnival, Software Development, webcast | Comments Off

Lean Thinking in Minnesota Government

Posted on February 8, 2009 by John Hunter

The Office of Governor Pawlenty issued a press release on Minnesota’s Drive to Excellence effort: Increased Quality via Lean Continuous Improvement Reform – The State has adopted “Lean Thinking” as its preferred process improvement tool. So far, 18 agencies are … Continue reading →

Posted in Lean thinking, Public Sector | Tagged government, Lean thinking, Public Sector | 1 Comment

Hire People You Can Trust to Do Their Job

Posted on February 5, 2009 by John Hunter

How great companies turn crisis into opportunity The right people don’t need to be managed. The moment you feel the need to tightly manage someone, you’ve made a hiring mistake. The right people don’t think they have a job: They … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Management, Management Articles, Psychology, Respect, Systems thinking | Tagged coaching, hiring, jobs, Management Articles, managing people, training | 4 Comments

Failure: Honda’s Secret to Success

Posted on February 3, 2009 by John Hunter

Related: Honda has Never had Layoffs and has been Profitable Every Year – Inside Honda’s Brain – Curious Cat Engineering Blog

Posted in Creativity, webcast | Tagged cars, engineering, webcast | 2 Comments

Management Improvement Carnival #53

Posted on February 1, 2009 by John Hunter

Shaun Sayers is hosting the Management Improvement Carnival #53 on the Capable blog, highlights include: The correct sequence for doing 5-S? – by Jon Miller. “Why would people alter the order and still call it 5-S instead of my version … Continue reading →

Posted in Carnival | Tagged Carnival | Comments Off

Newspaper Innovation In Kansas

Posted on January 29, 2009 by John Hunter

The newspaper industry is facing challenging times. One success story is the Lawrence Journal-World in Lawrence, Kansas. I first heard about their efforts years ago: Watchful Eyes on Kansas Media Innovations, NPR, 2005 Many media companies hoped that convergence — … Continue reading →

Posted in Creativity, Customer focus, Deming, Innovation, IT | Tagged Creativity, Customer focus, Deming, Innovation, internet, IT | 1 Comment

Jeff Bezos and Root Cause Analysis

Posted on January 28, 2009 by John Hunter

Using quality tools really works. Lots of people don’t use them. Improving is often not any more difficult than just applying tools that have been used for decades. Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Management, Quality tools, Respect | Tagged Amazon, Bezos, management experts, Quality tools | 2 Comments

Online Data Backup and Corporate Blogging

Posted on January 26, 2009 by John Hunter

This is a good example of a sensible corporate blog post, Online Data Backup [the broken link has been removed, breaking links is not a good practice for any website]. Their blog is fairly staid and impersonal (which is not … Continue reading →

Posted in Creativity | Tagged blogs, communication, internet, marketing | Comments Off