Yearly Archives: 2009

Three Years of Real-World IT Projects In Ruby

Posted on July 16, 2009 by John Hunter

Nice webcast by Martin Fowler, Three Years of Real-World Ruby. This talk is probably only of interest to those of you in software development, but for them I think it is an excellent presentation. At work we have been use … Continue reading →

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Management Improvement Carnival #69

Posted on July 13, 2009 by John Hunter

The Curious Cat Management Improvement Carnival provide links to recent blog posts for those interesting in improving management of organizations. Starving the Golden Goose by Michael Neiss – “Where they [the Human Resource Department] should be obsessed with growing talent, … Continue reading →

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Peter Scholtes

Posted on July 11, 2009 by John Hunter

Peter Scholtes died peacefully this morning [11 July 2009] in Madison, Wisconsin. His family was with him. My father wrote about the First Street Garage project in W. Edwards Deming’s Out of the Crisis (pages 245-247). Peter (who was working … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Management, quote, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , | 34 Comments

Management By IT Crowd Bosses

Posted on July 9, 2009 by John Hunter

The IT Crowd is a great BBC show on an IT support office in a large organization. The IT staff are knowledgeable and tired of dealing with foolish users of IT. And you wouldn’t want to watch for any customer … Continue reading →

Posted in IT, Management, Psychology, Respect | Tagged , , , , , | 3 Comments

United Breaks Guitars

Posted on July 7, 2009 by John Hunter

Unfortunately companies like United have created cultures where people take pride in doing their job poorly. And the continued long term customer hostility companies take shows no sign of letting up. My suggestion is to take Southwest or Jet Blue … Continue reading →

Posted in Customer focus, Management, webcast | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

The Trouble with Performance Reviews by Jeffrey Pfeffer

Posted on July 6, 2009 by John Hunter

The Trouble with Performance Reviews [the broken link was removed] by Jeffrey Pfeffer Managers don’t like giving appraisals, and employees don’t like getting them. Perhaps they’re not liked because both parties suspect what the evidence has proved for decades: Traditional … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, Performance Appraisal, Respect, Systems thinking, Toyota Production System (TPS) | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Computer Network Operations Center Failures

Posted on July 3, 2009 by John Hunter

Obviously many businesses are now dependent on computer Network Operations Centers (NOC). Some of these data centers can cause millions of dollars in lost sales each minute if they fail. So sound engineering, including off-site redundancy is critical. Authorize.net is … Continue reading →

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Management Improvement Carnival #68

Posted on July 1, 2009 by John Hunter

The Curious Cat Management Improvement Carnival began in 2006 with the goal to provide links to interesting blog posts for those interesting in improving the practice of management. Reward: Creativity’s Forbidden Fruit by Matt May – “Kaizen does not attempt … Continue reading →

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Toyota Develops Thought-controlled Wheelchair

Posted on June 30, 2009 by John Hunter

Toyota has developed a thought-controlled wheelchair (along with Japanese government research institute, RIKEN, and Genesis Research Institute). Honda has also developed a system that allows a person to control a robot through thoughts. Both companies continue to invest in innovation … Continue reading →

Posted in Creativity, Deming, Innovation, Lean thinking, Management, Science, Toyota Production System (TPS) | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments

The Myth of the Genius Programmer

Posted on June 29, 2009 by John Hunter

Nice talk on fear of looking foolish. The speakers discuss the idea that visibility is good. Don’t hide. Make everything visible and the benefit from many people’s ideas. The talk focuses on software development but is true for any work. … Continue reading →

Posted in Google, Psychology, Respect, Software Development, Systems thinking, Theory of Constraints, webcast | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment