Category Archives: quote

Don’t Expect Short Quotes to Tell the Whole Story

Posted on July 25, 2017 by John Hunter

When people try to use a short quote as an accurate encapsulation of a management concept they will often be disappointed. It is obvious that Dr. Deming believed that organizations failed to use data effectively to improve. He proposed that organizations needed to change and use data effectively in order to thrive over the long term. He believed that greatly increasing the use of data in decision making would be useful. He also believed there were specific problems with how … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, Management, quote, Statistics, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , | 4 Comments

Managers Are Not Non-Leaders: Managers Need to Practice Things We Classify as Leadership Traits

Posted on October 14, 2013 by John Hunter

Saying “Managers care about efficiency and leaders care about effectiveness” is like saying “Doctors care about theory and nurses care about patients.” Managers that don’t care about effectiveness are lousy managers. Leaders that don’t care about the gemba are lousy leaders. Doctors that don’t care about patients are lousy doctors. Nurses that don’t care about theory are lousy nurses. Your role in the organization (and for the particular situation in question) and training and the situation will impact how you … Continue reading →

Posted in Lean thinking, Management, Popular, quote | Tagged , , , , , , | 5 Comments

What is the Explanation Going to be if This Attempt Fails?

Posted on June 25, 2013 by John Hunter

Occasionally during my career I have been surprised by new insights. One of the things I found remarkable was how quickly I thought up a new explanation for what could have caused a problem when the previously expressed explanation was proven wrong. After awhile I stopped finding it remarkable and found it remarkable how long it took me to figure out that this happened. I discovered this as I programmed software applications. You constantly have code fail to run as … Continue reading →

Posted in Creativity, Innovation, Management, Process improvement, quote, Software Development, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , , ,

Experience Teaches Nothing Without Theory

Posted on June 11, 2013 by John Hunter

Experience teaches nothing. In fact there is no experience to record without theory… Without theory there is no learning… And that is their downfall. People copy examples and then they wonder what is the trouble. They look at examples and without theory they learn nothing. W. Edwards Deming in The Deming of America Our brains are good at creating theories, from our experiences, so that our brain can learn. However when this is done only subconsciously we can be led … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Psychology, quote | Tagged , , , , , | 9 Comments

Leadership and Management

Posted on June 4, 2013 by John Hunter

I don’t think the attempts to separate leadership and management are useful. I read plenty of things that are variations on Peter Drucker’s: “Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.” A manager that is not concerned about doing the right things is a lousy manager. And a leader that doesn’t care about doing things right is a lousy leader. Another theme of this contrasting type quote says some version of: “Managers care about efficiency and leaders … Continue reading →

Posted in Lean thinking, Management, quote, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

George Box

Posted on March 28, 2013 by John Hunter

I would most likely not exist if it were not for George Box. My father took a course from George while my father was a student at Princeton. George agreed to start the Statistics Department at the University of Wisconsin – Madison, and my father followed him to Madison, to be the first PhD student. Dad graduated, and the next year was a professor there, where he and George remained for the rest of their careers. George died today, he … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, Deming, Design of Experiments, Management, Manufacturing, Process improvement, Quality tools, quote, Respect, Six sigma, Statistics, Systems thinking, UK | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 15 Comments

Respect for Everyone

Posted on November 7, 2012 by John Hunter

TL;DR – The two pillars of the Toyota Way are: respect for people and continuous improvement. One of the big reasons my career followed the path it did (into management improvement) was due to the impact of respect for people. My father was a professor (in statistics, engineering and business) and consulted with organizations to help them achieve better results. To achieve results he took advantage of the gains possible when using statistical tools to manage with respect for people. … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Lean thinking, Management, quote, Respect, Toyota Production System (TPS) | Tagged , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

Special Cause Signal Isn’t Proof A Special Cause Exists

Posted on October 3, 2012 by John Hunter

One of my pet peeves is when people say that a point outside the control limits is a special cause. It is not. It is an indication that it likely a special cause exists, and that special cause thinking is the correct strategy to use to seek improvement. But that doesn’t mean there definitely was a special cause – it could be a false signal. This post relies on an understand of control charts and common and special causes (review … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, Deming, Management, Manufacturing, Process improvement, Quality tools, quote, Six sigma, Statistics, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , , , , ,

New Deadly Diseases

Posted on August 29, 2012 by John Hunter

Management and the economy keep evolving. Many good things happen. In the last decade the best things are probably the increased deep adoption of lean thinking in many organizations and the adoption of lean and Deming methods in software development (agile software development, kanban and lean startup [which I do realize isn’t limited to software development]). Sadly all the deadly diseases Dr. Deming described remain. And, as I said in 2007, I think 2 new diseases have become so widespread … Continue reading →

Posted in Creativity, Deming, Economics, Innovation, Lean thinking, Management, quote, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 12 Comments

My New Book: Management Matters

Posted on August 2, 2012 by John Hunter

I have a new book in progress: Management Matters. It is now available in “pre-release format” via leanpub. The idea I am experimenting with (supported by leanpub) is pre-publishing the book online. The ebook is available for purchase now, and comes with free access to the updates. My plan is to continue working on the book for the next few months and have it “release ready” by October, 2012. One of the advantages of this method is that I can … Continue reading →

Posted in Books, curiouscat.com, Deming, Lean thinking, Management, Process improvement, Psychology, Quality tools, quote, Respect, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Leading Improvement and Enjoying the Rewards

Posted on June 25, 2012 by John Hunter

The better job you do of managing the easier your job becomes. As a manager your primary responsibility is to improve the system: both the systems within your sphere of control and those outside of it. The more effectively you do so, the less firefighting you have to do. The less firefighting the less hectic and chaotic your days are. And the more time you have to focus on improving the system. The better you are at leveraging your efforts, … Continue reading →

Posted in Management, quote, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Management Blog Posts From November 2006

Posted on April 26, 2012 by John Hunter

I have selected a few great posts from the Curious Cat Management Blog back in November 2006. What Could we do Better? – There are many important ideas to improve management. This is one of the most important tips to aid improvement that I know of: it is easy to do, brings huge benefits and most organizations fail to do it. Ask your customers: “What one thing could we do to improve?” Ackoff’s F-laws: Common Sins of Management presents 13 … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Management, Process improvement, Quality tools, quote | Tagged , , , , , , , ,

The Customer is the Purpose of Our Work

Posted on April 9, 2012 by John Hunter

A customer is the most important visitor on our premises. He is not dependent on us. We are dependent on him. He is not an interruption in our work. He is the purpose of it. He is not an outsider in our business. He is part of it. We are not doing him a favor by serving him. He is doing us a favor by giving us an opportunity to do so. Mahatma Gandhi [his authorship of the quote is … Continue reading →

Posted in Customer focus, Management, Psychology, quote, Respect, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

Keys to the Effective Use of the PDSA Improvement Cycle

Posted on March 6, 2012 by John Hunter

The PDSA improvement cycle was created by Walter Shewhart where Dr. Deming learned about it. An improvement process is now part of many management improvement methods (A3 for lean manufacturing, DMAIC for six sigma and many other modifications). They are fairly similar in many ways. The PDSA cycle (Plan, Do, Study, Act) has a few key pieces that are either absent in most others processes of greatly de-emphasized which is why I prefer it (A3 is my second favorite). The … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, Deming, Management, Popular, Process improvement, Quality tools, quote, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 15 Comments

Agile Story Point Estimation

Posted on February 8, 2012 by John Hunter

In agile software development tasks are documented as user stories. Then the level of effort for those stores can be estimated by assigning each story points. The velocity that can be produced in a period (called a sprint, for us 2 weeks) can be estimated. Thus you can predict what can be delivered in the next sprint (which can help business managers make priority decisions). I have found estimation to be worthwhile. In doing so, we accept there is a … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, IT, Process improvement, Quality tools, quote, Software Development | Tagged , , , , ,

Trust But Verify

Posted on January 16, 2012 by John Hunter

The following are my comments, which were sparked by question “Trust, but verify. Is this a good example of Profound Knowledge in action?” on the Linked In Deming Institute group. Trust but verify makes sense to me. I think of verify as process measures to verify the process is producing as it should. By verifying you know when the process is failing and when to look for special causes (when using control chart thinking with an understanding of variation). There … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, Deming, Management, quote, Respect, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments