Tag Archives: Systems thinking

Management Improvement Carnival #123

Posted on February 21, 2011 by John Hunter

The Curious Cat Management blog carnival highlights recent management blog posts 3 times each month. The posts generally focus on the areas I have focused on in the Curious Cat Management Improvement guide since 1996 (lean manufacturing, Deming, agile software development, innovation, six sigma, customer focus…). Tradable Quality Hypothesis by Martin Fowler – “Instead it’s vital to focus on the true value of internal quality – that it’s the enabler to speed. The purpose of internal quality is to go … Continue reading →

Posted in Carnival, Management, Systems thinking | Tagged management, Systems thinking

Supporting Free and Open Source Software

Posted on January 24, 2011 by John Hunter

Gabriel Weinberg (founder of the great Duck Duck Go search engine) proposed starting a FOSS Tithing movement. Many benefit greatly from free and open source software like: Ruby on Rails, Linux (my favorite version Ubuntu), WordPress, Apache, Ruby, Perl, Nginx, Phusion Passenger. As well as other related efforts Electronic Frontier Foundation, creative commons, PLoS. If we can get people to contribute to this idea that would be great. I have had curiouscat.com give some money to continue the development of … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Management | Tagged charity, Creativity, open source, Software Development, Systems thinking

The Achilles’ Heel of Agile

Posted on December 14, 2010 by John Hunter

Guest post by Jurgen Appelo When I wrote this, I was working in a big open office space in the Van Nelle Factory in Rotterdam (see photo). About 100 people work in an office that was the first of its kind in Europe, when it was built in 1929. And more than 80 years later, architecture lovers from all over the world still come to admire it, take pictures, and make drawings. I sometimes waved at them. Van Nelle office, … Continue reading →

Posted in Books, IT, Lean thinking, Management, Psychology, Respect, Software Development, Systems thinking | Tagged agile management, Books, guest post, management, Psychology, research, respect for people, Software Development, Systems thinking | 4 Comments

Building Adoption of Management Improvement Ideas in Your Organization

Posted on December 8, 2010 by John Hunter

Continuation of How to Get a New Management Strategy, Tool or Concept Adopted Target something that actually provides a good story. It often helps if there have been failures in attempts to solve a problem in the past. That makes the new success more impressive. Something that is relate-able to the audience you are trying to win over is also useful. Even if senior management cares about an issue, if the solution is so technical they are completely baffled, they … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Management, Popular, Quality tools, Systems thinking, Toyota Production System (TPS) | Tagged culture, curiouscat, Deming, lean management, lean manufacturing, Lean thinking, Management, organization as a system, Popular, Quality tools, quote, Systems thinking | 16 Comments

Airport Security with Lean Management Principles

Posted on November 16, 2010 by John Hunter

The ‘Israelification’ of airports: High security, little bother [the broken link was removed] We [Israel] said, ‘We’re not going to do this. You’re going to find a way that will take care of security without touching the efficiency of the airport.” … “The whole time, they are looking into your eyes — which is very embarrassing. But this is one of the ways they figure out if you are suspicious or not. It takes 20, 25 seconds,” said Sela. Lines … Continue reading →

Posted in Creativity, Customer focus, Deming, Lean thinking, Psychology, Respect | Tagged airlines, commentary, Creativity, evidence based management, Innovation, Lean thinking, problem solving, Quality tools, Systems thinking | 1 Comment

Good Process Improvement Practices

Posted on November 8, 2010 by John Hunter

Good process improvement practices include: standardized improvement process (pdsa, or whatever) Going to the gemba – improvement is done where the work is done. You must go to the where the action is. Sitting in meeting rooms, or offices, reading reports and making decisions is not the way to improve effectively. evidence based decision making, data guides decision making rather than HiPPO broad participation (those working on the process should be the ones working on improving it and everyone in … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Lean thinking, Management, Process improvement, quote, Respect, Six sigma, Systems thinking | Tagged continual improvement, curiouscat, Deming, gemba, John Hunter, Lean thinking, Process improvement, Quality tools, quote, respect for people, Six sigma, Systems thinking, Toyota Production System (TPS) | 8 Comments

Work and Life

Posted on November 4, 2010 by John Hunter

I believe in efficiency a great deal (it is a big part of the reason I took to Deming and lean manufacturing – I find waste annoying). Vacation sure can seem inefficient. All these people that could be working, not working. But people are not the same as machines. Time away from work can reinvigorate people. Time away from the day to day work can lead to better performance when people are actually at work. Time to enjoy life is … Continue reading →

Posted in Management, Psychology, Systems thinking | Tagged Economics, managing people, Psychology, respect for people, Systems thinking | 3 Comments

Respect People: Trust Them to Use good Judgment

Posted on October 28, 2010 by John Hunter

Nordstrom’s employee handbook used to be presented on a single 5 x 8 card: Welcome to Nordstrom We’re glad to have you with our Company. Our number one goal is to provide outstanding customer service. Set both your personal and professional goals high. We have great confidence in your ability to achieve them. So our employee handbook is very simple. We have only one rule: Use good judgment in all situations. Please feel free to ask your department manager, store … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Lean thinking, Management, quote, Respect, Systems thinking | Tagged culture, management, managing people, Psychology, quote, respect for people, retail, Systems thinking | 3 Comments

A Theory of a System for Educators and Managers

Posted on October 25, 2010 by John Hunter

Excerpts from The Deming Library Volume XXI, Dr. W. Edwards Deming, Dr. Russell Ackoff and David Langford demonstrate that educators can begin a quality transformation by developing an understanding of the properties and powers of systems-oriented thinking. You can order the entire video, as well as the rest of The Deming Library. Great stuff! If you enjoy this blog (the Curious Cat Management Improvement Blog), you definitely should watch this webcast. This video has some great insight into education, learning … Continue reading →

Posted in Creativity, Deming, Education, Management, quote, Systems thinking, webcast | Tagged Ackoff, curiouscat, Data, Deming, Education, Innovation, learning, management, management webcast, quote, Systems thinking, theory of knowledge, webcast | 7 Comments

Build an Environment Where Intrinsic Motivation Flourishes

Posted on August 8, 2010 by John Hunter

50 years after Douglas McGregor’s classic, The Human Side of Enterprise, too many managers still have not learned that using extrinsic motivation is not an effective way to manage complex human systems (organizations). The issue is important to me because their is a huge amount of poor management based on this thinking (focused on how people need to be fixed/motivated) instead of fixing what management really needs to fix. You can succeed as a manager, and progress in your career, … Continue reading →

Posted in Career, Deming, Management, Process improvement, Psychology, quote, Respect, Systems thinking | Tagged Career, curiouscat, Deming, intrinsic motivation, Joy in Work, leadership, managing people, motivation, Psychology, quote, Systems thinking | 12 Comments

Stop Starting and Start Finishing – Jason Yip

Posted on August 5, 2010 by John Hunter

Jason Yip explores the value of reducing work in process and reducing context switching costs to optimize throughput. By designing processes to work on projects serially instead of in parallel we reduce context switching, and other costs, of multitasking. Related: Multi-Tasking: Why Projects Take so Long – The Importance of Making Problems Visible – One piece flow (continuous flow) – Kanban

Posted in Management, Process improvement, Quality tools, Software Development, Systems thinking, webcast | Tagged agile management, management, management webcast, Process improvement, Software Development, Systems thinking, teams | 1 Comment

How to Manage What You Can’t Measure

Posted on August 4, 2010 by John Hunter

In Out of the Crisis, page 121, Dr. Deming wrote: the most important figures that one needs for management are unknown or unknowable (Lloyd S. Nelson, director of statistical methods for the Nashua corporation), but successful management must nevertheless take account of them. So what do you do then? I am a strong advocate of Deming’s ideas on management. I see understanding system thinking, psychology, the theory of knowledge and variation as the tools to use when you can’t get … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Management, Popular, quote, Systems thinking | Tagged curiouscat, Data, Deming, management, managing people, Popular, quote, Statistics, Systems thinking, variation | 12 Comments

Delighting Customers

Posted on July 26, 2010 by John Hunter

If you have customers that see you as adequate you will keep customers based on inertia. But you have several big problems awaiting you. Those trying to win your customers business only have to overcome inertia – which can be very low hurdle (saving a small bit of money, some minor additional feature). If your customers are delighted they won’t leave (by and large) without significant reasons to. Also your attempts to increase price are very likely to lead to … Continue reading →

Posted in Competition, Customer focus, Deming, Management, Process improvement, quote | Tagged continual improvement, curiouscat, Customer focus, customer service, Deming, management, Process improvement, quote, Systems thinking, tips | 5 Comments

Involve IT Staff in Business Process Improvement

Posted on July 6, 2010 by John Hunter

I started out basically working on management improvement from the start of my career. My makeup (I am never satisfied and figure things should always be better) along with a few traits, experiences and probably even genes made this a natural fit for me. I tend to take the long view and find fire fighting a waste of time. Why fix some symptom, I want to fix the system so that problem doesn’t happen again. My father worked in statistics, … Continue reading →

Posted in Career, Deming, IT, Management, Popular, Process improvement, quote, Software Development, Systems thinking | Tagged agile management, Career, commentary, curiouscat, IT, John Hunter, management, Popular, Process improvement, quote, Software Development, Systems thinking | 5 Comments

Southwest Not Delta or United

Posted on June 14, 2010 by John Hunter

One of the posts highlighted in the last post was one example of how Southwest behaves. It wasn’t a one time thing. It was a common result of the system Southwest has in place where they treat customers like human beings that should be respected (as Southwest does with employees). Then you have the typical horrible treatment the other airlines practice. Like this example where Delta damages this guys bike and refuses to accept responsibility. That is until they suffered … Continue reading →

Posted in Customer focus, Management, Systems thinking | Tagged airlines, bad customer service, Customer focus, respect for people, Systems thinking | 2 Comments

Classic Management Theories Are Still Relevant

Posted on June 7, 2010 by John Hunter

Good management is good management: it doesn’t matter if someone figured out the good idea 100 years ago or last week. Are “Classic” Management Theories Still Relevant? It did make me wonder about the staying power of management models, processes, skills, and conventional wisdom… There are way too many people in our field that are not true professionals – they don’t do their homework, and rely too much on their own personal experience. They’re the ones who tend to jump … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Management, quote, Systems thinking | Tagged commentary, management, management experts, management history, Systems thinking, tips | 6 Comments