070922 Seddon - Quotes - Freedom from Command & Control

1. 070922 Seddon - Quotes - Freedom from Command & Control Jim Mather MSP

2. 070922 Seddon - Quotes - Freedom from Command & Control • Command and Control • Specific Issues and Views • New Paradigm • Check Plan Do • Performance: To perform well and individual needs three things:

3. Command and Control • Dysfunctional behaviour is ubiquitous and systemic, not because people are wicked but because the requirement to serve the hierarchy competes with the requirement to serve customers. • People's ingenuity is engaged in survival not improvement • By causing managers and staff to lose sight of their customers, they can ultimately contribute to putting the organisation out of business altogether • It is an unquestioned assumption that managers should have and set targets and then create control systems • Incentives, Performance Appraisals, Budget Reporting - and Computers to keep track of them all - to ensure that the targets are met. • In Toyota, these practices simply do not exist

4. Failure Demand • Failure Demand is demand caused by failure to do something or to do something right for the customer. • In Local Authorities it can be as high as 50-80% • The savings associated with the removal of the specification and inspection bureaucracies will be IMMENSE. • If failure demand is predictable you should act to remove the causes Short term - this requires leadership • Long term this requires the Whole System to change • Consequently - outsourcing often "outsources” waste and makes it permanent.

5. Don’t ignore Variation • In ignoring variation, organisations subject their managers and workers to measures that demoralise them and drive them to behave in ways that add no value to the system • “Employment in such alienating conditions led to the creation of Unions, whose purpose was to control and protect jobs” - see John Kay and Alberto Alesina • The seeds were sown for inefficiency and lack of co-operation brought about by inflexibility and both real & perceived inequity. • To understand the causes of variation managers and workers need to study FLOW • This is the best way to use people's ingenuity rather than consume it to meet arbitrary targets

6. Specific Issues and Views • On Targets • There is no point in having a "Target" if the system is stable • Targets are arbitrary • Capability measures are not arbitrary • They are derived from work not plucked from the air - see Control Charts • Targets increase disorder in systems, capability measures lead people to act in ways that increase order and control • Targets focus people on the wrong things, • The things they must do to survive within the system - not things to improve it. • In a hierarchical system target is generally something that is imposed with authority - by people who are detached from the work

7. Specific Issues and Views (Cont.) • A Law of Cost • In a command and control system, a service organisation's costs rise in proportion to the variety of customer demands • On Control • Control is an illusion - as costs are associated with flow - not function or activity • Numbers have achieved an ascendancy over purpose. • Time to change? • Clear need to flex to meet changing demand and to spend more time & resources on the services that customers value • We are going to change the system but we want to do it with the full proactive involvement of management and staff • Allow people to do what is needed to deliver "The purpose of the system" • Key Questions for Service oriented organisations • How much money do we spend on customer research?

8. Specific Issues and Views (Cont.) • What actions for improvement are taken as a consequence? • ISO 9000 • Despite a focus on ISO 9000 the UK has slipped down competitive league tables - overtaken by countries that do not use such methods • There is no one responsible for determining whether ISO 9000 works. IT IS AN ECONOMIC DISEASE OF WHICH THE UK SHOULD BE ASHAMED. • The inertia for continuing sub optimisation is designed in. • The management and compliance are healthy as the core business sickens

9. New Paradigm • Perspective • Outside - looking in - Systems thinking • Design • Demand - Value - Flow • Design against demand removes the abundant waste inherent in current systems design. • To eliminate waste - dismantle functional structures and "put variety in the line" • Give people the flexibility, training and capability to do the job • Acting on Demand improves Performance and Morale • People learn more when "trained against demand" • Managing the flow means thinking of service as "customers pulling value from the system"

10. New Paradigm (Cont.) • Decision Making • Integrated with work • Staff should recognise that they have Two Jobs • 1. Serve the Customer • 2. Constantly improve the work • Let the people decide? ………Not Quite • However - If the people, who do the work, have measures in their hands that help them understand and improve the work....and • they know how to act for improvement • then they can decide. • There is no substitute for learning by doing

11. New Paradigm (Cont.) • Measurement • Capability, variation - related to purpose • Measures that illustrate the systems ability to respond • To improve the flow you need measures of flow in the hands of the people who do the work • Capacity = (Work + Waste) • Capability Measures encourage people to focus their ingenuity on how the work WORKS. • Control and Understanding in the hands of the people who do the work • Never remove a measure without replacing it with a new one and helping people to understand how to use it • Attitude to Customers • What Matters to the customers

12. New Paradigm (Cont.) • Attitude to Suppliers • Co-operative • Role of Management • Act on the system • Focus on the 95% of performance dictated by the “System” & not the 5% that is staff & Mgt. • First Level managers - should work with staff ON THE WORK - not on the Staff • To hold the worker responsible for performance when in fact performance is governed by the system causes stress • When you introduce controls on human behaviour - you lose the game - particularly when those controls are at odds with the work • Leaders must be tough in getting demand, capacity and flow data and knowledge • Ethos should be one of Constant Learning

13. New Paradigm (Cont.) • Change • Adaptive - integral • In line with Eric Beinocker’s belief that: • To Endure and Grow • Systems must adapt, innovate and improve execution • Motivation • Must maximise Intrinsic Motivation

14. Check - Plan - Do • Check • What is the purpose of this system? • What is the nature of the Customer Demand? • Capability - What is the system achieving • Flow - How does the system work? • Why does the System behave this way? • Plan • What needs to change to improve performance against purpose? • What action could be taken and what are the predicted consequences? • Against what measurers should action be taken to ensure learning? • Do • Take the planned action and monitor the consequences versus purpose

15. Performance: To perform well and individual needs three things: • 1. Information related to the performance required • What do I have to do? • 2. Information about the method to be used • How do I use resources, information, equipment and so on – • By what method? • 3. Willingness to do the job? • This interests and motivates me – I want to do this • See - questions on performers p.124 - 127 • http://www.lean-service.com/home.asp