The irony in all of this is that while Tim Brown was calling Six Sigma and Lean “toxic”, IDEO, his firm, had been using many of the tools and methods from Toyota – the inventor of Lean Thinking.

An Orphaned Mother

Toyota is the mother whose ungrateful children have abandoned.  In IDEO’s case, in particular, while Tim Brown was attacking Six Sigma and Lean, his firm had been using it’s tools all along.  For example, IDEO’s patented Human-Centered Cards showcases several methods to help designers arrive at innovative design.  One card shows the 5 why’s.  Who invented the 5 why’s?  You got it, Taiichi Ohno, from Toyota.

Other tools on the Human-Centered Cards shared by Lean and Six Sigma practitioners as well as Design Thinkers are:

• Error Analysis (Failure Mode Effects Analysis – again, from Toyota)
• Flow Analysis (Process Mapping or Value Stream Map – again, from Toyota)
• Affinity Diagramming
• Activity Analysis (Value-Stream Mapping – again, from Toyota)
• A Day in the Life (Genchi Genbutsu – again, from Toyota)
• Empathy Tools (Gemba – again, from Toyota)

In All Fairness

I’m thankful that one of my early mentors was a trained ethnographer, with a PhD in Anthropology from the same graduate school I attended.  From him, I learned that humans are incredibly complex but simple at the same time and, to understand the human condition and be able to do something positive about it, we actually need all the help we can muster – from all disciplines.  His words and mentoring still ring true to this day.

To be fair, I greatly admire IDEO.  They have done some amazing work for companies and are defining how we understand innovation.  Their work has influenced me greatly.  Indeed, I often engage in amateur ethnographic expeditions, thanks to my early training in anthropology.^{1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14}

A Reformed Dichotomous Thinker, An Undercover Lean Thinker

Tim Brown is a reformed dichotomous thinker.  For him, it’s no longer black-or-white; lean thinking or design thinking; six sigma or design thinking.  In his words,

I have to admit that for a long time I was highly skeptical of design thinking’s ability to operate in a Six Sigma environment and I was once quoted in the Economist as saying that it was toxic to innovation.

I don’t think that anymore.  Having spent more time studying companies like Toyota I have realized that high quality (the goal of Six Sigma) is a great platform for new ideas (the goal of design thinking).  Similarly, as Chuck Jones implies, Six Sigma can help new ideas get better faster.  Having been involved in several first mover products at IDEO I can attest to the fact that very rarely is that first iteration the best possible product in terms of quality or functionality.

Perhaps we should think of design thinking and Six Sigma being part of a cycle, each feeding the other to create new and improved products, services and experiences. Of course the biggest challenge will be to build business cultures that are agile enough to incorporate both.

This is good, refreshing, and healthy.  After all, we need all the help we can muster if we are to better understand and more positively contribute to the human condition.

My hats off to Tim Brown and IDEO.

Dichotomous Thinking No More; Design Thinking and Lean Thinking – Yes.

We all love stories.  Stories have characters that we relate to or hate, there’s drama, heroes and villains, and the best stories stir the emotion.  The same goes for companies and their stories – all companies have a story.  Most stories are in-process still, whereas some have ended, such as the story of Enron.  What is your story?  If your company is amidst a transformation or a turnaround, what does that story look like?  What chapter are you in?

A Transformation is a fundamental change that penetrates the heart, mind, and soul of a company.  It is not superficial, or a flavor-of-the-month change.  In these tough economic times, superficial changes won’t do anymore – a fundamental change is often required to survive and, eventually, win.

More formally,

Transformation is a conscious and purposeful transition to a sustainable way of working at a significantly higher level of business performance and health, based on fundamental shifts in:

• Ambition
• Collective Self-Beliefs
• Behaviors and Culture
• Underlying Capabilities, Systems, & Processes

Conscious and Purposeful

A conscious and purposeful approach is a necessary attribute in sucessful transformations.  What does this mean?  In practical terms, it means the following:

• a transformation consciously and purposefully builds capability to deliver long-term performance
• a transformation consciously and purposefully builds organizational and individual skills and competencies
• a transformation is consciously and purposefully modeled by leadership – it is not “business as usual”
• a transformation consciously and purposefully reforms the cultural instincts of the organization

Creating Your Story

An effective story is simple and is most effectively executed when it is everybody’s story.  Like any story, it will contain characters and chapters.  Organizational stories are no different.

The proposed story approach above is one I’ve used several times with organization.  It has been effective because it is so simple.

1. Create your desired transformation story
2. The chapters in that story should have a performance metric attached to it – a metric that describes how we are doing.  Each chapter is a “theme”.
3. Lastly, this chapter should lay-out the portfolio of initiatives that are aligned to a theme or chapter and, when rolled-up, will collectively make your story a reality.

The recipe above is helpful and focused on the long-term, but tactically and attacks the short-term.  But the vision is toward the long-term.

Think about your story.  Does the story make sense?  Do the chapters fit together?  Do your initiatives fit within the chapters?

Transformation or Change efforts sometimes fail.  In fact, the numbers are staggering – most of them fail.  While the root cause is wide and varied, there are general themes or characteristics that are important to keep in mind in your own transformation efforts.  Think of these as symptoms also — that a failure is around the corner if you see these characteristics creeping-up or, better yet, you can course-correct if there’s still time.

The data on Transformation failures is instructive:

click to enlarge image

The main categories for why Transformations fail are ¹:

• Employee Resistance to Change (39%)
• Management Behavior not supportive of Change (33%)
• Lack of resources (14%)
• Other (14%)

The top two reasons are instructive and actionable – the root causes for most transformation failures have to do with people: employee resistance and management behavior.

Management Behavior that is not supportive of the change and Employee Resistance are the main factors that lead to transformation failures

Typical characteristics in transformation failures are the following:

• There is no obvious connection to outcomes that the organization values
• The aspirations of the organization are not clear, concise, or communicated
• The desired behaviors are not role-modeled, trained, or reinforced
• The top team is not aligned
• The informal “how things get done” remain inconsistent with espoused values
• The change champions lose interest and move to the “next” change program
• The leaders charged with implementing the change do not possess the requisite knowledge, skills, and abilities

In the next post, we’ll discuss how to surgically address the failure characteristics above, create a transformation story that is rigorously architected along broad themes, the chapters in that story, and the key initiatives that those chapters produce, and the role of the leadership team in all of it.

For example, let’s take the Andon Cord, a tool in the Toyota Production System.

An Andon is a cord that hangs on both sides of a production line. It is to be ‘pulled’ when a problem happens on the line and, when pulled, production stops on the line, loud irritating Japanese music blasts through the speakers, bringing attention to everybody that there is a problem.  The team gathers together, conducts root cause analysis (5-why’s), implements countermeasures (solutions on the spot), then the production line start again and the Japanese music stops.

Now, suppose your organization breeds fear in its people and that questioning the status quo or speaking-up when there is a problem is viewed as bad. In this type of environment, implementing the ‘tool’ of an Andon Cord will not work.  Why?  An Andon Cord is just a tool, but it represents an organizational tenet of “if there’s a problem, please speak your mind and be not afraid.”  If that tenet doesn’t exist, then it makes sense that nobody will pull the Andon Cord.

Changing Worldview, Changing Behaviors

Lean Thinking is more about changing worldview and behaviors:

when you change a person’s worldview, a change in their behavior will follow, then they begin to improve their world

In this specific example, an Andon Cord did not work because the fundamental worldview of the company is that they do not want to know if there are problems, or that they do not value the employees’ opinions or input — THAT is a bigger problem than the cumulative effect of all defects in the company (more precisely, that is the root cause of waste as well as issues in organizational effectiveness).

For this example, here is what is at play:

1. Speak-up if you see a problem
2. Don’t pass problems up or down the value chain
3. Improve the way you work, the service, and the product
4. There is an end-customer, but the person upstream and downstream from you is also your customer

If an organization doesn’t subscribe to these basic principles, then no matter how many Andon Cords are available at your company — nobody will pull them.

Underutilized People

Switching gears now.  A related tenet to the Respect for People Pillar, is the idea of Underutilized People.  While not officially one of the 7 Wastes in Lean, Underutilized People clearly sits in the Respect for People Pillar.

Barry Schwartz, in an inspiring TED talk on Practical Wisdom, explains the impact on the organization and customers when the company structure and values creates underutilized people:

In this talk, Schwartz tells us about a hospital janitor, showing the responsibilities associated with the job in their job description.  Of all the Janitor job descriptions, not a single one involves interacting with other people.  When Schwartz interviewed hospital janitors about the challenges of their jobs, all the problems they listed dealt with other people.

For example, good janitors knew not to vacuum the floor when guests were napping, or not to mop the floor when a patient was walking the hallways and restoring his strength.  Being a hospital janitor involves interactions that require kindness, care and empathic thought that’s not in the job description.

To test Barry Schwartz’s findings, I went to Monster.com (NYSE: MWW) and search for “Hospital Janitor”.  The job description is one I found for an Elderly Care Facility:

Cleans and maintains entry lobby, including cleaning of windows, doors, mopping floors, vacuuming carpets, etc., at least daily, and more if necessary to maintain excellent entrance appeal.

Cleans laundry room, community room, conference room, and management offices on a daily basis.

Vacuums hallways on a daily basis.

Cleans community bathrooms on a daily basis, more if necessary to maintain in a sanitary manner.

Cleans stairways and elevators on a regularly scheduled basis.

Does cleaning of units, including stoves, refrigerators, bathrooms, floors, windows, etc.

Reports all maintenance repairs needed to Maintenance Supervisor.

Sweeps and cleans parking lot on daily basis.

Waters flower box on a daily basis (seasonal).

Picks up trash from grounds.

Uses hose to clean front entry walks.

Changes all light bulbs in hallways and common areas.

Does minor work orders for residents and/or management as assigned by Maintenance Supervisor.

Reliable…Must be able to work a flexible work schedule

Not one of the requirements deals with elderly patients, listening to them tell war stories, smiling at them, or any other small nice-ities that can make the day for an elderly person.  This job description reflects the values of the company.

A Long-Winded, Jagged Post

Yes, a lot of inter-related ideas in this post.  Here’s the point:

Worldview and Values matter – those dictate the behaviors of everybody in the company.  When “tools” don’t work, that is because the values don’t support the “tools”.  Focus on Worldview and Behavior — then the rest will follow.

LaDereyon (born 5/2001) is the oldest brother who is protective of his younger siblings. LaDereyon loves to play computer games. LaDereyon loves to go to school.  Some of his favorite subjects in school include math, science, social studies and reading.  LaDereyon also likes to play outdoor activities including swimming and playing basketball and football.

CeNea (born 6/2005) is a happy child who is always smiling and giving hugs.  CeNea is a very talkative child who loves to use her imagination.  CeNea loves to watch Dora the Explorer.  CeNea also loves to play outdoors.  Some of her favorite outdoor activities include running and playing on the jungle gym.

LeJean (born 4/2007) is the youngest of the sibling group.  LeJean has a very playful disposition.  He loves giving hugs and kisses.  LeJean loves to play with his two older siblings. LeJean also likes to play independently and try new activities on his own.

If you are interested, please contact Jean Sailors or Crystal Quinlan.

Please help spread the word.  Tell you friends on Facebook, Twitter, and everyone you know.

click on the images below for a larger picture