“Citizens face many front doors…”

June 7, 2017 giantknave Brain Farts Demand, failure demand, Integrated teams, Jeremy Cox, John Seddon, Joined up government, Purpose, System, Systems Thinking

Governments all over the world want to get the most out of the money they spend on public services – for the benefit of the citizens requiring the services, and the taxpayers footing the bill.

Government officials regularly devise initiatives, and even new departments, aimed at getting their myriad of agencies to work better together.

However, looking at this from the outside, the media regularly uncover seemingly daft (and sometimes tragic) instances where government agencies have failed to effectively act, connect and co-operate with each other. In such instances, each agency appears to ‘the person on the street’ to have been wearing blinkers with their ‘common sense’ radars turned to ‘exceedingly low’.

But is it right to lay blame on the agencies or, worse, the people acting within them? In the majority of cases, I’d suggest that the answer would clearly be ‘no’. We should be looking at the bigger ‘whole of public service’ system that they are designed to operate within.

A new phrase was termed some years back called ‘Joined up government’. The Oxford dictionary defines it as:

“A method of government characterized by effective communication between different departments and co-ordination of policies.”

When a dictionary defines a word, it usually provides the reader with an example sentence showing its proper usage. In this instance, the first example sentence given is a negative one, as in:

“There is an obvious lack of joined-up government here” (Oxford Dictionary)

i.e. Governments openly recognise that there is a big problem (a lack of togetherness)…and that they would love to ‘solve’ it…but it’s regularly in the ‘too hard basket’!

The purpose of this post is to share (what is to me) an important (and very well presented) 30 min. video by Jeremy Cox¹: Budget Management and People Centred Services that nicely explains, by way of reference to a real case study, the ‘multi agency’ problem and how to go about changing it.

If you are interested (particularly if you work within the public sector) then I’d expect that watching it should be a worthwhile (and thought provoking) use of your time.

Right…if you’ve got to here then I’ll assume that you’ve watched the video…the rest of this post pulls out (what I believe to be) key things said by Jeremy Cox in his presentation (blue italics below) and my ‘wrap-around’ narrative.

Note: What follows is incomplete and not a substitute for watching the video. It’s just an aide-memoire so that I (and you) don’t have to watch the video every time to pull out the key points or discuss it with our colleagues.

Jeremy Cox starts at a summary level by walking us through “four critical steps”:

1. The first thing to do is to study your system…and, just to be crystal clear, YOU (those responsible for the system) have to study it, and do so WITH those who operate it. A consultant cannot do this for (i.e. to) you².

“You have to go and study because if you see it with your own eyes, you can’t deny it. If someone ‘tells you’, then you can ‘rationalise’ it away quite easily.”

2. From studying your system, you can then see and understand the effects of (supposed) ‘controls’ on its performance.

3. Only when we understand (at a root cause) WHY the system operates as it does, should we redesign…because then, and only then, is such a redesign based on meaningful evidence…as opposed to the usual ‘conventional wisdom’ or ‘current in-vogue ideology’;

and finally:

4. Devise new measures, and move to a new model of leadership.

Cox then goes into each step in some detail.

Going back to Step 1: Cox talks about studying demand.

He takes us through a case study of a real person in need, and their interactions with multiple organisations (many ‘front doors’) and how the traditional way of thinking seriously fails them and, as an aside, costs the full system a fortune.

“Understand demand in context….don’t understand people from the point of view of your organisation, understand the person and what matters to them about living a better life.”

The case study is sad…and yet not really a surprise – we all kind of know that it’s true. It shows the huge power of following some cases around the full system.

In explaining Step 2, Cox opens up the madness within silo’d (i.e. single department) thinking, which is driven by their ‘budgetary controls’.

He identifies three survival principles in play, and the resulting anti-systemic controls that result:

a) “We must prioritise [our] services for the most in need” which leads to attempts to stop entry into the service, and then the requirement to break through escalating thresholds of eligibility.

Such ‘screening out’ logic creates the following madness: “Your case isn’t serious enough yet…go away until things get worse!”

b) “We must stick to what we do” which leads to “I can see that you need A and B for you to get better…but, here, we only do A.”

Cox gives a real example of an alcoholic with depression being turned away by mental health practitioners because “we don’t work on alcoholism – you need to solve that first and then come back with your depression”. We can predict that such unhelpfulness will lead the needy citizen towards a rather large drink!

c) “We must limit service delivery” which leads to attempts at closing cases, doing things on the cheap, and setting time limits…all of which are about pushing things through at the expense of the needy citizen…which will lead to failure demand (probably popping up unexpectedly in another department…and therefore not seen as linked).

The redesign at Step 3 requires different principles.

Cox makes the obvious point that the actual redesign can’t be explained up-front because, well…how can it be -you haven’t studied your system yet!

…but, generally, it is likely that “genuinely integrated, local-by-default problem solving teams will emerge from [following the steps]”.

A clarification: ‘Genuinely integrated’ doesn’t mean a multi-disciplined shared building where people regularly come together for, say, case review meetings…and then go back to their ‘corners’ and work to their existing (i.e. competing) policies and procedures.

A nice test from Cox:

“How do you know a team is genuinely integrated rather than co-located?…All you have to do is look in the fridge – nobody’s written their department’s name on the milk!”

And so to Step 4: New measures and new leadership

[Once you’ve successfully redesigned the system] “The primary focus is on having really good citizen-focused measure: ’are you improving’, ‘are you getting better’, ‘is the demand that you’re placing reducing over time’.”

Notice that these measures are about the purpose of the system (i.e. for the citizen), and NOT about the activities performed within the system. It’s not about the volumes of calls taken or visits performed or payments made or cases closed or…[carry on naming activities].

“You have to shift leaders from managing the budget top-down to adding value to the process of studying, and improving outcomes for individuals.”

The point here is that you are never done. The outcomes from a redesign can radically shift performance, but you’ll quickly be ‘back at square one’ if you haven’t grasped the WHY and don’t ‘kick on’ to yet more learning, and yet more improvement – becoming better every day – for the good of citizens, and (importantly) for the pride of your employees.

To close

What’s most interesting to me from the video is the graphic explanation of one unit of demand, a needy citizen in a really shitty situation, being bounced around – presenting at public service ‘front doors’ in multiple and seemingly unrelated ‘cases’, with each agency doing what they can but not what is required….and the needy slip ever further into their personal quagmire.

“We limit what we do to ‘what we do’, not to what the person needs.”

Cox makes the hugely important point that, once you open your mind, then the study and redesign of the work is relatively easy. The hard bit is re-conceiving the ‘system of management’. This takes real leadership and (perhaps most importantly) self-development.

Cox closes with the following comment:

“Some of the most rewarding work that I have ever done is just working with these integrated teams who are out…on the ground, with good leadership, learning how to solve problems for citizens. You actually see people’s lives turned around and people who otherwise would have been dead who are now still alive.”

This is powerful stuff! There can’t be much more meaning to anyone’s working life than that.

Footnotes:

1. The video covers one session within a ‘Beyond Budgeting’ event run by Vanguard Consulting over in the UK. The first 3 mins. is an introduction from John Seddon, and then Jeremy Cox (a Vanguard consultant) presents the rest.

Note: Cox refers to names of UK government departments (e.g. The DWP). If you live elsewhere in the world then you are likely to have similar agencies, just with different names.

2. A consultant cannot do it for you: I should clarify that an experienced ‘systems thinking’ coach CAN facilitate you through studying your system and its redesign….BUT they aren’t ‘doing it’ – you are!

I have a post with the ink half dry that explains and expands this point called ‘Smoke and Mirrors’. I guess I should get on and finish it now.

3. The NZ government is setting up a Social Investment Agency. Its “focus is fundamentally about changing the lives of the most vulnerable New Zealanders by focusing on individuals and families, understanding their needs better, and doing more of what is most likely to give the best results”. I like the intent. I hope that those involved watch (or have already watched) the Jeremy Cox video, and consider the messages within.

“Why is your proposed change so profound?”

November 3, 2016November 3, 2016 giantknave Brain Farts All Blacks, Donella Meadows, Elements, Interconnections, Purpose, System, Systems Thinking, transformation

My recent serialised post titled “Your Money or your Life!” proposed that every ‘large corporate’* should make a meaningful change…that would be for the good of all.

Wow, that would be great!

* Where ‘large corporate’ is short form for ‘controlled by free-floating short-term thinking shareholders’.

I got thinking (as is often the case after pressing the ‘publish’ button) about readers thinking:

“Erm, okay – interesting perspective – but why is the suggested change supposedly so profound?”

…and this caused me to question whether I had got the ‘this is a potential game changer!’ point across.

Note: What follows is relevant when considering ANY proposed change, not just the contents of my last post!

And so to a ‘systems thinking’ explanation:

First, a definition:

“A system is an interconnected set of elements that is coherently organised in a way that achieves something.

If you look at that definition closely for a minute, you can see that a system must consist of three kinds of things: elements, interconnections, and a function or purpose¹.” (Donella Meadows)

Going back to an organisation (yours, mine,…wherever) as a system to ponder:

The Elements are pretty obvious – they include the people, the products and services offered, the physical buildings and resources, lots of intangible pieces (distinct departments, teams within) and so on…;

The Interconnections are the “the relationships that hold the elements together” e. g. the physical flows of work, the business policies and guidelines, external laws and regulations, the communications (including the gossip!), and flows of information (signals that go to decision or action points…which may or may not trigger reactions);

The Purpose of a system, whilst essential, is often hard to see (even if you think you know what it is!):

“The best way to deduce the system’s purpose is to watch for a while to see how the system behaves…Purposes are deduced from behaviour, not from rhetoric or stated goals.”

What you see may be very different to what you are told.

…and so, if you want to change an organisational system, presumably through a desire to improve (and even transform) it, then you have three “kinds of things” to play with.

Taking each ‘kind of thing’ in turn:

Elements

“Changing elements usually has the least effect on the system.”

Using rugby and the All Blacks to illustrate the point: The coaches can change one or two players but, if they keep everything else the same, then not too much will change.

Now, sure, some elements may be very important (perhaps the introduction of a brilliant goal kicker) but, even then, the worth of such a change is hugely constrained by the rest of the system.

You might change ALL the elements (e.g. players) but if you keep the interconnections (such as the game plan, methods of communication, information sharing, the environment of trust and respect…) and purpose the same, then very little change may occur.

A positive example of this phenomenon: The All Blacks won the rugby World Cup in 2011 and 2015, making them the first team ever to achieve ‘back-to-back’ rugby World Cups. They did this with a core of extremely influential world-class players³…who then promptly retired!

The world rugby media wondered how the All Blacks would rebuild, given the apparently gaping holes these players would leave. Many a pundit envisioned dark days ahead.

And yet a few weeks ago (on 22^nd Oct 2016), despite introducing many new players, the All Blacks broke the world record for the number of consecutive international games won against ‘Tier one’ rugby nations (18 games). In short, rather than going backwards, they have ‘kicked on’ to even higher levels.

Their purpose and interconnections have clearly been shown to be stronger than the elements (e.g. players).

To the world of work: and organisational ‘restructures’. If you re-jig your hierarchical structure, changing the departments and faces within, but keep the methods of interconnection (the management system) and the underlying purpose the same (whether profit or political ideology), then not much has really changed.

“A system generally goes on being itself, changing only slowly if at all, even with complete substitution of its elements – as long as its interconnections and purposes remain intact.”

Further, you may have convinced yourself that your problems were ‘because of’ individuals…but consider that you may have ‘cut out’ the symptom and not the cause. If you don’t learn from this then you can expect another (costly) restructure in maybe 12 months time…and again…and again.

Interconnections

“Changing interconnections in a system can change it dramatically.”

So, staying with rugby, let’s move to the English national team. In contrast to the All Blacks, they have had two terrible World Cups.

In 2011: they travelled to New Zealand and were awful (I know – I watched them!) They were heavily criticised for their attitude, and off field behaviour – they acted as if they were on an all expenses paid holiday…and, in the end, they were! The coach (Martin Johnson) resigned.

In 2015: they had home advantage – hopes were high. The whole of England was supporting them…but they exited the competition at the pool stages – the first time in their history. The coach (Stuart Lancaster) resigned.

So how has 2016 gone? Well, they’ve played 9, won 9…which includes:

achieving the Grand Slam (which they haven’t done for 13 years);
a 3-0 tour whitewash of Australia (a rare achievement); and
rising to be ranked 2^nd in the World (from 8^th)…just behind those mighty All Blacks.

So what’s changed? Well, England appointed a new manager (Eddie Jones)…but he has stuck with the core of previous players (those elements).

Instead of wholesale changing of the elements, he’s changed the interconnections – how they work together – resulting in players that had become labelled as ‘bad boys’, ‘past their best’ and ‘donkeys’⁴ being reborn, putting in controlled, consistent and herculean performances.

We don’t yet know whether the change will be long lasting…but it has most definitely been profound.

Back to the world of work: Perhaps the best known modern(ish) example of keeping the elements but changing the interconnections has to be NUMMI:

General Motor’s Fremont car plant was one of the worst performing plants in the whole industry, with high costs, low quality and terrible worker relations. GM closed the plant in 1982.

Toyota, wanting to start production in America, struck a joint-venture agreement with GM and the Fremont plant reopened as NUMMI in 1985. They rehired 85% of the original workforce (who still belonged to the Union – considered by GM as a serious problem). After taking 100s of the workers over to Japan to experience totally different thinking (involving a high degree of meaningful worker interacting), these learning’s were put into practise and the factory went on to produce the lowest cost, highest quality cars within its first year!

“Toyota took a bunch of [apparent] F Players, retrained them, put them into a great system, and magically they became superstars.” (Pfeffer and Sutton)

In short: Changing from a command-and-control management system to one that better understands systems and people will be dramatic.

Purpose

“A change in purpose changes a system profoundly, even if every element and interconnection remains the same.”

So, to switch from rugby to football: There’s an annual knockout competition in English Football, known as ‘The FA cup’. First played in 1871, it is the oldest football competition in the world. There is something rather magical about it because, given that it is open to any eligible club down to level 10 of the English football league system, it allows amateur minnows to mix it with the millionaire mega-stars…and, every now and then, create an upset – a minnow becomes a giant killer!

I searched for a game between a low-league minnow and a 1^st division giant…and came up with Wrexham vs. Arsenal back in 1992⁵. Both appeared to have had the same purpose – to win the game – but I suggest that their true purposes were rather different (and not so obviously stated).

Arsenal’s stars were probably trying to keep themselves injury free, to focus on other important matters – win their league (the 1^st division) and perhaps get into their respective national sides (it was European Cup year)….and maybe avoid the embarrassment of defeat.

In contrast, every man in the Wrexham team was aiming to become a legend!

Wrexham won 2 – 1. The crowd went nuts!

But here’s an interesting point: Wrexham, the giant killing minnow, went back to their low-league competition the following weekend and drew 0 – 0 at home with Maidstone United. Maidstone who? Exactly! The same players and staff, same coaching system, same methods of communications…different purpose!

This example, I hope, serves to illustrate the point that a (true) change in purpose will be profound, even whilst retaining the same elements and interconnections.

To the world of work: Even better than a transient change in purpose (like Wrexham’s), would be a permanent one!

…and so we finally come to that ‘profound point’ from my recent serialised post: long-term profit sharing. Bringing ‘Live Money’ into an organisation permanently changes its purpose, for the good of all…which would lead to experimentation with new interconnections…which would reinvigorate the elements (or at least naturally sort through those that fit vs. those that wish to pursue something else).

All in all – a profound change to the system. It would be…well…‘Transformed’.

To close: So, what if your ‘leader‘ changes?

Let’s say your organisation hires a new CEO – an element, but a central one. Everyone’s chattering about this ‘big change’…but will it change much?

The answer is “it depends”.

It will depend upon whether the leader understands systems and people (through education and experience, or perhaps instinctively)…because:

if the new leader goes on to change interconnections and, even better, the (actual) purpose then transformational change will likely occur; but
if that leaders attempts change merely through changing the elements (new people, new departments, a new IT system, some new products and brands….) then not much will actually change.

Changing the interconnections relates to the management system.

Changing the purpose relates to why the organisation exists, and for whom.

…and I hope I don’t need to say that a fancy new ‘purpose statement’ doesn’t, of itself, change a thing!

Footnote:

1. The word ‘Function’ is generally used for non-human systems and ‘Purpose’ for human systems.

2. Quote source: All quotes (unless otherwise stated) are taken from the excellent book ‘Thinking in Systems’ written by the late Donella Meadows (a giant to add at some point).

3. All Black players that retired after 2015 rugby World Cup:

Richie McCaw (148 caps): Regarded by many as the greatest ever rugby player, Most capped rugby player of all time, 3x World Rugby Player of the Year….and his accolades go on and on;
Dan Carter (112 caps): Regarded by many as the greatest ever no. 10 (fly half) player, Highest international test points scorer of all time (1,598), 3x World Rugby Player of the Year…and on and on;
Ma’a Nonu (103 caps) and Conrad Smith (94 caps). Most successful mid-field pairing;
…and other great players: Kevin Mealamu (132 caps), Tony Woodcock (118 caps)

4. England players: If you are a rugby fan then I’m referring to the likes of Dylan Hartley (‘bad boy’), Chris Robshaw (‘has been’) and James Haskell (‘donkey’). Sorry chaps…but this is what you had seemingly become!

5. FA Cup Giant Killing Context: Wrexham came last in League 4 the year before (i.e. came 92^nd out of all the 92 league 1 – 4 clubs). At the complete opposite end of the spectrum, Arsenal won League 1 (i.e. came 1^st out of these 92 clubs).

6. Explaining the main post Image: The system is made up of ropes (elements), knots (interconnections) and purpose (what it is intended to achieve)….which may be to look pretty or to hold a heavy load.

7. Clarification: This post is NOT saying that purpose is the only lever you should focus on. It is merely explaining the likely impact of working on each type of lever. We should be working on improving all three ‘kinds of things’ and, being a system, they are all related!

Where’s the meat in your sandwich?!

August 22, 2016 giantknave Brain Farts environment, John Seddon, Performance, Profit, Purpose, research, System

I came across a LinkedIn ‘research’ report that had been shared on a social media platform the other day. It had a grand title:

The 2016 Workforce Purpose Index: ‘Purpose at work – the largest global study on the Role of Purpose in the Workforce.’

Mmmm, sounds interesting. And, wow, ‘largest global study’ – must be important – I’d better have a read…and so I did…and then I found myself doing a bit of frothing at the mouth. I do that when stuff winds me up…I’m okay, honest 🙂

Now I am absolutely NOT getting at the person who shared the ‘report’, or any persons liking or positively commenting on it. Just to clear up any potential confusion at the start: I totally agree that the premise of ‘purpose at work’ is to be ‘liked’….and in fact passionately argued for. An earlier post uses an Ackoff essay to explain why this so.

But here’s some other stuff that I thought as I read through the ‘report’:

Helpfulness?

The introductory pages deliver the usual ‘listen up people – purpose matters’ message. This is, for me, like the ‘Buy low, sell high’ advice – blindingly obvious…but not particularly useful.

Profit?

And so to the page on “Purpose brings profit”: Yes, I agree with this…but, at the risk of repeating my ‘blindingly obvious’ mantra, this shouldn’t really be surprising i.e. if you passionately understand and serve your customers with what they actually need (this is fundamentally different to ‘selling to them’), then you have a high chance of success. Simples.

What the report fails to tackle, let alone drive home, is that many organisations get their logic ‘in a twist’ i.e. their (subconscious?) thinking is that ‘If we craft, and then regularly, state a cool-sounding purpose, then we can focus on our real purpose of profit.’ This is NOT what ‘purpose brings profit’ means!

A focus on growth and profitability doesn’t unlock purpose – indeed it will likely do the exact opposite. This isn’t to say that you can’t grow and be profitable. Of course you can. It is to correctly state the cause-effect relationship between a fanatical focus on a meaningful purpose (cause) delivering sustainable and healthy growth and profitability (effect).

Again, I’ve written about the ‘what and why’ of this previously in a post titled ‘Oxygen isn’t what life is about’.

People?

To quote from the report:

“Key Finding: Given the right role and environment, [people] are ready to tap into their purpose and reach a higher potential at work”.

Now, I absolutely agree with this statement but I get sick of, what I consider to be, the spectacularly obvious being dressed up as a ‘finding’. This is ‘McGregor 101’: How you treat me will determine a massive amount of how I behave.

And so to the next quote:

“this correlation of satisfaction at work and purpose orientation was consistent in virtually every country and industry studied.”

This is where I write “No sh1t Sherlock!” That would be because we are all humans – which is a nice segue to Dilbert, and the Theory of Evolution.

It’s a bit like all those scientific research projects spending scarce grant money to confirm that ‘water quenches our thirst’ or ‘alcohol gets us drunk’ or [insert one from today’s supposed news].

The trouble, for me, with stating the obvious but missing out the important contextual piece is that organisations then run away shouting “oooh, quick, quick…we’ve got to find our purpose! Let’s gather round and play with some words.”

And they spectacularly miss the point.

Purpose driven?

So let’s get to the nub of my critique: The report implies that there are three different types of people*, these being those who are primarily:

Purpose-driven; or
Status-driven; or
Money-driven.

They then follow this line of reasoning with….have you guessed it?…the recommendation to search for and select purpose-oriented ‘talent’. It even suggests adding the ‘what is your primary drive?’ dimension to an organisation’s talent selection criteria 😦

The hilarity of this is that they may recruit lots of (currently) purpose-driven people…and then kill it. It’s the same old talent message – don’t endlessly seek talent, recognise and tirelessly work to unleash the talent from within.

So, back to the ‘research report’: sure you can ask someone to respond to survey questions as to which category they currently associate themselves most with (i.e. purpose, status, money)…but where is the consideration as to WHY someone might answer as they did.

* are they ‘types’ of people….or are they outcomes that people have arrived at or been driven to?

Some examples:

how many of you started a new job with passion and purpose, but within 6 months – 1 year, had been beaten back to surviving on merely the money and seeking some status to get noticed?
how many of you started your ‘careers’ focused on getting on the ladder and earning enough money to gain a roof over your heads and have a family….and how many of you have reached a certain level of wealth and/or experience where your priorities have changed?¹

To conclude:

Yep, purpose is important.

Yep, I can’t really disagree with the blindingly obvious littered throughout the ‘report’.

…but if the report were a sandwich, it is bland, limp and empty – where’s the important and insightful stuff that needed to be said?

In short, where’s the meat in the sandwich?!

Does this matter? Well, yes, it does. The problem with such reports is that they allow the top management of traditional (‘command and control’) organisations to gleefully wave them about, shouting “nothing to see here – we know all of this and, even better, we’ve got it totally covered!”

Total codswallop. As I wrote in an earlier ‘Blackadder’ post, a report is only valuable if it covers what needs to be said, not what they want to hear.

The report spectacularly misses the huge point that:

“People’s behaviour is a product of their system. It is only by changing [the system] that we can expect a change in behaviour.” (John Seddon)

What sort of system environmental things am I talking about? If you read Deming’s 14 points for management you will get a good idea. At a high level, let’s compare two environments and then you tell me which would enable you to focus on your purpose and which would see you struggling to survive through status and money:

Traditional	A better way!
Hierarchical (authority…superiority)	‘Social’ (responsibility, equality)
Fear/ blame	Trust/ ‘safe to fail’
Rules and consequences	Guidance and support
Growth and Profitability	Customer, customer, customer
Budgets, financial measures, cost cutting	‘Purpose’ operational measures, variation
Implement ‘best practise’ on the people (plans)	Problem solving by the people (experiments)
Cascaded personal (or team) targets	Value stream capability measures
Judgement, through rating and ranking	Coaching, through non-judgemental feedback
Carrot and stick compliance	Intrinsically motivated
Incentives	Profit sharing
Competitions, and hero (people) awards	Collaboration, and achievement focus
…	…

Whether a person can (will) be purpose-oriented is hugely down to the environment in which they work. Simples.

Footnotes

1. This is rather obvious: take your pick from ‘Herzberg’s Motivators & Hygiene factors’ or ‘Maslow’s hierarchy of needs’.

2. I ‘get’ that LinkedIn are merely trying to drum up business by suggesting we all need to find ‘talent’ but….grrrrrr.

There’s no such thing as…

August 1, 2016November 2, 2023 giantknave Brain Farts customer, Henry Ford, Peter Drucker, Sam Walton, System

This post is a bit ‘tongue in cheek’ (so if you don’t agree 100% then please don’t take it too much to heart 🙂 ) but it expresses what I’ve thought for years now.

A business fashion started back in, oooh, probably the 1980s – talking about ‘internal customers’ within organisations. The idea being that you are the customer for the person upstream from you – they are producing for you – and, in turn, the person downstream from you is your customer…and on and on…in a long chain from the start to the finish of a value stream. Lots of lovely internal customers.

But here’s the thing: They aren’t your customer – they are a part of (i.e. colleagues within) your system!

Yes, yes, I know that you are reliant on them and then the next lot are in turn reliant on you…but that’s just because of the design of the (current) method.

And, yes, yes, I know that it would be jolly nice if you all worked together in really efficient and effective ways – but that doesn’t make for a customer relationship. Further, it can be harmful to think in this way.

What is a customer?

I’ll draw on a set of related quotes to assist me here:

“The purpose of a business is to create a customer.”¹ (Peter Drucker)

“It is not the employer who pays the wages. Employers only handle the money. It is the customer who pays the wages.” (Henry Ford)

“There is only one boss. The customer. And he can fire everybody in the company from the chairman down simply by spending his money somewhere else.” (Sam Walton)

The point being that a customer is, by definition, external to the system. Everyone and everything within the system is (or should be) there for them.

Without the (true) customer, there is nothing.

Why does this ‘internal customer’ label bother me so?

Such ‘internal customer’ logic causes us to think that we must do what they ask, and not question them too much, along the lines of the ‘customer is always right’ and ‘give the customer what they want’ mantras.

It presents a suboptimal ‘them’ and ‘us’ situation rather than a collaborative horizontal (across the system) ‘we’.

Once you think in terms of internal customers, it’s only a short and painful step towards the dreaded ‘Service Level Agreement’ (SLA) game show. Grrrr.

A massive risk within the ‘internal customer’ logic is the creation of a static system, one in which the method (and targets) becomes defined in quick drying cement.

If I think of you as my customer, then there’s unlikely to be much challenge from me as to whether your role should change, or even exist…and you sure as hell aren’t going to appreciate any such line of reasoning from me – who the hell am I to suggest this – you are my customer, I am merely your supplier!

Further, as my customer, you may consider that you know best, that your wish should be my command and that I should be grateful to be of service to you. Indeed, you may even score me on how well I treat you. Ouch!

How many of you reading this post have been asked to do something by your ‘internal customer’ and thought that what they were asking for was nuts…and how many of you didn’t get the chance to meaningfully discuss this with them, and had to carry it out anyway?

Even worse, how many of you have switched off from even thinking about whether your internal customer’s request makes sense and have merely become ‘order takers’.

What a load of nonsense. Let’s just throw the ‘internal customer‘ language in the bin.

“But what about treating all our colleagues with respect?!”

I can almost hear some HR departments chiding my thinking as being disrespectful to my fellow employees. No, it’s not!

In fact, it’s the opposite. I think it’s disingenuous for me to pretend that my work colleagues are my customer. They are far far more than that – we are reliant on each other, to keep our jobs, to grow ourselves, to stimulate each other, to want to come to work…to spend our working lives delivering something meaningful to this world. This is soooo much more than being merely thought of as ‘internal customers’.

As colleagues, we need a robust relationship, not one of diffidence and servitude. We need to respectfully challenge each other, work hard to listen to and understand each other’s worldviews…and become better, closer and wiser for this.

We are not ‘internal customers’, we are colleagues.

Addendum:

I always pick a trusted colleague (from an ever widening group of ‘pioneers’) to have a read of my posts before I press publish. I was particularly nervous about this one as I felt that it could just be me ranting about an ‘issue I have with the world’ (again 🙂 ).

…but I got a great response back, with the following gem (thanks A):

“Are the All Blacks ‘customers’ to one another, or are they a team with a shared purpose? By using the term ‘customer’ where it doesn’t belong… it distracts us from understanding who our real customers are.”

This made me giggle. Turning to the wonderful game of rugby, I had visions of the ‘backs’ telling the ‘forwards’ that they are their customers…I don’t think that this would go down too well.

How about the following, even dafter rugby situations:

the jumper in the line-out considering themselves as the customer of the hooker throwing the ball in;
the winger considering themselves as the customer of the no. 10, who is kicking the ball through for them to get on the end of; or, at its simplest
the potential receiver considering themselves as the customer of the possible passer of the ball.

What a load of guff! They’re a team that have to work together, as equals; that have to understand, and swiftly react, to what’s around them; that have to make the selfless pass or tackle; and that have to pick each other up and genuinely offer words of support when perhaps it doesn’t go quite as desired.

They are not ‘internal customers’, they are team mates.

And so, to complete the title of this post: There’s no such thing as ‘internal customers’

Footnote:

1. I’m not a massive fan of this particular Peter Drucker quote, but it fits for this post.

Why so? Unfortunately, businesses have become far too adept at creating customers and, as a result, we have rampant consumerism.

I reflect on Professor Tim Jackson (author of ‘Prosperity without Growth’) clearly calling out THE problem for humanity, and what we* might do about it (* requiring brilliant political leadership).

His take-away quote “The story about us – people being persuaded to spend money we don’t have on things we don’t need to create impressions that won’t last on people we don’t care about.” Prof. Tim Jackson TED talk.

Oh…so that’s why ‘Command and Control’ doesn’t work very well!

July 11, 2016July 11, 2016 giantknave Brain Farts Animated, Command and control, Deterministic, Henry Ford, Management model, Peter Checkland, Russell Ackoff, Social, Stafford Beer, System, System types, Systems Thinking

Warning (or advert for some): Sometimes I write long(er) ‘foundational’ type posts – this is one of them 🙂

Russ Ackoff researched and wrote a great deal about systems.

It is within his writings¹ that I find an excellent explanation about why many organisations adopted the command and control management model, why there is a major problem with this and, most importantly, why there is a better way.

First, A recap:

Before looking at types of systems, I should allow Ackoff to remind us what is meant by ‘a system’ and why this matters:

“A system is a network of inter-dependant components that work together to try to accomplish the aim of the system…

The two key pieces here are that:

there is an aim; and
it is made up of parts that need to work together (either directly or indirectly) to achieve that aim

If you have parts but no aim then you don’t have a system…you simply have a ‘collection’.

If you have a part that (truly) isn’t required to achieve the aim then it isn’t actually part of the system…which is why your ‘appendix’ body part got its name.

…If each part of a system, considered separately, is made to operate as efficiently as possible, the system as a whole will not operate as effectively as possible…

The heart and lungs are parts of the body but if they function according to what’s best ‘for themselves’ then they won’t function as required for the overall good of the whole. It’s no good if the brain is telling the heart and lungs to ‘work flat out’ to run like hell from a chasing pack of lions and these organs both respond with a “no thanks, this doesn’t suit us!” The same is true for parts of (e.g. functions within) organisations.

…The performance of a system depends more on how its components interact than on how they act independently of each other…

You can buy a ‘light as a feather’ carbon frame, an awesome set of aero wheels and a precision engineered 11-speed group set but you can’t ride them as a bike if they don’t fit together. Further, someone with a basic ‘sit up and beg’ bike frame with cheap wheels and components that do fit will easily beat you in a bike race.

…When a system is taken apart it loses its essential properties.”

If you take apart an alarm clock, you will have all of the parts necessary for the system but the disassembled collection of parts isn’t sufficient to tell you the time.

The above has huge implications.

So, on to Ackoff’s system types:

Ackoff defined a number of types of systems² and the problems that occur when an organisation adopts a management model that does not match the correct system type.

Here goes….

Type 1: Deterministic (e.g. mechanisms)

A deterministic system is one which has no purpose and neither do its component parts. This might seem rather strange…”Erm, I thought you said a system had to have an aim?!” – the point is that a deterministic system normally serves a purpose of an entity external to it, such as its creator. Its function, and that of its parts, is simply to provide that service when required.

Mechanisms are the most obvious examples of deterministic systems: An alarm clock is such a system. Its purpose (to tell the time) has been provided to it by its creator (the clock maker)….and that is what it is for, nothing more and nothing less. It can’t decide to do something else!

Even a computer, whilst incredibly more complicated than an alarm clock, is such a system – it is reliant on the inputs and programs provided to it by its external sources.

Type 2: Animated (e.g. most organisms)

An animated system is one which does have a purpose of its own but its parts don’t.

Animals (and therefore humans) are the most obvious example. They have a purpose of their own – where this might be argued as (at a minimum) survival, and (more optimistically) to enjoy doing so, in the manner of their own choosing.

The animal is made up of parts (e.g. organs) and whilst these parts have a necessary function for the good of the whole, they do not have a purpose of their own.

In this way we can compare a computer to a person and see that they are fundamentally different. The computer’s purpose is provided to it whilst the person provides their own.

Type 3: Social (e.g. organisations, societies)

A social system is one which has a purpose of its own and so do its parts (the people within).

Indeed each social system is usually part of a larger social system (e.g. a family is part of a community, which is part of a nation, which is part of ….)

And even more complex, a person belongs to multiple social systems – which have different, sometimes conflicting, purposes³.

So, bringing these three types together, we have:

System Type⁴:	The whole is:	The Parts are:
Deterministic (e.g. a mechanism)	Not purposeful	Not purposeful
Animated (e.g. a human)	Purposeful	Not purposeful
Social (e.g. an organisation)	Purposeful	Purposeful

These three system types form a sort of hierarchy: The deterministic alarm clock is given purpose by the animated (clock making) person who also lives within their social group. The linkages don’t go the other way….or at least they shouldn’t…which leads on to…

Okay, interesting stuff but what’s the point?

Well, now that we have an understanding of three different types of systems, we can see the consequences of the misunderstanding of an organisation as a system:

A ‘deterministic’ model applied to an organisation:

Adam Smith (often referred to as the father of economics and of capitalism) wrote a famous book called ‘The wealth of nations’ (1776). In it, he used the example of a pin factory to explain the concept of ‘the division of labour’. He explained that one person performing all the steps necessary to making a pin could perhaps make only 20 pins a day but if the pin-making process were broken up into a series of limited operations, with separate people performing them in a joined-up line, productivity could rise to thousands of pins per day per worker.

Now that sounds fantastic doesn’t it! But for who?

Smith’s thinking was taken on board by industrialists who went on to employ vast factories of ‘unskilled labour’ in the new concept of ‘manufacturing’ (and who likely still do in the sweat shops of 3^rd world countries).

Standing back, we can see that this is using people as replaceable machine parts i.e. we have a defined mechanism (the manufacturing process) which is given its purpose externally by its creator (e.g. make pins)…and wow, this mechanism sure can make pins!

Henry Ford’s phenomenal success worked in the same way. He designed a mechanism to make Model T Fords (his mass production factory) and installed workers as the mechanism’s parts. He (and other ‘owners’ at this time) could use workers in this mechanistic way because:

unskilled workers, whilst poorly educated, were adequate for the simple tasks required of them;
such workers were willing to tolerate being treated as a machine part since there was high unemployment and virtually no social security safety net…giving them little option (i.e. work as required or starve);
there was a large pool of available labour – the human parts of the machine were easily replaceable; and
such business owners were subject to very little societal controls (such as governmental interventions and constraints) limiting their treatment of their worker ‘parts’⁴.

It’s worth noting that, even though worker conditions were massively in his favour, Ford’s ‘mechanism’ had an astounding 370% turnover of workers in 1913, with new hires staying an average of only 3 months. Many workers simply ‘walked off the job’ without notifying anyone…which is what happens if you ask humans to perform monotonous (demoralising) work without having to use their brains.

An ‘animated’ model applied to an organisation

So times moved on. We had two world wars that caused/ enabled major societal changes – a major shakeup of the class system, the birth and rise of the Labour movement and worker unions, massive improvements in education, social security and welfare, and great advances in technology.

The other significant change was the raising of capital (necessary for post war growth and development) from the public and the consequent birth/ rise of publically owned corporations. This separated the ownership and management of these new organisations.

A big difference from before was that:

the workers were now far more educated and empowered; and
the required work had become far more skilled (utilising new technologies).

Managers were no longer able to treat workers as merely replaceable cogs in a machine – it took time to train them, and they now had worker rights and choice.

Now, rather than seeing an organisation as a deterministic system with the all-powerful owner dictating its purpose (as the likes of Ford had done), they operated as an animated system would⁶: with a ‘brain’ (senior management) and a ‘body’ (the various operating functions performing the work).

Such a model works by senior management providing the instructions (the what: commands) and procedures (the how: controls) and then the operating units carrying them out accordingly.

“Command and control represents the division of labour between decision-making and doing the work.” (Seddon)

We all know that the ‘operator’ parts within the organisations ‘body’ are actually human beings but the ‘command and control’ management instruments don’t really recognise this fact:

the organisational ‘brain’ (often annually) decides the strategy and breaks this down into a set of objectives for the parts of the ‘body’ and locks these into a cascaded grand plan;

the organisational ‘brain’ provides incentives for the ‘body’ to act as it requires: thus assuming that it is simply a matter of extrinsically motivating each part to comply as required;

the organisational ‘brain’ considers the performance of each part of the ‘body’, scores it and delivers this judgement back: thus assuming that each part can and will accept such feedback for the good of the whole;

the organisational ‘brain’ performs (frequent) reorganisations on the ‘body’ parts, as if shifting pawns around a game board. The brain does this by dictating such redesigns to the body rather than asking the body if (and how) it could better rearrange itself;

The organisational ‘brain’ thinks that the answer to an increasingly complex environment is simply to increase the quantity and regularity of communication with the ‘body’ parts. This fails to realise that communication is not the underlying problem.

But the reality for every organisation is that they have purposeful parts – you and I – whether they like it or not…and so to treat these parts as merely having a function for the whole is to inevitably generate conflict.

A social model applied to an organisation

…and so we reach the point at which we conclude the obvious that:

the organisation (hopefully) has a purpose;

AND

the humans working within it have separate purposes.

…and therefore any management model that doesn’t understand and work within such a social system will be very limiting – causing loss of immeasurable value to the organisation AND to the people within.

Now you might say “okay, interesting stuff, but treating an organisation as an animated system and using command and control methods has worked fine so far…why do we need to change?”

The rate of change in our world has been massively accelerating. It used to be that change was seen as generational and this made it relatively easy for people to adapt but this no longer holds true.

Organisations are operating in more complex and less predictable environments with the result that:

“Over the last 50 years, the average lifespan of S&P 500 companies has shrunk from around 60 years to closer to 18 years.” (Source: The art of corporate endurance )

Here’s a classic Deming quote: “It is not necessary to change. Survival is not mandatory.”

But if survival is desired, then the best chance that an organisation has is to operate a management model that actually fits with the correct type of system! In so doing, it can get the best out of everyone within.

What might this model look like? Studying ‘Deming’s 14 points for Management’ would be a great start. A post to follow next.

Who’s been successfully operating a social model for decades? Two brilliant examples are Toyota and Handelsbanken.

Footnotes:

1. Credit: The core of this post comes from learnings derived from a classic Ackoff essay entitled ‘Reflections on systems and their models’ which can be found in the book ‘Ackoff’s Best: His classic writings on management’.

2. I’m aware that other system thinkers have created other, more sophisticated, classification schemes (e.g. Boulding, Beer). Ackoff’s system types nicely serve the purpose of this post.

3. This fact is probably relevant to the need for, and creation of ‘soft systems thinking’…which is where Peter Checkland’s work fits in (A ‘giant bio’ currently in draft)

4. For those ‘system’ geeks out there: Ackoff explained a 4^th system type, that of an ecological system – where the parts are purposeful but the whole is not. Ecological systems contain interacting mechanistic, organismic and social systems, but do not have a purpose of their own. However, their function(s) serve the purpose of the systems that are their parts.

Example: the purposeful use of fluorocarbons as propellants by humans (a purposeful part of the ecological system) affects the ozone layer in a way that is determined, and not a matter of choice for our planet (the whole)…the planet cannot decide that it is harmful to it and decide to ‘do something about it’– the outcome (even though we may not understand it) is determined.

5. Henry Ford realised the problem and, in an attempt to compensate for their conditions, paid his workers well as compared to what they could earn elsewhere.

6. Stafford Beer wrote a famous book called ‘The brain of the firm’ (1972) that explored in detail the analogy of an organisation working as the human body does.

“Sir, Sir, Sir…have you marked it yet?!”

June 9, 2016 giantknave Brain Farts Capability, Feedback, Gemba, John Seddon, Measures, Ralph Tyler, System

So my son had some school exams and this post was triggered from a conversation I had with him just afterwards:

I expect all of you can cast your minds back to school and if you’ve got teenagers then, like me, you will also be sharing their experiences.

Picture the following scenario:

You’ve studied for, let’s say, a maths exam¹;

You’ve spent 2 long hours sat on an uncomfortable school chair, whilst being watched by the beady eyes of the maths teacher (who was actually asleep), and have just emerged from the exam hall;

You and your mates fall straight into discussing the trauma that you’ve just been through:

“What did you put for question 4?”

“Oh [beep], I hadn’t realised it was about that! I wrote about [something else that was completely irrelevant to the question]”

“Could you work out the pattern in that sequence of numbers?…’Fibonacci’ who?”

“What do you mean there were more questions over the page?!!!”

…and so on.

What you will notice is that they are all ‘switched on’ in the moment, whether they ‘enjoyed’ the exam or not. They really want to know what the answers were and how they did against them!

The after’math’ 🙂

So, next day, they have double-maths…whoopee!

The Students all plead together: “Sir, Sir, Sir…have you marked our exam yet?”

Teacher: “Whoa, hold your horses, I’ve barely sat down! I’ll do it as soon as I can.”

…and the students engage in yet more chatter about the exam but their memory of the exam is beginning to fade.

At the end of the week, they have maths again:

The majority of Students: “Sir, Sir, Sir…have you marked our exam yet?”

Teacher: “No, not yet, I’ll do it over the weekend.”

…much less chatter now. They have forgotten most of it.

So, now it’s the following week and maths:

A few keen Students: “Sir, have you marked our exam yet?”

Teacher: “Sorry, no, I’ve been writing reports so I haven’t got around to it yet. I’ll definitely do it by the end of this week.”

…the mood has changed. The content of the exam has been forgotten and so, instead, they fall back to merely wanting to know a score.

End of week 2 maths lesson:

One diligent Student: “Sir, have you marked our exam yet?”

Teacher: “Yes I have! I’ll read out the marks” and the marks are duly read out to the class, which brings out the whole spectrum of emotions (from feelings of elation to tears of despair, with a healthy dose of indifference in between).

That diligent Student again: “…but Sir, can I have my marked exam paper back?”

Teacher: “Erm, yes…I haven’t got them with me now…I’ll bring them in next week.”

What do we think about this?

We all know that by far the best thing to do for effective learning to take place is to mark this exam, get the marked papers back to the students and then go through the paper to explain and then discuss it question-by-question…and to do all of this As Soon As Possible.

(… and I know that this is what all good teachers will try to do)

We can see that:

There is a human desire for immediate and meaningful feedback, which quickly dissipates over time;

An overall score (the result), whilst potentially providing some useful indicative data, cannot help with learning – you can feel emotions from receiving a score but you can’t improve. Instead, you need to know about the method (or, in this exam scenario, each question);

“We don’t learn from our mistakes, we learn from thinking about our mistakes” (Ralph Tyler, Educator)

There is little point in just the teacher knowing the current capability of each of their students. Each student should be very clear on this for themselves.

So, to organisations:

The above might seem blindingly obvious and a world away from work but every day we all carry out actions and interactions within value-streams for the good of our customers…and the usual buzz phrase uttered at regular intervals is ‘we want to continuously improve!‘…but do we provide ourselves with what we need to do so?

Think of the richly varied units of customer demand that we* strive to satisfy as analogous to the maths exam:

(how) do we all know how we (really) did?
(how) do we find this out quickly?
(how) do we know what specifically went well and what didn’t?
…and thus, (how) can we learn where to experiment and how this went?!

(* where ‘we’ refers to the complete team along the horizontal value stream)

There’s not much point in senior managers receiving a report at the end of the month that provides them with activity measures against targets and some misleading up/down arrows or traffic light colouring. Very little learning is going to occur from this…and, worse, perhaps quite a bit of damage!

…and when I say learning, I hope you understand that I am referring to meaningful changes being made that improve the effectiveness of the value stream at the gemba.

The value-creating people ‘at the gemba’:

The people who need the (relevant) measures are the people who manage and perform the work with, and for, the customer.

If the people who do the work don’t know how they are truly doing from the customer’s point of view then they are no different from the students who don’t have their marked exam papers back.

There should be no surprise if the workers are merely clocking in, turning the wheel, collecting their pay and going home again. It’s what people end up doing when they are kept in the dark….though they likely didn’t start out like this!

Senior Management may respond with “but we regularly hold meetings/ send out communications to share our financial results with them, and how they are doing against budget!”

This gives people the wrong message! If you lead with, and constantly point at, the financials, you are telling people that the purpose of the system is profit, and NOT your stated ‘customer centric’ purpose;

You can’t manage by financial results. This is an outcome – ‘read only’. You have to look at the causes of the results – the operational measures;

…and as for budgets!!!

To repeat a hugely important John Seddon quote:

“Use operational measures to manage, and financial measures to keep the score”

I am championing what may be termed as ‘visual management’: being able to easily see and understand what is happening, in customer terms, where the work is done.

A whopping big caution

However, ‘visual management’ should have a whopping big warning message plastered all over its box, that people would have to read before undoing the clasps and pushing back the lid…because visual management works for whatever you put up on the wall!

If you put up a visual display of how many calls are waiting or how long your current call has taken or a league table of how many sales each member of your team has made or….etc. etc. etc. people WILL see it and WILL react….and you won’t like the dysfunctional behaviours that they feel compelled to engage in!

So, rather than posting activity measures and people’s performance comparisons, what do the value creating people need to know? Well, put simply, they need to know how their system is operating over time, towards its purpose.

Here’s what John Seddon says about the operational measures that should be “integrated with the work: In other words they must be in the hands of the people who do the work. This is a prerequisite for the development of knowledge and, hence, improvement.

Demand: what are the types and frequencies of demands that customers place on the system? What is the predictability of failure demands and value demands?

Flow: what is the capability of the system to handle demands in one-stop transactions? Where a customer demand needs to go through a flow, what is the capability of that flow, measured in customer terms?

…in both cases we need to know the extent of variation – by revealing variation we invite questioning of its causes. By acting on² the causes, we improve performance.”

A final thought: This blog has often said “don’t copy manufacturing because Service is different!“ But gemba walks through a well run ‘Lean thinking’ factory floor may very well assist your understanding of what is meant by good visual management. No, I’m not saying ‘copy what you see’…I’m suggesting that you might understand how a well run value stream has a physical place alongside the gemba where its participants gather and collaborate against a background of what they are currently achieving (their current condition) and what experiments they are working on to improve towards some future target condition.

To close – A shameless segue:

So I’ve been writing this blog for nearly 2 years…and I know many people read it…but I don’t get much feedback³.

If you have read, and accept the thinking within this post, you will understand that this limited feedback ensures that I am somewhat ‘in the dark’ as to how useful my writings are for you.

I do know that people see/ open my posts…but I don’t know too much more:

you might read the title or first few lines of a post, yawn, and go and do something else;
you might get half way through and not understand what on earth I am rambling on about;
you might read to the end and violently disagree with some or all of what I’ve written;

but…and here’s the punch line, how would I know? 🙂

Notes:

It’s clearly a totally separate, and MUCH bigger question as to whether taking exams is good for learning – I’m aware that many educators think otherwise. The genesis of this post merely comes from my son’s exam reality. Just for clarity: I’m not a fan of the ‘top-down standards and constant testing’ movement.
Seddon writes ‘acting on’, NOT ‘removing’ the causes of variation. The aim is not to standardise demand in a service offering…because you will fail: the customer comes in ‘customer shaped’. The aim is to understand each customer’s nominal value and absorb it within your system as best you can…and continue to experiment with, and improve how you can do this.
A big thanks to those of you that do provide me with feedback!….and I’m most definitely not criticising those that don’t comment – I’m just saying that I have a very limited view on how I am performing against my purpose…just like many (most?) people within their daily work lives.

‘Beyond Budgeting’: There is a better way!

May 18, 2016July 6, 2016 giantknave Brain Farts Beyond Budgeting, Devolution, Jeremy Hope, Levers, Lock, Robin Fraser, System, Systems Thinking, Transparency, Variation

So this post is part 2 of a two-part piece in respect of budgeting.

Part 1 (The Great Budget God in the Sky) introduced the ideas that:

creating a detailed budget for the next year and then holding people to it is a very poor way to manage;
the budget is part of a wider ‘fixed performance contract’ that understandably causes budget holders and their teams to engage in a set of games that are hugely harmful to the system and its purpose;
but there is a better way…which will be discussed in (this) part 2.

If you can’t remember, or haven’t yet read, why part 1 came to these conclusions then please (re)read it…otherwise read on:

So what do you do instead of a budget?

So there’s a short, simple (and insufficient) answer, and then there’s the rest of what needs to be said.

In simple financial process terms, those organisations that no longer use budgets work with rolling forecasts instead. Here are a few explanatory quotes from successful practitioners:

“Rolling forecasts are updated quarterly and look five quarters ahead…and because [they] are separated from any form of performance evaluation and control*, we get far more accurate forecasts than was ever the case with the budgeting system.”

(* a necessary discussion point covered later in this post)

“…this approach has reduced dramatically the amount of time managers now spend in forecasting compared with the previous budgeting process.”

“Forecasts are used in conjunction with actual results to show trends for high level KPIs such as return on capital, profitability, volumes and so forth. These typically show the last eight quarter’s actual results and the next five quarters forecasts.” (i.e. they see, and understand variation rather than making binary comparisons)

“Rolling forecasts…place the CEO in a much stronger position to anticipate financial results.”

Right, so you’ve got the basic idea about rolling forecasts…but I started by stating that this was insufficient:

Necessary…but not sufficient!

Here’s a rather nice animation of a seven-levered lock:

I find it mesmerising! And it’s pretty cool seeing how it actually works 🙂

Using the lock as an analogy:

The lock is a system. Each of the seven levers (along with the key and accompanying barrel) is a component part;
You can uncover the existence of one lever, work out what position it needs to be in, and get this sorted (e.g. moving from budgets to rolling forecasts)…and yet the lock won’t open;
Further, the moving of this one lever into the ‘right’ position will very likely upset the positioning of all the other levers;
It is only when all of the necessary components work together that the lock opens;
Each component is necessary, but not sufficient.

…and so it is the same for any organisation’s stated desire for (what is often termed) ‘Operational Excellence’.

Clarification: The lock system as an analogy is obviously limited because it is a simple ‘digital’ system – it is either locked or unlocked, on or off, black or white, 0 or 1. This doesn’t represent the real world but it is still useful.

The ‘locked – unlocked’ states in my analogy are the difference between:

a command and control management system (that will likely be playing with a few levers in the hope of change but which hasn’t unlocked the underlying issues with its ideology); and
a truly devolved, adaptive and purpose-seeking system.

The lock is only truly open when all the necessary levers are working together.

What levers?!

Here’s a brief touch on them (with links to further discussions):

1. System-level Clarity:

Of purpose: a meaningful ‘why’ for the organisation, and each of its value streams, from the perspective of the customer and society…where profit is an ongoing result, not an excuse;
Of philosophy: i.e. how to get there (which incorporates the other four levers)

…where this clarity is instead of, not as well as, a ‘management has the answer for you’ plan.

2. Transparency:

Fast, frequent, unadulterated, open-to-all and useful information feedback on what your value streams are achieving over time and if/ how this is changing, NOT activity measures, targets, binary comparisons and management reports
Actual trends and rolling forecasts NOT budgets and variance analysis (as explained at the top of this post)

…meaning that the people who do the work gain constant feedback on the capability of their value stream(s) against customer purpose.

3. Front-line Control (Devolution):

Ownership of decisions and customers by the value creators: that’s the people working at the front line with the customer and their needs;
Freedom to explore, experiment, learn and act:

“Self-managed teams are far more productive than any other form of organising. There is a clear correlation between participation and productivity.” (Margaret Wheatley)

4. Management as Support (NOT control):

Provision of enabling technologies and expertise, NOT dictating what these shall be and how they shall be used;
Guidance, NOT rules;
Farmers, NOT heroes

…in short, value enablers instead of, not as well as, commanders and controllers.

5. Collective Accountability:

You may have noticed that I’ve put this in the centre of my fancy bubbles diagram. That’s because it will be a catalyst for everything else yet, without it, nothing great is likely to be achieved because individualism and extrinsic rewards will act as a highly effective brake.

Recognition and reward only by Long term, (equal) sharing in success a.k.a Profit Sharing;
Balance of collaboration with healthy competition (knowing how everyone is doing AND wanting to help them do better because it is in your interest to do so);
NOT cascaded personal objectives, targets, rating and contingent rewards

…can you imagine if you and everyone around you were all truly harnessed together towards the same aim, and how this would change/ enhance your behaviour?!

With these five levers working together then you will get a ‘whole organisation’ that is very clear on what it is trying to achieve, that is laser-focused on their customers, that will constantly innovate and adapt, that is never satisfied with where it’s at, that wants to know who’s doing well (and why) and who’s not (and, importantly, how to help them).

It will also avoid the huge waste inherent within the fixed performance contract (with all the ‘budget setting, target tracking, performance appraising and contingent reward’ paraphernalia dismantled and replaced).

Revisiting those 10 games

In part 1 of this post I set out, and explained, a series of recognisable games that budget holders and their teams play.

However, if you are working on the set of levers explained above, you can expect to create a management system that reverses those games into highly desirable outcomes (for employees, customers and investors). Here are those opposites:

“Always aim to improve upon and beat the competition”

“Never let the team down and be the one that drains the profit-sharing pool”

“Always aim to know and care for customers”

“Always share knowledge and resources with other teams – they are our partners!”

“Never acquire more resources than you need”

“Always aim to challenge (and reduce) costs”

“Always have the ability to understand root causes”

“Always ‘tell it like it is’ and share bad news”

“Always do your best, never fudge the numbers”

“Always challenge conventional wisdom”

Wow, that would be a cool place to work!

‘Beyond Budgeting’: The movement

So, I might well hear you asking “who’s actually doing this mad-as-a-hatter stuff eh Steve?!!” and I would answer that there are loads and loads of organisations (large and small) all around the world who are somewhere along their journey.

If you want to read case studies then there are plenty of places to go to: There’s the Beyond Budgeting Organisation…but there’s also The Lean Enterprise Institute, Theory of Constraints Institute, Kaizen Institute, Vanguard Method …and on and on. Let’s not forget Toyota itself! It’s not about a methodology – the systemic thinking advocated by these different organisations isn’t contradictory.

And, whilst obviously they don’t all agree on exactly everything, they all point towards what has been called by some ‘Management 2.0’ – the realisation that the command and control management system is ‘the problem’ and advocating evolving to a new one (by humbly studying, experimenting and learning).

It’s not a recipe – it’s a philosophy

A recipe has a set of ingredients and related instructions as to how to combine them – it is something that is implemented (being repeatable and reproducible).

A (scientific) philosophy is a theory, based on sound evidence, that acts as a guiding principle for behaviour. It is a direction to follow, where the path is found through experimentation and learning.

This (or any other) post is not meant to prescribe what needs doing. Instead, this whole blog advocates a move away from command-and-control, and towards systemic thinking and adaptive progress towards a meaningful purpose through empowered (which must imply engaged) people.

Caveat: setting out a ‘philosophy’ is absolute twaddle if it isn’t actually believed in, understood and expertly, humbly and continuously practiced by those in leadership.

‘Lipstick on a pig’

What a great phrase! Putting lipstick, some earrings and a blonde wig on a pig doesn’t change what it is…even if you are doing so with good intentions! (Ewe, that’s a weird thought).

There are many organisations out there attempting to command-and-control their way to ‘Operational Excellence’ but this is an oxymoron.

There is a subtle, yet gargantuan, difference between an organisation fumbling (with best intent) with a few of the levers and one that understands the lock.

Note: All quotes, unless specifically stated, come from Hope and Fraser’s book ‘Beyond Budgeting’ (2003) and their associated case studies.

Oxygen isn’t what life is about

April 21, 2016April 21, 2016 giantknave Brain Farts Aaron Dignan, Alfred P Sloan, H. Thomas Johnson, Mike Rother, Profit, Purpose, Richard Branson, Sam Walton, Simon Sinek, System

I often hear people talking about the need for profit and that my thinking must address this fact. I respond that it does, but not as they might think. This post tries to explain.

There are two types of ‘for profit’ organisational thinking, both of which consider that profit is necessary…and there the similarity ends.

Type 1: Considers profit as the overall goal and purpose of the organisation ‘at any cost’;

Type 2: Perceives profit as necessary for the organisation’s survival, but not its reason for existence. Profit to such an organisation “will be seen as breathing is to a human organism, but not what life is about.” (H. Thomas Johnson)

The difference in management systems and outcomes for these two types of thinking will be profound.

Below are a number of convergent viewpoints from key thinkers backing a ‘Type 2’ view on profit:

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Aaron Dignan, in his talk on the operating model that is eating the world, explains the over-riding importance of purpose. He uses the examples of Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Tesla (and many other highly successful organisations operating beyond traditional 20^th century western management thinking) to explain that:

It’s not about the money, it’s about the mission [purpose]. The idea of putting values above revenues is really important and defines how powerful that purpose can be!
- Put another way, placing profit above your stated purpose means that it usurps this purpose.

The leaders of these organisations, such as Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, make this very clear to the market: “This is our mission, it’s long term, if you don’t like it, get out of our stock”.
- This message is very useful for the company and potential investors – it provides transparency; allows the company to focus on what it is actually trying to do; and it allows prospective and existing investors to make clear investment decisions…it also provides them with a high degree of confidence in the organisation.

Playing a long game is a really good sign that an organisation has its purpose screwed on tight. They’re not playing to the (financial reporting) quarter or to ‘the man in the street’, they are playing to the purpose…and that means that they might have to make long term bets and let things play out and then cash out over time.

Cause and effect: If you truly focus on purpose, the effect will be a highly successful organisation (and happy investors).

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Sir Richard Branson has a very clear philosophy on priorities : “put your staff first, customers second and your shareholders third”. This is the complete opposite of the traditional view, but there is a simple yet profound logic within which Branson says “should go without saying and it’s surprising that it still doesn’t in many organisations”.

Put simply, if the people working at your company are 100% proud of the job they are doing, are given the tools to do a good job, are treated well and (consequently) are proud of the brand then they are going to truly look after the customer.

Cause and effect: The shareholders do well because the customers do better because your staff are (truly) happy.

A caveat: Don’t think that you can hoodwink your staff (i.e. with words, ‘canned fun’ and/or bribes) into thinking that they are ‘first’ if this is not so…they will see right through such a facade.

A reality check: If your people aren’t proud of what they do/ where they work then you have a problem with your priorities.

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Mike Rother, in his book ‘Toyota Kata’, sets out an interesting historical perspective of how we arrived at the traditional 20^thcentury (Western) management approach. In it he quotes Alfred P Sloan (President and then Chief Exec. and Chairman of General Motors between 1923 – 56) as saying:

“We are not in the business of making cars, we are in the business of making money.” *

You might come back at me and say, “well he’s right isn’t he? We might ‘say’ our purpose is ‘xyz’ but it’s actually about the money.”

To this, I would say that we need to recognise that customer, employee and investor make up necessary components of an organisation’s system and, going back to harmony or cacophony, we should understand that we can’t put one component (e.g. investors) above the others and expect it to be good for the system. In fact, to do so will cause unknown and unknowable harm to the system.

We need to understand the system and its purpose and then act in such a way as to derive a win/win/win scenario….which goes back to Dignan’s point about purpose and Branson’s point about priorities.

Cause and effect: Optimising the system will be good for all of its components over the long term.

A caveat: If you ‘say’ it’s all about purpose but underneath it all it isn’t then don’t be surprised at your inability to move towards it. This is a classic case of POSIWID.

* Note: General Motors made a 2007 financial loss of US$38.7 Billion and, after running out of cash soon after, entered ‘Chapter 11’ bankruptcy in 2009. After selling off or discontinuing many brands, it emerged as a new company with new management and financial bailouts from both the US and Europe, with a net cost to US taxpayers (to date) of US$12 Billion.

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Thomas (Tom) Johnson, Professor of Accounting and author of the book ‘Profit beyond measure’ wrote in an article on the excellent ‘Lean Edge’ site that “financial results such as revenues, costs and profits are by-products of well-run human-focused processes”.

He goes on to make the following comparison:

“…the Toyota people in Japan who founded and grew the company down to the 1990s saw the company as a disciplined organization of ’employee/suppliers’ whose purpose is to serve ‘customers’ in a way that earns sufficient profit to ensure the long-term survival of the organization.

…those of us from the West, on the other hand, for the past 30 to 40 years have viewed the purpose of business as making profit, by any means considered legal.

…the contrasting view held by Toyota people who founded and built that company from the 1950s to 2000 considers that a business exists to provide opportunity for humans to exercise their inherent creativity in gainful employment serving needs of other humans. The people who held that view saw the purpose of the business to be continuous improvement of a system designed to enable humans to serve other humans gainfully and sustainably”

It’s interesting to note that there are plenty of organisations around the world (Dignan refers to some in his video above) that have understood the ’cause and effect’ of Toyota’s view i.e. that everyone (including investors) does well if an organisation sets out and truly pursues its purpose, with its long term success being the outcome.

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And finally, if we go back to Simon Sinek’s ‘start with why’, he makes some things very clear:

‘Why’ is not about profit…that’s just an outcome:

“By why, I don’t mean to make a profit, that’s a result. By why, I mean what’s your purpose, your cause, your belief? Why does your organisation exist? Why do you get out of bed in the morning and why should anyone care?”

You can’t just state your ‘why’ (your purpose). It actually has to be what you believe! If your actions are about profit over your stated purpose then this evidence will be seen, taken on board and acted upon accordingly:

“…what you do serves as the proof of what you believe.”

People ultimately follow leaders for themselves. If the actions of those leaders do not align with the beliefs of the workers then don’t expect them to follow:

“We follow those who lead, not because we have to but because we want to. We follow, not for them but for ourselves.”

Finally, there’s a really important point implied but not explicitly stated by Simon Sinek: The leaders of an organisation need to provide the environment, through an appropriate management system, that enables the purpose and does not frustrate it.

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In summary:

You can state a purpose….but you’ve got to actually live it to move towards it;
An organisation’s purpose should NOT be ‘profit’, even though this outcome is necessary for the system and those that finance it;
If you think it’s the other way around i.e. that you need to state a purpose so as to chase profit, then you are likely to fall a long way short of what you could achieve…and will put your long term survival at serious risk;
A focus on short term profits and results for the market will likely destroy unknown and unknowable value.

For those of you who think “what a load of hippy liberal rubbish, of course it’s all about the shareholder”, here’s a really nice quote to consider from Sam Walton (founder of Wal-Mart):

“There is only one boss. The customer. And he can fire everybody in the company from the chairman on down, simply by spending his money somewhere else.”

…how would those shareholders feel if their investment became worthless?

Note: The above raises a ‘big hairy question’ – There are many corporate forms…but which ones help and which ones hinder an organisation’s ability to truly live its stated purpose? This is something that the world’s politicians and financial markets are currently grappling with. Here’s an interesting ‘Economist.com’ article about this.

Unknown…and unknowable

March 30, 2016March 30, 2016 giantknave Brain Farts Education, Improvement, System, Training

So it’s the beginning of an ‘Improvement through Systems Thinking’ course that I facilitate and I am asked a question from one of the attendees:

“What is the value, as in ‘return on investment’ (ROI), in me attending this training?”

Now, that’s a (sadly) all too common a question when someone working within a command-and-control environment has to guarantee a short term payback BEFORE they are authorised to spend time towards studying and improving their system.

Here’s my response:

1) It isn’t a training course. It is education, aimed at making you curious. No more and no less; and

2) The ‘value’ is unknown….and unknowable!!!

Sure, I can (and will) do my best in designing and delivering this course against its purpose but:

I cannot know (let alone dictate) which of you will speak to who during and afterwards, and about which bits. I cannot know when such conversation(s) will occur (tomorrow, next week, next month…or even after someone leaves for another organisation!) and I cannot know how the system will enable (or constrain) as and when these conversations eventuate;

and perhaps the nub of it is that the ‘value’ is in YOUR hands to decide, not mine! YOU decide whether you will explore or ignore. YOU decide whether you are too comfortable in your current state or whether you desire growth. Not I.

…BUT that doesn’t make this a problem. It’s just ‘how it is’, whether you like it or not.

There is massive ‘organisation-changing’ value to be had…but it is for you to decide whether you pursue it.

The ‘ROI as permission to act’ view of the world is such a poor way to seek, and achieve, improvement.

I am reminded of a fabulous scene in the classic ‘Love Actually’ film between Rowan Atkinson and the late Alan Rickman: How much is that necklace there? (It’s only 3 mins. long and well worth watching 🙂 )

A course can be ‘so much more than a bag’…but that depends on you.

Water water everywhere

December 31, 2015 giantknave Brain Farts George Monbiot, Indira Gandhi, Jubilee River, River Fosse, Sand bagging, System, Systems Thinking, W Edwards Deming, York

So, it’s coming to the end of December 2015 and the UK is reeling from torrential rain storms and, as a result, unprecedented flooding across circa. half the nation.

It makes for a really interesting case study of systems.

As a reminder, a system is “a network of inter-dependant components that work together to try to accomplish the aim of the system” (Deming)

Now the UK’s rain water dispersal system has many components, such as:

the high ground on which the majority of the rain falls on;
the small streams from which it flows downwards;
the lakes and rivers in which it gathers;
the flood plains on which the water spreads out;
the man-made structures (banks, bridges, culverts, tunnels, protection barriers) put in place to ‘guide’ the water through major towns and cities; and finally
down to the estuaries which feed into the sea

…and all along these components lays humanity and its man-made assets (domestic and commercial).

We all know that there is variation in rain-fall (though in the UK the rain switch seems to be more often in the ‘on’ rather than ‘off’ position) and that there are sometimes special events. Unfortunately the UK has experienced record breaking rainfall…

…and the system is unable to cope without having a drastic effect on people.

The UK Environment Agency (EA) has the unenviable task of protecting people and their possessions. They have spent years, and billions of pounds, building flood defences.

The outcome of the rain, whilst somewhat grisly for those involved, provides lots of examples of behaviour that is optimal for one component but catastrophic for another.

How about these:

Sand-bagging around your house: This is at the smallest end of the scale and sounds sensible and innocuous doesn’t it. What’s not to like?

Well, let’s say that you successfully sand-bag around your gate…where does the water go now?

…next door! This sets off a chain reaction. As each person sand-bags their door, then the volume of water that has been ‘turned away’ increases, making the poor bugger who hasn’t managed to plug their hole enough to become deluged with everyone else’s diverted problem; which takes us up the scale to…

The Fosse Barrier was built to protect the City of York from the River Ouse. Once closed, it prevents the River Ouse from forcing flood waters back up the tributary River Fosse and into the City of York, whilst simultaneously pumping the River Fosse around the barrier and into the River Ouse. Sounds tricky!

The barrier was lowered a few days ago but, due to concerns about the unexpectedly high waters flooding (and thereby seizing up) the barrier mechanism, the EA took the (brave and/or daft?) decision to lift the barrier before this could occur…and thus knowingly flooded parts of York…although, by their calculations, reducing flooding elsewhere.

Here’s a picture of York after the River Fosse burst its banks:

…and on to an even bigger example:

The Jubilee River is an artificial channel that was dug (at a cost of £110m) to divert flood waters from the River Thames around the towns of Maidenhead and Windsor. It was opened in 2002 and, given that it rejoins the River Thames below these towns, those residents unlucky to be downstream are seriously unhappy about it!

Here are a couple of quotes from angry residents “It’s grossly unfair that a man-made river can be to the benefit of some people and to the detriment of others.” and “I believe we are being used as sacrificial lambs!”

…and so what might the EA’s answer to this be? Well, to extend the scheme of course! “We have very extensive plans to continue the Jubilee River all the way down…to Teddington…It’s very expensive but it’s got huge support.” I bet it does – by those who will benefit! Erm, but won’t that just move the problem again?

Now, the EA can build walls and divert rivers the length and breadth of the land…and we can be certain that each engineered ‘solution’ will uncover the need for yet another one nearby. But what about reasons as to why the flooding is soooo bad this time? Is it about more than the volume of rain falling?

Here’s an interesting article written by George Monbiot on the subject (it’s aptly called ‘Going downhill fast’). Rather than trying to cope with the water once it’s got into our rivers, he looks at why it is rushing at such speeds to get there…such as:

down from all that high ground that used to have trees on it (which massively soak up and contain water) but which have been cleared for grazing, grouse shooting and other such uses; and
over all that land that has been concreted for industrial, commercial and domestic purposes.

The point:

Now, the above is in no way an attempt to advise the UK EA on what to do! I am merely using it all as a superb example of a complex and dynamic system, with all its various components.

I often talk about two excellent systems effects/ analogies and they are brilliantly demonstrated above:

‘Systems bite back’ and
‘The push down, pop up’ or ‘balloon effect’: “squashing down on activity in one place causes it to pop up somewhere else”

The whole point of systems thinking is to recognise that everything in the system is connected and interacts, usually in highly complex and unexpected ways…and in so realising, move our thinking to the ‘whole system’ level, rather than its components.

In the words of Indira Gandhi “Whenever you take [what you think is] a step forward, you are bound to disturb something.”

…and so it is the same within any organisation, and its value streams.

Organisational value streams

Each of our value streams are like the UK rain water dispersal system: they have a purpose, a start and end, and many components in between.

To manage at a component level is to cause problems elsewhere.

We can only truly improve a value stream (the system) when we think about it from end-to-end, understand it’s purpose from the customer’s point of view and fully collaborate along its full horizontal length….and, to do this, we need to remove any and all system conditions and management thinking that are impediments.