transformation

Starting from the wrong place

giantknave Brain Farts , ,

It’s very short Friday evening post time 🙂

So, you want to transform your organisation? Here’s the conventional recipe:

Step 1: Lay out some beautiful ‘sunlit uplands’ statement that everyone but an anarchist would find obviously desirable!

Step 2: Break down the output from step 1 into some pleasing themes (‘strategic shifts’) to focus on

Step 3: …erm, now what? I’m stuck!

 

Not many organisations actually understand ‘where they truly are’…and so, no matter how much brilliant imagining of perfection is done, and the subsequent strategic planning, they will likely be working in the wrong way on the wrong stuff.

 

The place to start is to really understand your system, from the perspective of how well it meets its purpose (as defined by its customers, not you), and then critically reflect on what this tells you, and why it is like this.

Then…think about what really needs to change.

This will be different to what you are currently thinking. If not, you probably haven’t seen what you needed to see.

Part 2: The problem of changing from ‘this’ (Control) to ‘that’ (Autonomy)

giantknave Brain Farts , , , , ,

This post discusses a ‘how’ and follows on from a discussion of the ‘what and why’ in Part 1: Autonomy – Autonomy Support – Autonomy Enabling (a Dec ’21 post – it only took me 7 months!)

I’ll assume you know that the ‘how’ I am writing about is with respect to an approach to moving a large people-centred system:

  • from (attempted) control
  • to autonomy (and its enablement).

Please (re)read ‘part 1’ if you need to (including what is meant by people-centred)

 Oh for the luxury of a ‘Green field’!

You could be fortunate to start in a relatively ‘green field’ situation (i.e. with very little already in place).

This is what Jos de Blok did in 2006 when he founded the community healthcare provider Buurtzorg in the Netherlands. He started with a few like-minded colleagues to form a self-managed team (i.e. an autonomous unit), and when it reached a defined size (which, in their model, is a team of 12), it ‘calved off’ another autonomous unit.

Buurtzorg carried on doing this until, 10 years later, there were 850 highly effective self-managing teams (autonomous units) in towns and villages all over the country.

In doing this, the autonomous units evolved the desire to have some (very limited) support functions, that would enable (and most definitely not attempt to control) them.

Sounds wonderful.

But many (most) of us don’t have this green field scenario.

We are starting with huge organisations, with thousands of workers within an existing set of highly defined (and usually inflexible) structures. The local, regional and (usually large and deeply functionalised) central model exist in the ‘here and now’.

So, the Buurtzoorg example (whilst recognised as a brilliant social system) is limited.

Rather, we would do well to look to an organisation that successfully changed itself after it had become a big control system. And Handelsbanken is, for me, a highly valuable organisation to study in this regard.

 

Some context on Handelsbanken

I recall writing about Handelsbanken and their forward-thinking CEO Jan Wallander some time back…and, after searching around, found a couple of articles that I wrote five years ago (how time flies!). A reminder if you are interested:

I’ve added some historical context1 in a footnote at the bottom of this post, but the upshot is that the results have been hugely impressive, such that they have been written into management case studies and books. Wallander successfully transformed the organisation, for the long term. It is now an International bank (across 6 countries) and turned 150 years old in 2021. It continually wins awards for customer satisfaction, financial safety, and sustainability.

I should deal with a likely critique before I go any further:

“But it’s a bank Steve!!!” Over the last few years, my area of interest has become the social sector (rather than ‘for profit’ organisations)…and, if you’ve noticed this, you may be questioning my use of a bank for this ‘Part 2’ post.

I’d respond that much of Jan Wallander’s thinking fits incredibly well for organisational design within the social sector. He saw that the answer was ‘about the long-term client journey’ (people-centred), within a community and NOT about pushing ‘products and services’.

 

An introduction to the ‘how’

I’ll break up my explanation into:

  • Some key ‘up-front’ points;
  • How Wallander achieved the transformation; and
  • The core of Wallander’s organisational design

 

Some key ‘up front’ points

“As a rule, it is large and complex systems and structures that have to be changed if a real change is to take place.” [Wallander]

  • There is no magic ‘let’s do another change programme’ silver bullet. It is a change in organisational paradigm
  • It will take time and, above all, leadership (in the true meaning of the word)
  • Most important for the ‘leadership’ bit is that those leading ‘get the why’. Constancy of purpose can only come from this

 

How Wallander achieved the transformation

Saying and doing are quite different things. I expect that I could have lots of agreeable conversations with people throughout an organisation (and particularly with those at its ‘centre’) about ‘autonomy at the front line, with enablement from the centre’…and yet nothing would change.

The following quote interests me greatly:

“The reason why [such an ‘autonomy and enabling’ system] is so rare and so difficult to achieve is quite simply that people who have power…are unwilling to hand part of it over to anyone else – a very human reaction. So, if one is to succeed, one needs a firm and clear goal and one has to begin at the top…with oneself.” [Wallander]

Which leads on to…

Wallander’s head office problem

“The staff working at the head office saw themselves as smarter, better educated and ‘more up-to-date’ than the great mass of practical men and women out in the field. They also felt superior because they were in close contact with the highest authority [i.e. the members of the senior management team].

A steady stream of instructions…poured out from the head office departments…amounting to several hundred a month. Even if a branch manager was critical of these instructions and recommendations, he did not feel he had any possibility of questioning them.” [Wallander]

Wallander saw things very differently to this:

“The new policy…aimed at turning the pyramid upside down and making the branch office2 the primary units.

In the old organisation there was a clear hierarchy: at the bottom of the scale were the branch offices, and on the next step up the [regional] centres. [‘Success’ was] a move up to a post at the head office.

In the new organisation, it was service at the branch offices that would be the primary merit…[because] it was the branch offices that gave the bank its income [i.e. delivered value to clients, towards their purpose]

In the new organisation:

    • the branch offices were the buyers of [enabling services]; and
    • the [central] departments the sellers who needed to cover their costs.”

It’s one thing saying this. It’s quite another achieving it. So how did Wallander do it?

Put simply, he stopped ‘push to’ the front line and enabled ‘pull by’ the front line.

Initially, he wanted to ‘stop the train’:

“[Head office] Departments were forbidden to send out any more memos to the branch offices apart from those that were necessary for daily work and reports to the authorities [e.g. regulators].

[All the head office] committees and working groups engaged in various development projects…were told to stop their work at once and the secretaries were asked to submit a report on not more than one A4 page describing what the work had resulting in so far.”

Then he wanted to change the direction:

“An important tool in the change process was the creation of a central planning committee that had a majority of members representing the branch offices.

This committee summoned the managers of the various head office departments, who had to report on what they were planning to do… and how much it would cost the branch offices [i.e. what value would be derived].

The committee could then decide [what was of use to their clients] and [where they considered it was not] the departmental managers were sent back to do their homework again.

In short, those delivering to clients (the branch offices) were given ‘right of veto’ over those from elsewhere proposing changes to this.

This had a dramatic effect. If you are a central department and you don’t want to be wasting your time on unwanted stuff (and who does?), then you’d better (regularly) get out to the front line, observe what’s happening, understand what’s required and/or getting in the way, and then collaborate on helping to resolve.

Further, if (after doing this) a central department develops something that the branches don’t want to use, then the next step turns into dialogue (leading to deeper understanding and valuable pivots in direction), not enforcement.

…which would create adult – adult interactions (rather than parent – child).

 

The core of the organisational design

I’m going to set out a bunch of inter-related points that need to be taken together for their effect to take hold. Here goes:

1. The local team ‘owns’ the client (relationship):

A client isn’t split up into lots of ‘bits’ and referred ‘all over the place’. Rather, the local team owns the client, as a whole person, throughout their journey. This provides: the client with direct access to the people responsible for helping them; and the local team with meaningful work.

“If you want people motivated to do a good job, give them a good job to do.” (Hertzberg)

2. The local team functions as a semi-autonomous self-managing unit, and is the primary unit of importance:

They are fully responsible for their local cohort of clients and, where they need to, pulling expertise to them (rather than pushing them off to other places).

3. The local team manager is a hugely important role:

This is because they are the linchpin (the vital link). They are responsible for:

  • the meaningful and sustained help provided to their local cohort of clients;
  • the development and wellbeing of the local team helping clients; AND
  • ensuring that the necessary support is being pulled from (and being provided by) the enabling centre.

They are NOT the enforcers of the centre’s rules. Rather they are the stewards of their local community (clients and employees).  This is a big responsibility…which means turning the ‘local team manager’ into a highly desirable role and promoting highly capable people into it.

In a reversal of thinking:

  • the old way was that you ran a local site in the hope of one day moving ‘up’ to head office
  • the new way is that a job at the centre might be a stepping-stone to being appointed as one of the highly respected local team managers

4. The capability of the local team employees is paramount:

If the local team are to truly help clients, then focused, ongoing time and effort needs to go into developing their capability to do this.

They are no longer merely ‘front line order takers’…so they need help to develop and grow (‘on the job’, ‘in the moment’).

5. Local team employees must receive a reasonable salary:

If we want people to develop and grow such that they deliver outstanding help to their clients, then we need to pay them accordingly. This is not ‘unskilled’ work (whatever that means nowadays).

 

Putting points 1 through to 5 together creates a virtuous circle: meaningful work, self-direction, relatedness, growth, wellbeing…and back around to meaningful work.

 

We now turn to some enabling principles:

6. The centre’s job is to enable (and NOT control) the local team:

Basically, re-read (if you need to) what I’ve written above about Wallander’s head office problem and how to transform this.

THE core principle here is that the local teams (via representation) have right of veto over central ideas for change.  After all, YOU (the centre) are impacting upon THEIR clients.

For those of you ‘in the centre’ who are thinking “but this is Bullsh!t, the problem is that the local team just don’t get why [my brilliant change] is necessary!” then

  • either they know something you don’t…and so you’d better get learning
  • and/or you know something they don’t…and so you’d better get into a productive dialogue with them

…and whichever it is, a dose of experiential learning (at the Gemba) is likely to be the route out of any impasse.

In short: If the local team don’t ‘get it’ or don’t ‘want it’ then the centre has more work to do!

7. All employees (local team and centre) need clarity of purpose and a set of guiding principles:

Whilst we want each and every local team ‘thinking for itself’, we need them all to be going in the same direction. For this to occur, they need a simple, clear (client centred) purpose and principles, to use as their anchor for everything they do…and with this they can amaze us!

Which leads to one of my all-time favourite quotes:

“Simple, clear purpose and principles give rise to complex and intelligent behaviour.

Complex rules and regulations give rise to simple and stupid behaviour.” (Dee Hock)

We also need the ‘centre’ (and most definitely senior management) to live and breathe the purpose and principles*. Without this it’s just ‘happy talk’.

* Note: This list of nine points (and the context around them) is a good start on a core set of principles.

8. There needs to be transparency across local teams as to the outcomes being achieved (towards purpose):

A key role for the centre is simply to make transparent that which is being achieved, so that this is clear to all…and then resist dictating ‘answers’.

This means that each local team can see their outcomes and those of all the other local teams…and can therefore gain feedback, which creates curiosity, stimulates collaboration, generates innovation, and produces learning towards purpose…

…we are then on the way to a purpose-seeking organisation.

Once outcomes are transparent, then if the centre is demonstrably able to help, it is highly likely that local teams will pull for it.

 Clarification: Transparency of systemic outcomes towards purpose, NOT activities and outputs (i.e. how many ‘widgets’ were shoved from ‘a’ to ‘b’ and how quickly!)

 

and last, but by no means least…

9. The budget process needs to be replaced with something better:

I’m not going to write anything detailed on this, as I’ve written about this before. You are welcome to explore this point if you wish: ‘The Great Budget God in the Sky’.

In short, the conventional budget process is also a HUGE problem for a system in meeting its client defined purpose.

 Right, I’m one point short of ‘The Ten Commandments’…so I’ll stop there. This isn’t a religion 🙂

 

To close

The above might seem unpalatable, even frightening, to the current ‘Head Office machine’ but there’s still seriously important work for ‘the centre’ to do…but just different to how you do it now.

In fact, if those in the centre really thought about it (and looked at the copious evidence), how much of what the head office machine currently does provides truly meaningful and inspiring work for you? Perhaps not so much.

Sure, we tell ourselves that we’ve ‘delivered’ what we said we would, according to a budget and timescale…but how are those clients going? Are things (really) getting better for them, or are they stuck and perhaps even going backwards?

How would you know? I expect the local team could tell you!

 

Footnotes:

1. Historical context: Handelsbanken was, back at the end of the 1960s, a large historic Swedish bank that had got itself into an existential crisis

It was run in the typical functionalised, centralised command-and-control manner, according to the dominant management ideas emanating from American management schools (and which still leave a heavy mark on so many organisations today)

The Handelsbanken Board decided to headhunt a new CEO in an attempt to turn things around (i.e. ‘transform’ in the proper use of the word)

Dr. Jan Wallander was an academic who, through years of research and experience, had arrived at a systemic human-centred management philosophy. To test his thinking, he had taken up the role of CEO at a small Swedish bank (which was becoming an increasingly successful competitor of Handelsbanken)

The Handelsbanken Board were struck with the highly successful outcomes that Wallander had achieved, and they wanted him to rescue them from their crisis.

In 1970 he said yes to their request…but with strings attached: They had to allow him the time and space to put his ideas into practice.

2. ‘Local team’, ‘Branch’, ….: Organisations choose various words to refer to their local presence, be it office, site, shop, outlet, etc. What matters most is the decentralised thinking, not the word chosen or even how the ‘localness’ manifests itself.

I’ve used the generic phrase ‘local team’ in this blog because it implies (to me) a distinct group of people looking after their clients. You’ll note that Jan Wallander refers to the ‘Branch’ in this respect (which fits with his banking world). You can substitute any word you wish so long as it retains the point.

3. The detail for this post comes mainly from Jan Wallander’s book ‘Decentralisation – Why and How to make it work: The Handelsbanken Way’. It is an interesting (and relatively short) read.

I found this book a bit hard to get hold of. I got mine shipped from Sweden…though I had a little mishap of accidently procuring the Swedish language version – sadly, not much use to me and my limited linguistic skills. I happily amended my order to the English version.

4. ‘Within a community’: The conventional public sector model is to have a huge number of branches within a given community – one for each central government department, one for each separate NGO, etc. etc. They are (virtually always) at cross purposes with each other, causing vulnerable clients to have to adopt the inappropriate (and unacceptable) position of trying to ‘project manage’ themselves through the malaise.

The need is to replace this controlling central-ness (lots of central Octopuses with overlapping local tentacles) with meaningful local teams. This is a huge subject in itself, and worthy of another post (or a series of).

Books – Part 1: The typical book store

giantknave Brain Farts , ,

how-to-read-a-bookHave you ever thought about the types of ‘management books’ out there?

I wrote a post a bit back on three ‘depths of transformation’:

  • ‘On the surface’;
  • ‘Under the skin’; and
  • ‘In the DNA’.

If you walked into the ‘management’ section of a large book shop, examined the selection on offer and then categorised them according to depth of transformation…

…I guess1 that you’d find books in something like the following 100:10:1 ratio:

100 ‘On the surface’ self-help style books filled with loads of methods and tools. The book shop shelves buckle under the weight of these – they are very easily written…by almost anyone! (I’m looking at half a dozen such books on my own shelf right now).

Many (most? …all?) ‘Lean Six Sigma’ books sit here.

10 ‘Under the skin’ books on principles. Much harder to write because they need a very sound basis from which to build…but they don’t really tackle the management system and, importantly, how (and how not) to intervene2.

‘Lean Thinking’ by Womack and Jones is, to me, a classic example.

‘The Goal’ by Goldratt probably sits about here too.

1 ‘In the DNA’ book on management’s thinking and behaviours. This is where the true value resides. These are the gems, where the management system is truly opened up for what it is.

Here’s a random list of (what I consider to be) some3 classic ‘In the DNA’ books4:

– Deming: ‘The New Economics’

– ‘Ackoff’s Best: His classic writings on management’

– Seddon: ‘Freedom from Command and Control’

– Rother: ‘Toyota Kata’; and

– Womack: ‘Gemba Walks’ – a retrospective look at the ‘Lean’ thing in a humble attempt to move from ‘Under the skin’ to ‘In the DNA’.

What ‘In the DNA’ books do you have on your shelf?

Footnotes:

1. Guessing: I realise that I am falling foul of my own criticism – that of expressing an opinion, rather than dealing with facts…and I suppose that I could carry out the exercise in question…but, in this instance, I’m okay with a playful guess 🙂

2. How to intervene: Sure, these book ‘tell you what to do’…but that’s different to making successful interventions!

For the avoidance of doubt, I think that ‘Lean Thinking’ and ‘The Goal’ are both useful books…but (as with most ‘under the skin’ type books) they are so easily abused by management stuck in their ‘command and control’ comfort bubble, mapping what they read onto their current world views (rather than changing them).

3. In the DNA books: I’ve limited my list to a handful. Also, most of the authors I’ve chosen have written more than one book that I see as fitting into this category.

4. Peter Scholtes: I’d note that ‘The Leaders Handbook’ is an interesting mix of all three depths…but most definitely based within the DNA.

Why I dislike…

giantknave Brain Farts , ,

maturity-model…(so called) ‘maturity models’.

You know the ones I mean:

They are drawn up with an answer already in mind…and there’s seemingly one ‘out there’ for every ‘silver bullet.’

They are broken into:

  • a supposed linear 1 to 5 scale; and
  • neat horizontal swim lanes of supposedly important sub-categories.

The wording to articulate each point on the scale is contrived to work for the author’s intent. They start off as ‘black’ on the left (obviously undesirable), finish as ‘white’ on the right (i.e. heavenly) and go through a torturous swamp of grey in-between.

The people involved in designing and then scoring ‘our position on’ the scale are ‘in management’ (often assisted by some external consultants)…with little or no (meaningful) inclusion of the front line or customers i.e. those that would actually know about reality.

Scoring is performed based on opinions (perhaps in workshops, or via surveys), not the facts at the gemba.

Each team employing such a maturity scale is miraculously1 led to self-score themselves somewhere between a 1 and 2 at the start.

Management then use this ‘shocking’ score to justify the investment in a transformation programme (often given a name that is dripping in propaganda). Such a programme contains a wondrous set of initiatives to move2 the organisation from a ‘1.5’ score, up to a target3 score of ‘5′.

…and finally, each organisation stops once they reach a (self declared) ‘4’, saying that this is how far they need to go – a 5 now being seen as somehow no longer important. They stop because everyone’s got bored of it and/or they’ve used up their budget…and want to move onto another shiny new thing.

BUT…and this is the biggie…before, during and after this maturity exercise, they retain, and promote, management’s current faulty logic on ‘implementing change’.

An observation: A fundamental fault with the ‘maturity model movement’ is that each model has an end point (the supposed end of the journey). If this were so then the likes of Toyota would presumably have stopped improving decades ago.

A reflection:  I was asked by a comrade as to whether I believed that ‘maturity models’ could be of use4.

So, er, yes…there could most definitely be some positives BUT I’d suggest that these will be limited in scope, scale and duration….so not really transformational.

Now, if you think that you’ve got a maturity framework that would change management’s fundamental beliefs and behaviours…then you are very welcome to share this with me and anyone else reading this blog.

 A closing ‘cover my arse’ comment: I ‘get’ that many of you reading this will have ‘successfully’ used maturity models in your careers to date. This post is just me jotting down my thoughts on why I have a problem with them. It’s merely therapy for me 🙂

Footnotes

1. Not so miraculous when you consider that the people wanting the organisation to implement ‘the change’ wrote (or copied) the scale and its associated wording. It would be no good if you were already a 4 or 5.

2. When I say ‘move’ I actually mean ‘look for any evidence’ that could justify arguing that you are now a rather wonderful 4!

3. regarding ‘target’ – management will likely have baked some success criteria into their existing (and hugely flawed) cascaded objectives and incentives framework…meaning that they are somewhat biased in looking for favourable outcomes.

4. A few of those around me are always trying to get me to ‘see the positives’ in things 🙂

 

“Why is your proposed change so profound?”

giantknave Brain Farts , , , , , , ,

knot-systemMy 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.

dan-and-richieA 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 22nd 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.”

chris-robshawSo, 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 2nd in the World (from 8th)…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 1st 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 1st division) and perhaps get into their respective national sides (it was European Cup year)….and maybe avoid the embarrassment of defeat.

wrexham

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 92nd out of all the 92 league 1 – 4 clubs). At the complete opposite end of the spectrum, Arsenal won League 1 (i.e. came 1st 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!

Depths of ‘Transformation’

giantknave Brain Farts , , , , , , , , ,

butterflyI’ve been meaning to write this post for 2 years! It feels good to finally ‘get it out of my head’ and onto the page.

It’s about that lovely ‘Transformation’ word.

Before I go on, I’ll repeat a definition from an earlier post:

“Transformation: In an organisational context, a process of profound and radical change that orients an organisation in a new direction and takes it to an entirely different level of effectiveness….transformation implies a basic change of character and little or no resemblance with the past configuration or structure.” (businessdictionary.com)

To repeat the key phrase: An entirely different level of effectiveness! …and, just in case you missed it, the word is effectiveness, not efficiency.

I’m going to outline 3 levels of (supposed) transformation and I’ll do this by borrowing the bones of an idea from Mike Rother’s excellent ‘Toyota Kata’ book and extend it with a large dose of my own ‘poetic license’.

Level 1 Transformation: ‘On the surface’

iceburgSo, picture the scene: It’s the late 1970s. Your organisation desperately wants to improve and, on looking around for someone achieving brilliant results, you spot the awesome Toyota (or such like1).

You go on a Toyota factory visit. You are amazed at what you see and excitedly ask them how they do it.

You easily observe (‘on the surface’) lots of obvious methods and tools…and so you grab evidence of how these are carried out – e.g. some template forms, and the instructions that go with them. You also take lots of pictures of their (visual management) walls to show all this working in situ.

You run back home, hand out the methods and tools and mandate that, from now on, this is what we are doing.

toolboxYou helpfully provide training and (so called) ‘coaching’…and you put in place ‘governance’ to ensure it’s working. You roll it all up together and you give it a funky title…like your Quality Toolbox. Nice.

So what happens?

Well, yep, those tools and methods sure are ‘shiny new’ and easily applied. There’s an initial buzz, probably because of senior management focus…and pressure to prove the comedy ‘Return on Investment’ (ROI) calculation that had to be set out in the short-term thinking ‘will you pay for our factory trip?’ business case.

But the initial effects fall away. Anything achieved was a one-off, or of limited and low level benefit. The changes aren’t sustained – with a slide back to the old state. People start to misuse the tools and methods, and do much damage rather than good. There is a brief and ugly fight with the ‘methods and tools’ compliance police but disillusionment sets in and the early good work becomes discredited and abandoned (just like the last silver bullet…and the one before that…)

Timely reminder: “A fool with a tool is still a fool” (Grady Booch)

Note: This ‘on the surface’ transformation attempt has been likened to organisations going over to Japan in the late 1970s and early 1980s and coming home to fanatically ‘do Total Quality Management’ (TQM)…and then quietly dropping it a few years later. Sure, some organisations sustained it but most didn’t.

Level 2 Transformation: ‘Under the skin’

skinSo it’s now the 1990s. The methods and tools that came out of the initial Toyota factory visit weren’t sustained but the pressure is still on (and mounting) to transform your organisation…and your management can’t help noticing that Toyota are still doing amazing!

“Perhaps we didn’t look hard enough or close enough or long enough…perhaps we should go back and have a look ‘under the skin’.”

…and so you go for another factory visit (once you’ve been given permission following another well written story business case 🙂 ).

This time you take real care – studying ‘at the gemba’ for weeks, asking questions, watching activities, understanding the nature of changes being made to the system before you.

“Eureka! There’s something underneath those methods and tools! We can see that there’s an underlying logic that we missed last time round…oooh, we could codify them into a set of principles!”

And here’s basically what you arrive at:

0. Everything should belong to, or support, a value stream (a horizontal flow from customer need, through to its satisfaction)

…and for each value stream we should:

1. Specify value, where this is through the eyes of the customer; then

2. Identify all the actions performed within the value stream, and expose and remove the obvious waste; then

3. Create flow by understanding and removing the barriers; then

4. Establish pull by producing only what is needed, when requested; and finally

5. The ‘golden nugget’: we should continually strive for perfection because this is a never-ending journey

Wow, that was profound – your factory tour team now need to give it a name!

And so, after a fun focus group, a young member of your team called John2 shouts out “It needs less of everything to create a given amount of value, so let’s call it ‘Lean’.”

Whoop, whoop, he’s only gone and cracked it!

You run back home to tell everyone about the wonders of ‘Lean’. You hand out books, provide training courses, coaching and mentoring and you slot all those wonderful tools and methods nicely into their place…neat…this is going to be great!

So what happens?

Well, everyone absolutely LOVES the principles. They make sooo much sense. They particularly liked playing with Lego in the training sessions to demo flow, pull, kanban and ‘stop the line’ thinking.

But after a while (and some short-term gains) you realise that there’s a huge tension building. No one can make those darn principles work because they continually clash with existing management practises.

Your senior management employ a gaggle of so-called Lean coaches to try to change the people at the bottom whilst they carry on at the top as before!

Your ‘Lean Office’ has become an island of coaches doing great work with the people but unable to turn the tide. Coaching conversations end with responses like:

“Yes, I can see that would be the right thing to do for the value stream…but that’s not what my objectives, performance rating and bonus is based on…or what my manager above me would support…so I’ll stick to soul-destroying fighting within my silo. Sorry about that 😦”

This culminates in huge frustration; a revolving door of broken coaches; and many a good employee finding a better organisation to work for. If you ran an employee survey at this point, the results would make for ugly reading – you’ve created a complete divide between worker reality and management ‘cloud cuckoo land’.

Oh, and that lean word? Well it became capitalised! LEAN…as if it were a thing. You’ve all forgotten that it was just a label thought up by John in a focus group merely to describe what the factory visit team saw.

Pause for reflection: Taiichi Ohno is considered to be the father of the Toyota Production System (TPS) but he didn’t want it to be written down3 (codified) because he wanted it to remain dynamic.

And as for that name:“Ohno did not call his innovation ‘lean’ – he didn’t want to call it anything. He could, perhaps foresee the folly of a label.” (John Seddon)

Caution: …and if you did this ‘under the skin’ (supposed) transformation within a service organisation, you may find (if you properly stood back to look at it!) that you’d totally f@ck$d it up!

Credit: The ‘Level 2’ principles jotted down above are the core of the 1996 book ‘Lean Thinking’ by Womack and Jones….which they wrote following their research in Japan. They explicitly set out 5 principles, with a foundational one implied (hence why I’ve labelled it as ‘principle nought’).

Level 3 Transformation: ‘In the DNA’

dna…and so to the 2000s. The pressure to change your organisation is relentless – the corporate world is ‘suffering’ from seemingly constant technological disruption…but Toyota continues to be somehow different.

You pluck up the courage and ask for a sabbatical for 6 months – you want to find the meaning of life…well, perhaps not that deep…but you sure as hell want to know what Toyota have got that you don’t…and to work this out, you are going to have to go in deep – to their DNA.

Toyota are happy to see you again. But, rather than repeating what you did on the last two trips, you come straight out with it:

“Okay, you’ve shown me your tools and methods…you’ve let me uncover your principles…and I know that these aren’t the answer! What are you hiding from me?! Come on, I get it, it’s a competitive world out there but PLEASE let me in on your secret.”

The Toyota managers are perplexed. They don’t know what else they can do. They are adamant that they aren’t hiding anything from you.

…and so, rather than go straight back home empty handed, you ask if you can work with Toyota to experience what day-to-day work is actually like. They humbly agree to your request.

And six months later your mind has been totally blown!

You really get it….no, REALLY GET IT!

You couldn’t see the wood for the trees but now it’s as obvious as can be.

It’s all about the environment created by management’s actions, which come from their beliefs and behaviours about human beings: about society, about customers…and, most profoundly, about employees.

This is invisible on a factory visit! But it’s still there. It’s simply ‘in the DNA’.

Sure, you could provide a list of attributes as to what this looks like…but management can’t just do them, they have to believe in them – in fact, ‘be’ them!

Further, there’s nothing to be ‘implemented’ because it can’t be!

Everything flows from management’s beliefs and behaviours: It’s from these that Toyota creates new principles, methods and tools all the time…and throws out old ones that are no longer appropriate. Their systems thinking and human thinking is solid and profound, whilst their method is dynamic and agile.

…and the realisation sinks in: No wonder Toyota are happy to open their door to anyone. The thing that makes them great can’t be copied. It has to be lived and breathed…and nurtured from the shop floor all the way up. Oh sh1t!

…and so to your new headache: you totally ‘get it’ but how on earth do you change your organisational system – now that is THE nut to crack. That would be transformational!

Reflection time:

So ‘On the surface’, ‘Under the skin’ or ‘In the DNA’: What level of transformation are you playing at?

…if you are at level 1 or 2 then it’s not actually transformation.

…if you are truly at level 3, then here’s the final mind blowing bit – it is self-sustaining.

To close: I have been asking myself a HUGE question for a fair while now: Can management’s beliefs and behaviours change within a large floating (i.e. short-term thinking) shareholder owned organisation.  I’m nearly there with writing down my thoughts. Watch this space…

Footnotes:

1. Just Toyota? I use Toyota in this story since everyone knows who they are…and visits to their factories is precisely what happened regularly over the last several decades. But it isn’t just Toyota.

Your own ‘Toyota’ factory visit could be to another great organisation…and it needn’t be a factory making products – it could be a service organisation. Handelsbanken would be a great financial services example.

Though beware, there aren’t that many ‘true Toyotas’ out there. And perhaps none that have sustained it for so long.

2. ‘John’: He’s even called John in the true story – John Krafcik, a young researcher on Womack’s MIT research team…and those were his words back in 1987 (as recalled by Womack) to give birth to the Lean label.

3. Writing it down: Ohno finally relented when he retired in 1978 and wrote a book on TPS.

4. Clarification: I think a great deal of Lean Thinking, but not a lot about ‘LEAN’ – the implementation movement. I respect Womack and Jones, and their writings…but I note that my favourite Womack book is ‘Gemba Walks’ written about a decade after ‘Lean Thinking’ in which he humbly reflects that it was about far more than the tools and the principles. It was really about the management system (or, in my words, the DNA).

Obsessed!

giantknave Brain Farts , , , ,

ObsessionThere’s a word that seems to be overly used within many organisations, almost an obsession.

That word is ‘Culture‘. Indeed, they seem to have a culture of ‘being obsessed by the word culture’.

We hear the following phrases (or variants of):

  • We are measuring our culture
  • We need to change our culture
  • We have a culture committee
  • We are performing a culture-changing programme of work
  • …

So, here’s the thing – an organisation’s culture is a result, an outcome, just like its financial situation. As I wrote in one of my first posts, we shouldn’t be attempting to ‘manage by results’ (as in “let’s change our culture”), we need to manage the causes of the results…and the results will then look after themselves.

The culture of an organisation is the sum of the way people behave. The main cause of the culture is the management system in place. That management system reflects the beliefs and behaviours of the leaders of the organisation.

A reminder of a hugely important quote from John Seddon:

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

i.e. we can do all sorts to ‘require’ people to change how they behave (in an attempt to change the culture), but if we continue to apply the command and control management instruments ‘on’ them, such as:

  • management by hierarchical opinion rather than facts at the Gemba;
  • cascaded personal objectives;
  • setting of arbitrary numeric targets;
  • dictating methodologies and tools to use;
  • contingent rewards; and
  • the rating and ranking of people

…then we can’t expect much to really change.

No end of people ‘attitude’ targets, incentives, evidence gathering and rewards will change the system. Instead, we can expect such a system to derive distorted ‘attitude’ metrics – “I will likely tell you what you want to hear if it benefits me to do so.”

Interestingly, whenever I’ve worked in an organisation with a really good environment, the ‘culture’ (outcome) word was seldom mentioned – it didn’t need to be.

So, whilst we’re considering the ‘Culture’ word, what about the ‘Transformation’ word?

Here’s a definition to ponder:

“Transformation: In an organisational context, a process of profound and radical change that orients an organisation in a new direction and takes it to an entirely different level of effectiveness….transformation implies a basic change of character and little or no resemblance with the past configuration or structure.”

Many organisation’s use the word ‘transformation’ a lot, and perform major organisational change a lot…but unless that change has succeeded in delivering an entirely different level of effectiveness, then they’ve only really been ‘rearranging the deck chairs’.

Conversely, if an organisation changes its management system (which would be truly transformational!) then culture change is free.

If an organisation truly operates a ‘systems thinking’ management system then it should result in a powerful culture capable of continuously improving, through the people who work there…with no need for endless attempts at ‘transformation’.