Visual Thinking

I'm trying not to be negative about the HR cost reduction idea generator request. But I find myself wavering between bursting into hysterical laughter and bursting into tears.

Have I mentioned that our company has an official ban on the use of whiteboards? You know, the things that people gather around and scribble ideas on, and draw value streams and process maps and that kind of thing? I'm sure I have. The Chairman doesn't like them. He thinks they are unclean. I wonder if we had been doing some value streams on a whiteboard we wouldn't need to beg for some cost cutting ideas.

I'm very big on visual thinking. You can tell a person how to get from A to Z, but if you draw a map it's much easier, isn't it? Many people say "Oh, I'm not a visual person." What they mean is they aren't artistic, or they can't draw. But when you use images to plan a work process, no one cares about artistic ability. While we might have different learning styles - some learn best by reading, some by watching, some by seeing and doing - we all have some intrinsic visual learning ability. Unless you're visually challenged, of course.

And I wrote earlier how the Canadian Mount Everest Expedition got its start on the back of a napkin in a Camrose tavern. So I was very interested to see a new book by Dan Roam called The Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures. Here's what Publisher's Weekly wrote:

"The premise behind Roam's book is simple: anybody with a pen and a scrap of paper can use visual thinking to work through complex business ideas. Management consultant and lecturer Roam begins with a “watershed moment”: asked, at the last minute, to give a talk to top government officials, he sketched a diagram on a napkin. The clarity and power of that image allowed him to communicate directly with his audience."

Power. Clarity. Words have them but pictures have them even more. That's the premise behind the axiom "A picture is worth a thousand words." That's why processes like Value Stream Mapping are based on a visual map of the process, so you see every step and can cut out the ones that are wasteful. Maybe if just one of the conference rooms had a whiteboard, some group would be generating ideas of power and clarity. Just a thought.

So we've taken away the tool that allows people to express themselves visually. And now we wonder why we are in a bit of a rut, shall we say. I wonder if, when we removed the visual tools, we sent a message that we didn't want people to share ideas. In any case, we further ingrained the silo mentality we have. Not only is there less communication between departments, there is less within departments.

In any case, another memo came out from the same Captain of Industry. It had the classic elements of an HR memo as written on page 174 of the HR Person's Communication Manual:

1. Obligatory condescending note of thanks - "Oh, you had some REALLY good ideas". Does that mean we aren't as stupid as you thought we were?
   
2. Mandatory rah rah: "We know you have lots more ideas."
3. Pitiful begging: "So please send them to us", because we ran out of new ideas years ago.
4. Wave the carrot: "Three extra days of PTO". Which you won't have time to use anyway.
   

Here's another thing. Isn't it the responsibility of every employee and every manager to constantly look for ways to improve their work processes, cut costs and eliminate waste? Call me irrational, but isn't that implicit in the employment agreement - "We are hiring you to do this job, and if you can see any way to do it better, we'd like to hear it." Well, now that I've written that, I can see that I'm not being rational. that might be the imagery companies present. But many in many organizations the reality is "Here's your job. Shut up and do it."

When Tom Peters and Bob Waterman wrote "In Search of Excellence" a lifetime ago, their research demonstrated the importance of perception. Peters often says that "perception is all there is". In other words the facts don't matter too much. If consumers, or employees, have a certain perception of a product or a company, that perception will overrule rational thought. Much of management is the management of perceptions. If the employees get the idea that the company is screwing them, or the company is lieing to them, the perception will overrule fact. Managers need to respond to wrong perceptions with facts, honesty, speed and truth.

These are difficult times. I don't care if you think we are in a recession or not. We are certainly in difficult times. And difficult times call for strong management. Companies that have been managed by weaklings will fall by the wayside. Remember the old keyboarding exercise "Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country"? What, they don't teach that any more? Anyway, now is the time for managers to step up to the plate and show their mettle.

Lead, follow, or get out of the way.

Some People Only Want the Shirt

Our company has a slow pitch softball team. That's not unique, but I've found the dynamics of the team interesting and wanted to share some thoughts.

There were lots of guys sign up. You have to have 9 for a team and ten players can take the field. It looked like we'd have no trouble fielding a full team. But signing up and showing up are two completely different things. Sound familiar? When there's a great, fun project at work that is going to attract a lot of attention, everybody wants to be on the team. But when there's heavy work to do, or when the team gets bogged down in minutiae or details, or politics, all of a sudden there aren't so many show up at the meetings.

There have been a few games where we didn't have a full complement of company employees to take the field. Fortunately, we've had husbands, cousins and neighbors show up and have been able to at least take the field. Where are the company team members? Well, some are ill, some have work commitments. Those are reasonable excuses. But some... let's just say that some are just there for the shirt. The game starts too late. It might rain. I've got the sniffles. When the going got tough, they stayed home.

We're not going to win any championships. In fact, we'll be ecstatic if we win a game! We're there for a good time. We're in the "C" division which is home to the beginners and klutzes. And we are chief of the klutzes. Nevertheless, when we show up, we give it our all, knowing that it might not be enough to actually win. Some of our competition doesn't belong in that division. These are guys that live for slow pitch. They are good, and they're using our league to practice and get better. That's OK. But it would be nice if those who signed up showed up. Last Thursday, my heart swelled with pride for my team. It was a torrential downpour prior to the game. Mrs. T. thought I was nuts for leaving the house. But when I got to the diamond, the team was there. We had ten guys and could of played. We even had a strategy to beat these guys! But that coward umpire called the game. Still, I was proud of the guys that sacrificed and showed up to play.

Many years ago I spent some time in the bull riding ring as a bullfighter. That's the guy you know as the rodeo clown. We might dress like clowns and wear makeup like clowns, but it's serious business. When a bullrider hits the ground, his life is in our hands. There's no time for jokes or games when you're steering an angry bull away from someone he'd like to stomp on. During my training period, a wise, experienced bullfighter told me "There's lots of people want to dress up and tell jokes and have people applaud for them. But when they feel half a ton of angry pot roast blowing hot snot down their shorts, lots of 'em decide they'd rather sit in the stands."

I love the imagery that old cowboy invoked. Half a ton of angry pot roast, blowing hot snot down your shorts. Life is sometimes like that. It's all you can do to make it to the fence and jump for your life. But the important thing is that you showed up, and you came to give it your all.

In my high school days I had the opportunity to work in the training room of the Edmonton Eskimos. I was a gofer. But I had a "Staff" shirt. I wore that thing until it was in shreds. Today, anyone can go buy professional sports clothing. T-shirts, golf shirts, dress shirts. Anyone can dress the part. But buying the shirt doesn't make you part of the team.

Our company is full of people that have the shirt, but they aren't part of the team. Know what I mean? They don't show up willing to give 100% every day. Some of them get offended if you push them to give 75%. There are some people that allegedly start work at 7:30 AM. But I usually go past those people at 7:35 when they are on their way out for their first smoke break of the day. And they saunter back in at 8 AM with the regular starters, then brag about how much work they've already done.

It's a gross failure of managers to allow that type of attitude in the work place. If you want the shirt, you need to be prepared to bear some of the scars from the fight. You need to show that you have some of the hot snot on the back of your shorts.

We Need More Slogans!

While I was away at one of our new facilities this week, an email came through from our VP Safety. He was distraught about our poor safety performance. Early in the year, we have had more than our share of accidents, and even a rollover. His email was a plea for better safety performance.

I was thinking we should name our company softball team "The Rollovers", but chances are good that senior management won't see the humor in that.

What did the email accomplish? If a company is tanking financially, will an email asking for more sales produce the requested result? Without detailed attention to the issues that are causing poor performance, and without a plan to remove the roadblocks to poor performance, nothing will change. Was it Einstein who said that the definition of mental illness was to do the same thing over and expect different results?

One of the things I find unproductive, bordering on insulting, is our use of safety slogans. We used to have a slogan a year, sort of a focus on one issue. But now, we produce a new slogan every week. And what's the result? We have a declining safety record.

Deming said that slogans are an insult to the workers. They do not produce any change in attitude or work habits. Why then do we think that some new slogan will result in improved performance? Was the old slogan flawed because because of poor rhyming scheme? Management has a responsibility to produce results. If the manager simply does the same thing over and over, then he or she is demonstrating a type of corporate mental illness - repeating a process but expecting different results.

Maybe we need a daily safety slogan since the weekly slogan has been so effective.

This week I'm off to Texas where we have acquired another company. Have a great week.