Nov 4, 2010 | Change, Operations, Personal Rant
Last week talking to a colleague, we agreed that a skill that seems to have been lost in the rush to electronic aids is being able to look at a bunch of numbers and know if it is approximately right or wrong. It seems that many over 50 just “know” if the column is OK, whereas a youngster who has all the electronic skills has no idea.
There seemed to us to be something cognitive at work that we did not have a grasp of, then I came across this article on the impact on learning of writing, and realised that the same phenomenon is possibly at work with numbers.
As kids at school, we worked with numbers, wrote down all the exercises, before we worked them, I can even remember not being allowed to bring a calculator into exams because they just gave an answer when understanding the process of arriving at an answer was as important as getting the right answer, so we had to show the workings to demonstrate understanding.
When involved in improvement projects in factories, I often find the default position is to buy some software, when time and time again the best outcome is achieved with simple visual recording and labeling. Now I understand a bit better why that is.
Oct 20, 2010 | Management, Operations, Personal Rant
If you ever needed a lesson in the pitfalls of negotiating under pressure, take a look at the mess created by the agreement of the terms of the revised Mining Resources Rent Tax between the large miners, and the Federal government . If it wasn’t so serious, it would be funny.
In simple terms, the deal which set MRRT rates was with the Federal government, but the states own the resources, and already do, and will continue to levy, a royalty payment on tonnes extracted.
The miners thought the MRRT rate was inclusive of any increase by the states in Royalties, so they had a reliable ceiling on the total tax paid, the Feds say no such condition was agreed, and the states are cash strapped, and looking for revenue, where better than the miners in a boom.
All parties stuffed up royally by making assumptions in a pressure cooker negotiation, and not articulating them in the discussions, and written agreement.
This is easy to do under pressure, but these guys are supposed to be experts, so it is unbelievable that such a basic oversight occurred. The lesson is that whatever you do, take some time away from the scramble and pressure of “completing” a negotiation before an agreement is executed to ensure all the bases are covered.
Oct 17, 2010 | Innovation, Operations
Usually discussion about innovation focuses on the new stuff, the things that have, or need to change to deliver a changed outcome.
During a discussion recently about “green electricity” in Australia, specifically solar power, it struck me that the costs of the Photo Voltaic panels was dropping rapidly, and is the focus of most of the activity, and certainly all the publicity. By contrast, all the surrounding elements of the value chain necessary to deliver the innovative technology, the processes to source parts, deliver, maintain and install the cells, and link them to the existing grid, were all going up in price, more than offsetting the benefits of the drop in price of the core technology.
Innovation is only of any value when it is delivered, when the benefits flow, and usually the “delivery” is a forgotten element of the whole process during the hype.
Oct 4, 2010 | Alliance management, Collaboration, Operations, Social Media
Somehow, there is an evolutionally phenomenon at work that kicks in when a group gets larger than 150-200, the number that social research has repeatedly identified as the number of people that any individual can have a relationship with, first postulated by anthropologist Robin Dunbar, and now commonly known as “Dunbar’s number.“
As humans evolved, they did so in groups of 200 maximum, and there was little serious conflict inside the group, but there was constant conflict with the similar sized groups in the vicinity, even though they were to all intents and purposes, identical, apart from their group membership.
We now have social media seemingly rewriting the rules, or is Facebook and similar networks the electronic equivalent of a genetic mutation?
In a situation where you have many more than the genetic 200 having a sort of a relationship facilitated by the net, what implications does this mutation, if that is what is, have on the way we should be thinking about using, and regulating access to these sites, and what are the implications in the management of conflict?.
These are very big questions for the next 20 years thay deserve more than a passing, and ideaology driven response.
Sep 30, 2010 | Leadership, Operations
The word “leader” can have a range of meanings depending on the context.
It can mean someone who holds a position of power, and it just defines the position. It can also describe someone who inspires, who points the way, who commands loyalty without asking for it, totally independent of the position held.
Years ago, in a factory I was running, there was a quiet bloke, uneducated, and unassuming, but one who could make or break any initiative management proposed in the factory. He led, not by position, but simply by the force of his presence, and capacity to engage and inspire the others in the factory. He was a “leader” who led.
Sep 27, 2010 | Management, OE, Operations
Continuous improvement initiatives I have seen almost always impose a “finishing line”, correctly believing that focusing on an objective is a key to motivate performance.
However, what they often miss in this approach to improvement is the cultural aspect of continuous improvement, the recognition that there is no finishing line, just the next challenge, and the real management challenge is to build a capacity to improve continuously as a foundation of the culture of the business,not just to address the current issue.
Another of the many paradox’s that exist in our world, to motivate, have a goal, but having a goal other than an inbuilt desire to do it better today than you did yesterday, can be counter-productive
