Leadership and the 8th Muda
27/July/12 Filed in: Leadership Articles
…are you wasting your company’s most valuable asset?
As a leader in your organization,
do you add muda or subtract it?
Muda is a Japanese term for waste. As pioneered by Toyota and adopted worldwide as LEAN processing, top businesses strive to eliminate muda - any waste that does not add value for the final customer.
Seven mudas are traditionally recognized: overproduction, waiting, unnecessary transport, over-processing, excess inventory, unnecessary movement, and defects. Jeffrey K. Liker, in his excellent book The Toyota Way, adds an eighth muda – unused employee creativity.
Liker describes the eighth muda as the waste of “losing time, ideas, skills, improvements, and learning opportunities by not engaging or listening to your employees.”
Too many organizations suffer from CEOs, owners, and executives that inflate the eighth muda, rather than contribute to its elimination.
In the two weeks before writing this article I was told handful of stories - unsolicited - about clueless bosses who seem eager to be eighth muda poster icons. They shut down employee contributions by:
In all fairness, these executives could accurately be described as passionately enthusiastic about their company or idea, incredibly smart, and enormously talented individuals. They possess inspiring visions, and have an enviable track record of achievement. What is often outside of their awareness is the deep erosion, if not outright destruction, of relationships that could sustain and amplify their success.
8th muda leaders can obsess about squeezing each penny of value out of their organizations, yet flush tons of money down the drain in the form of lost opportunity and employee turnover. When faced with 8th muda bosses, the best and the brightest look for opportunities to go where they are appreciated - places where they not only have economic opportunity but can make a contribution to something larger than themselves without having to endure a pile of muda.
I hear plenty of stories, too, of great places to work, and of incredible leaders who strive to bring out the best talent of everyone in the company. They may call it any number of things, but what you consistently see are leaders that are intentional about eliminating the 8th muda, the waste of untapped employee talent. They invest in employee development, pay attention to the human side of their businesses, and correct unintentional disincentives whenever they are discovered. And they eat their competition’s lunches.
Seeking to reduce the muda on the human side is as important and as do-able as reducing muda in manufacturing or operational processes. It does, however, require an effort to learn and practice a distinct body of leadership and interpersonal skills - above and beyond knowledge and skill in business and in your particular industry or profession.
Exceptional leaders look hard at their organizations and ask, “Where are we eliminating muda?”
They also look at themselves and ask, “In what ways am I creating muda?” The next question to ask is, “What are you going to do about it?”
As a leader in your organization,
do you add muda or subtract it?
Muda is a Japanese term for waste. As pioneered by Toyota and adopted worldwide as LEAN processing, top businesses strive to eliminate muda - any waste that does not add value for the final customer.
Seven mudas are traditionally recognized: overproduction, waiting, unnecessary transport, over-processing, excess inventory, unnecessary movement, and defects. Jeffrey K. Liker, in his excellent book The Toyota Way, adds an eighth muda – unused employee creativity.
Liker describes the eighth muda as the waste of “losing time, ideas, skills, improvements, and learning opportunities by not engaging or listening to your employees.”
Too many organizations suffer from CEOs, owners, and executives that inflate the eighth muda, rather than contribute to its elimination.
In the two weeks before writing this article I was told handful of stories - unsolicited - about clueless bosses who seem eager to be eighth muda poster icons. They shut down employee contributions by:
- Blowing up angrily at errors, apologizing, but then doing it again. Bring them bad news, they kill the messenger.
- Arrogant statements of who is in charge – “It’s my way or the highway,” or “In this company, I am god.”
- Ignoring and refusing to discuss looming challenges that keep partners, directors, and other lesser executives awake at night.
- Refusing to let other executives to speak on the company’s behalf, even if they are more polished presenters - but also can’t seem to find time to improve their own basic presentation skills.
- Discounting human concerns, while fixating on a company goal – “I don’t care about anything except making this quarter’s numbers.”
In all fairness, these executives could accurately be described as passionately enthusiastic about their company or idea, incredibly smart, and enormously talented individuals. They possess inspiring visions, and have an enviable track record of achievement. What is often outside of their awareness is the deep erosion, if not outright destruction, of relationships that could sustain and amplify their success.
8th muda leaders can obsess about squeezing each penny of value out of their organizations, yet flush tons of money down the drain in the form of lost opportunity and employee turnover. When faced with 8th muda bosses, the best and the brightest look for opportunities to go where they are appreciated - places where they not only have economic opportunity but can make a contribution to something larger than themselves without having to endure a pile of muda.
I hear plenty of stories, too, of great places to work, and of incredible leaders who strive to bring out the best talent of everyone in the company. They may call it any number of things, but what you consistently see are leaders that are intentional about eliminating the 8th muda, the waste of untapped employee talent. They invest in employee development, pay attention to the human side of their businesses, and correct unintentional disincentives whenever they are discovered. And they eat their competition’s lunches.
Seeking to reduce the muda on the human side is as important and as do-able as reducing muda in manufacturing or operational processes. It does, however, require an effort to learn and practice a distinct body of leadership and interpersonal skills - above and beyond knowledge and skill in business and in your particular industry or profession.
Exceptional leaders look hard at their organizations and ask, “Where are we eliminating muda?”
They also look at themselves and ask, “In what ways am I creating muda?” The next question to ask is, “What are you going to do about it?”
***
by Tom Stevens (c)2007
Tom Stevens helps individuals and organizations create brilliant futures and make a difference. To contact him, visit www.ThinkLeadershipIdeas.com
This article may be freely reprinted in your company, association, or commercial publication (or website) under the following terms: that the author attribution, copyright notice, contact information, and this reprint notice be included; and that you inform us that you are using the article (samples appreciated).
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Comments
Big Planning Retreat Errors #3
20/July/12 Filed in: Leadership Articles
the reason retreats underperform is not what you think….
As soon as planning for a retreat begins, smart leaders can start avoiding three big and all-to-common mistakes.
I’m not talking about having a long meeting but never crafting a plan, or making a plan but not specifying a time-frame or accountability in their action steps to accomplish objectives. Most enterprises organized enough to have a retreat at all get these basics.
Actually, getting the basics right can be a problem. The errors I see organizations perpetuate - again and again - often go unseen because the organization has the basics right and never look beyond them. And this can keep an organization - whether business, public agency, or non-profit - mired in mediocrity. Don't let these errors creep into your leadership or board retreat!
retreat error #3
Internal Goals, but NO CUSTOMER OUTCOMES
What the error looks like….
The retreat results in a well-crafted and thoughtful plan that nicely outlines what people in the organization will do, how they will do it, and how the quality of what people do will be measured.
What’s so wrong with that?
What matters is results. Outcomes. What happens from what you do.
And it is astonishing how much this is ignored by so many organizations. They set goals, but all the goals are about what they will do - without taking time to contemplate their organization from the customer’s perspective. They focus too much on transactions and organizational outcomes, and too little on customer outcomes.
Businesses excel at making money when their customers experience a distinctive value from that business. Nonprofits and public entities excel at their missions when their ‘customers’ experience distinctive outcomes. In short, customer outcomes should be the driver of operational objectives.
Exceptional organizations discern the distinctive value they create for customers, and then focus what people do and how they do it to deliver that value. They measure customer outcomes as well as the quality of organizational inputs.
In exceptional organizations, everything revolves around creating customer outcomes. It is clarity about customer outcomes that most informs meaningful direction and strategy.
How to avoid the error...
Early in your agenda include discussion, clarification, and articulation of outcomes from your customer’s (client, constituent, community) point of view - and then work action planning focused on producing those outcomes.
As soon as planning for a retreat begins, smart leaders can start avoiding three big and all-to-common mistakes.
I’m not talking about having a long meeting but never crafting a plan, or making a plan but not specifying a time-frame or accountability in their action steps to accomplish objectives. Most enterprises organized enough to have a retreat at all get these basics.
Actually, getting the basics right can be a problem. The errors I see organizations perpetuate - again and again - often go unseen because the organization has the basics right and never look beyond them. And this can keep an organization - whether business, public agency, or non-profit - mired in mediocrity. Don't let these errors creep into your leadership or board retreat!
retreat error #3
Internal Goals, but NO CUSTOMER OUTCOMES
What the error looks like….
The retreat results in a well-crafted and thoughtful plan that nicely outlines what people in the organization will do, how they will do it, and how the quality of what people do will be measured.
What’s so wrong with that?
What matters is results. Outcomes. What happens from what you do.
And it is astonishing how much this is ignored by so many organizations. They set goals, but all the goals are about what they will do - without taking time to contemplate their organization from the customer’s perspective. They focus too much on transactions and organizational outcomes, and too little on customer outcomes.
Businesses excel at making money when their customers experience a distinctive value from that business. Nonprofits and public entities excel at their missions when their ‘customers’ experience distinctive outcomes. In short, customer outcomes should be the driver of operational objectives.
Exceptional organizations discern the distinctive value they create for customers, and then focus what people do and how they do it to deliver that value. They measure customer outcomes as well as the quality of organizational inputs.
In exceptional organizations, everything revolves around creating customer outcomes. It is clarity about customer outcomes that most informs meaningful direction and strategy.
How to avoid the error...
Early in your agenda include discussion, clarification, and articulation of outcomes from your customer’s (client, constituent, community) point of view - and then work action planning focused on producing those outcomes.
Big Planning Retreat Errors #2
18/July/12 Filed in: Leadership Articles
retreat error #2
Action List, but NO STRATEGY
What the error looks like….
The retreat consists entirely of listing problems or issues - maybe even putting them in priority order - then one by one discussing particular solutions. The group then creates an action plan to implement each solutions.
What’s so wrong with that?
Action items are handled independent of each other, without attention to how they are interdependent or how they work in combination to produce results.
Checklists are an awesome tool, but do not a strategy make. Read More...
Big Planning Retreat Errors #1
16/July/12 Filed in: Leadership Articles
retreat error #1
Lots of Effort, but NO DIRECTION
What the error looks like….
The retreat consists entirely of listing problems or issues - maybe even putting them in priority order - then one by one discussing particular solutions. The group then creates an action plan to implement each solutions.
What’s so wrong with that? …. Read More...
Reframing Emotions in the Workplace
27/June/12 Filed in: Leadership Articles
Emotions are More Essential Than You Might Think….
Imagine you and a colleague hop in a car, pull out of the parking lot, and head for the interstate highway. As you approach the on-ramp, your colleague reminds you that at high speeds your car can careen out-of-control - and to prevent this you should turn your car off.
Nonsense? Of course! Yet I can practically guarantee that you have experienced something similar and just as ridiculous. Anyone who has spent a few years in the world of work has heard someone warned to “leave your emotions at the door” or otherwise advised to “turn off” emotions – they don’t belong at the office.
Turning your emotions off because they get in the way of work is as misplaced an idea as turning off your car because it has the potential of speeding out of control.
It’s an expensive misconception - here’s why……
Read More...
Get On the Same Page with a Strat-Map
08/April/12 Filed in: Leadership Articles
A Powerful Leadership Tool for Providing Direction
Throughout Your Organization
In the way that a master chef’s recipe describes the essentials for creating a distinctive dish, a Strategy Map describes the essentials for creating a distinctive organization.
Ask This One Question...
28/March/12 Filed in: Leadership Articles
Your Answer Informs How To Align the 5 Key Priorities of Leading an Organization
If you want to create and sustain an exceptional organization, one that stands out from the rest, the most important question you can ask is ….
Read More...