In Chess & Business, Lies & Hypocrisy Do Not Last Long

By Pascal Dennis (bio)

I paraphrase the great Emmanuel Lasker, philosopher, mathematician, and world chess champ from 1894 to 1920.

I encourage you all to play chess. It’s fun, engrossing and wonderful for the mind. Chess’s wildly romantic history and mythology is an added bonus.

(Nowadays you can download grandmaster level chess programs on to your Pad!)

One of the great charms of chess is its binary nature.

You win or lose based on

• The strength of your ideas, and
• Your skill & courage in implementing them

Is Lasker's maxim true in business?

In small business, I'd say Yes.

Our success or failure depends on the depth of our strategic understanding, and the energy & intelligence with which we execute.

(Luck plays a part too, of course, as always & everywhere.)

How about BIG business?

Based on my experience, I'd say Yes - with important reservations.

Monopoly, oligopoly, and market rigging (e.g. to keep competition out) are all too common.

(The countermeasure is intelligent regulation in accord with the "Less is More" principle)

Another exception is large companies suffering from Big Company Disease, the villain in my last book, The Remedy.

Perhaps the greatest power of the Toyota management system (aka "Lean") is its ability to make problems visible.

Lasker might add, "thereby, we expose lies & hypocrisy."

Good Lean companies are thus, a meritocracy. The best & brightest prosper, and bozos are exposed.

Play chess, have fun, kick butt and take names.

Best,

Pascal

Lean in the Public Service – Part 1

By Pascal Dennis

Lean (aka Toyota management system) has developed deep roots far outside of manufacturing.

I’ve been privileged to work in sectors as diverse as Healthcare, universities, home building, utilities and software development.

How about the Public Service? Does Lean apply at municipal, state and federal government agencies? I’ll explore this question in blogs to come.

The short answer is ‘Yes’. All work is a process, all work can be improved. Public service is Lean’s frontier and the potential is enormous.

An effective public service creates great value and strengthens a society. (An inept or corrupt civil service is the stuff of Franz Kafka novels.)

What are some of the challenges for Lean in the Public Service? It’s not the people – I’ve found our civil service colleagues to be capable and dedicated.

Civil servants seek and deserve what Deming called ‘pride of workmanship’. They have a right to be involved in designing and improving their work.

But too often they work in dysfunctional management systems, and under antique mental models. The problem is in the system, which senior leaders own.

What are some of the systemic problems? The absence of competition is perhaps the most important. Lean’s heart is value, and value’s heart is the customer-supplier connection (Rule 2 of Lean).

How to motivate kaizen where there’s no competition? How to motivate leaders to build good systems for the 4Ms – manpower, methods, materials and machines? How to develop a meritocracy?

(Can we engage international marketing organizations like, say, JD Power, in developing awards and recognition for excellence in public service?)

The stakes are high, as is the challenge. To our civil service friends and colleagues, full speed ahead.

Best,

Pascal

Pascal Dennis Bio