Scatter - Our Nemesis

By Pascal Dennis (bio)

Big Company Disease has many causes.

One of the most subtle is our inability to ‘wrap our arms around’ the PDCA cycle.

Myriad improvement cycles begin – but they become fragmented:

• Group A develops the Plan,
• Group B deploys,
• Group C checks the Plan, and
• Group D adjusts it.

I call this Scatter, with a deep bow to the late, great Al Ward – friend, colleague & profound Lean thinker.

Al described this syndrome to me over lunch a decade ago, and then again in his splendid book Lean Product & Process Design.

Improvement, whether a Kaizen Workshop, Problem Solving cycle or Strategy A3, requires complete PDCA cycles

One person (or team) needs to wrap her arms around the cycle, and thereby develop the profound, sympathetic knowledge central to breakthrough.

Thereby, our entire brains start firing – Left, Right, prefrontal cortex etc.

The countermeasures we select are usually simple and clear.

There’s usually a sense of release. “Of course! Why didn’t we see it before!”

As opposed to the ponderous, countermeasure-by-committee stuff that blights so many report outs.

So how to reduce Scatter?

Lean fundamentals like visual management and Leader standard work are a good start.

Veteran Lean companies like Toyota have developed the Chief Engineer role in Design, and Key Thinker (aka Deployment Leader or Pacemaker) role in Strategy Deployment.

Their job is to oversee & manage broad PDCA cycles – and to record & share the learning.

There are all a good place to start in your never-ending battle with Scatter.

Best regards,

Pascal



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Scatter - Our Nemesis

By Pascal Dennis (bio)

Big Company Disease has many causes.

One of the most subtle is our inability to ‘wrap our arms around’ the PDCA cycle.

Myriad improvement cycles begin – but they become fragmented:

• Group A develops the Plan,
• Group B deploys,
• Group C checks the Plan, and
• Group D adjusts it.

I call this Scatter, with a deep bow to the late, great Al Ward – friend, colleague & profound Lean thinker.

Al described this syndrome to me over lunch a decade ago, and then again in his splendid book Lean Product & Process Design.

Improvement, whether a Kaizen Workshop, Problem Solving cycle or Strategy A3, requires complete PDCA cycles

One person (or team) needs to wrap her arms around the cycle, and thereby develop the profound, sympathetic knowledge central to breakthrough.

Thereby, our entire brains start firing – Left, Right, prefrontal cortex etc.

The countermeasures we select are usually simple and clear.

There’s usually a sense of release. “Of course! Why didn’t we see it before!”

As opposed to the ponderous, countermeasure-by-committee stuff that blights so many report outs.

So how to reduce Scatter?

Lean fundamentals like visual management and Leader standard work are a good start.

Veteran Lean companies like Toyota have developed the Chief Engineer role in Design, and Key Thinker (aka Deployment Leader or Pacemaker) role in Strategy Deployment.

Their job is to oversee & manage broad PDCA cycles – and to record & share the learning.

There are all a good place to start in your never-ending battle with Scatter.

Best regards,

Pascal

Reflection - the Breakfast of Champions

By Pascal Dennis

Reflection entails. honest, humble acceptance of successes & failures, strengths & weaknesses.

Hansei, as the Japanese call it.

Reflection is the countermeasure to hubris, overweening pride & arrogance, that destroyer of people and organization.

Reflection is central to all great religions, in the form of prayer, meditation, and rumination.

In some traditions the acolyte leaves civilization and seeks reflection in solitude.

In my experience, reflection requires both solitude, as well as, the camaraderie of one's team.

Thus, questions like 'What have I learned?’ naturally lead to 'What did we learn?'

Reflection, of course, reflects the Adjust phase of Plan-Do-Check-Adjust cycle.

We close of the loop thereby, and lay the foundation for next year's PDCA loop.

A couple of points here:

To close the loop, we need to observe each PDCA phase.

Otherwise, we suffer the debilitating ailment I call Scatter - one group does the Plan, another Deploys the Plan, yet a third Checks the Plan.

Result: lousy results and little learning.

Scatter is at epidemic proportions, especially in large organizations.

So important activities need a deployment leader, ‘key thinker’, ‘chief engineer’ or equivalent to ‘wrap their arms around the problem’, observe each PDCA phase, and thereby harvest & share the learning.

Best regards,

Pascal

Pascal Dennis Bio

Reprise - Scatter - a Symptom of Big Company Disease

By Pascal Dennis

By scatter, I mean the tendency large organizations have of disassembling the PDCA cycle - and giving different parts to different people.

One group develops the Plan, another deploys the Plan, yet another monitors the Plan.

Sometimes a fourth group is responsible for adjusting the plan.

More often, though, there is no adjustment. We just hope what's left of the Plan will quietly fade away.

The role of a Key Thinker (Deployment Leader, 'Control Department' at Toyota) is to "wrap their arms around" the problem -- and to shepherd it through the entire PDCA cycle.

Thus, you have a holistic understanding of what's happening - and a much better chance of making diagnoses & adjustments.

I see scatter is New Production Development, Marketing, Engineering and Strategic Planning in general.

We like to take things apart.

That's okay, so long as we put them back together.

And so long as one person is charged with seeing the whole chessboard, and grasping the unfolding story.

Best,

Pascal

Pascal Dennis Bio

Scatter - Our Nemesis

LPI Back to Basics Series

By Pascal Dennis

Big Company Disease has many causes.

One of the most subtle is our inability to ‘wrap our arms around’ the PDCA cycle.

Myriad improvement cycles begin – but they become fragmented:

• Group A develops the Plan,
• Group B deploys,
• Group C checks the Plan, and
• Group D adjusts it.

I call this Scatter, with a deep bow to the late, great Al Ward – friend, colleague & profound Lean thinker.

Al described this syndrome to me over lunch a decade ago, and then again in his splendid book Lean Product & Process Design.

Improvement, whether a Kaizen Workshop, Problem Solving cycle or Strategy A3, requires complete PDCA cycles

One person (or team) needs to wrap her arms around the cycle, and thereby develop the profound, sympathetic knowledge central to breakthrough.

Thereby, our entire brains start firing – Left, Right, prefrontal cortex etc.

The countermeasures we select are usually simple and clear.

There’s usually a sense of release. “Of course! Why didn’t we see it before!”

As opposed to the ponderous, countermeasure-by-committee stuff that blights so many report outs.

So how to reduce Scatter?

Lean fundamentals like visual management and Leader standard work are a good start.

Veteran Lean companies like Toyota have developed the Chief Engineer role in Design, and Key Thinker (aka Deployment Leader or Pacemaker) role in Strategy Deployment.

Their job is to oversee & manage broad PDCA cycles – and to record & share the learning.

There are all a good place to start in your never-ending battle with Scatter.

Best regards,

Pascal

Pascal Dennis Bio

Scatter - a Symptom of Big Company Disease

By Pascal Dennis

By scatter, I mean the tendency large organizations have of disassembling the PDCA cycle - and giving different parts to different people.

One group develops the Plan, another deploys the Plan, yet another monitors the Plan.

Sometimes a fourth group is responsible for adjusting the plan.

More often, though, there is no adjustment. We just hope what's left of the Plan will quietly fade away.

The role of a Key Thinker (Deployment Leader, 'Control Department' at Toyota) is to "wrap their arms around" the problem -- and to shepherd it through the entire PDCA cycle.

Thus, you have a holistic understanding of what's happening - and a much better chance of making diagnoses & adjustments.

I see scatter is New Production Development, Marketing, Engineering and Strategic Planning in general.

We like to take things apart.

That's okay, so long as we put them back together.

And so long as one person is charged with seeing the whole chessboard, and grasping the unfolding story.

Best,

Pascal