What’s the good of arguing? One possibility is that under the right conditions it gets us closer to the truth. What are the conditions required?

First, an open mind and a basic respect for the truth.

Second, the assumption that your partner has an open mind and a basic respect for the truth.

Third, the discussion should be based on reason. If it is based on emotion, then you just have two people expressing their feelings and no progress is made.

What is reason? This very small no-nonsense “rulebook” offers a great start.

Weston’s main purpose for the book was to allow a professor to expedite grading essays. Rather than offer a long-winded explanation, he can refer his students to “rule 19″ and they know that they have somehow overlooked or failed to address alternative explanations for a correlation. [I sure wish a teacher had given me a book like this!]

But there are other uses as well. You can simply browse it in a reflective spirit to determine if you make any of these mistakes in your daily life. Incident investigators and root cause analysts can use chapter 6 on deductive arguments, to enhance their reasoning. [PROACT analysts in particular, will find the disjunctive syllogism, rule 25, very very familiar.]

Or, if you decide that a productive conversation is no longer in your interest, you can simply use the new latin terms to agitate people. ["My dear brother-in-law: I'm afraid that your attempt at reductio ad absurdum suffers from an erroneous false dilemma."]

Okay, okay. That last paragraph was a joke. Sort of. [Gentle humor or subtle gamesmanship is usually more effective against a raving political philosopher at the dinner-table.]

Normally I would have “key concepts” and “useful features” here, but in this case, the only key concept is that arguments should be based on reason rather than emotion, and as a short reference work it serves as it’s own “useful feature.”

Publisher’s Blurb

From Amazon.com:

A Rulebook for Arguments is a succinct introduction to the art of writing and assessing arguments, organized around specific rules, each illustrated and explained soundly but briefly. This widely popular primer – translated into eight languages – remains the first choice in all disciplines for writers who seek straightforward guidance about how to assess arguments and how to cogently construct them.

The fourth edition offers a revamped and more tightly focused approach to extended arguments, a new chapter on oral arguments, and updated examples and topics throughout.

Table of Contents

Preface

Note to the Fourth Edition

Introduction

Chapter 1: Short Arguments: Some General Rules

Chapter 2: Generalizations

Chapter 3: Arguments by Analogy

Chapter 4: Sources

Chapter 5: Arguments About Causes

Chapter 6: Deductive Arguments

Chapter 7: Extended Arguments

Chapter 8: Argumentative Essays

Chapter 9: Oral Arguments

Appendix 1: Some Common Fallacies

Appendix 2: Definitions

Resources

Questions to ask [and the mindset to have] when hiring your first boss

Design and construction of lifting beams

A nicely-balanced article on the boomer stereotyping of milennials. References this excellent piece from The Atlantic. For an interesting cyclical perspective on the generational question, see Strauss & Howe’s Generations: The History of America’s Future, 1584-2069.

Contrarian Corner: Think sunscreen reduces your risk of cancer? Think again.

When buying from a dealer, consider what the fine print actually means

A crucial distinction if you have authority: are you a leader or bureaucrat? [In my experience, it may actually be easier to be a leader at times when you do not have officially-sanctioned authority.]

Normal science in the Kuhn cycle model

A steam-powered box factory still in operation:

Talent strategies for a post-loyalty world

Have stock exchanges outlived their usefulness?

The challenge of human reliability

Gut feel or analytics? The trend is toward analytics.

Words that replace thought

Speaking of “replacing thought” here’s more clover taxonomy from Eric Peters

MindTools for effective feedback: the SBI tool, giving praise, and rewarding the team

An approach to visualizing data

Some good advice on acting a leader before you become one

Potential downside of positivity: when you refuse to acknowledge it’s a challenge your coworkers can feel stifled

If you’re going to work on your own vehicle, DON’T DO THESE THINGS

Procedures without stifling creativity and innovation: must-do, should-do, and may-do

Eggs vs. Cereal: Which is the breakfast of champions?

At the end, we discussed how much we should let perverse incentives influence our quality of work. [I simplified the language since I was speaking to a non-MBM audience.]

Note: Wherever an ellipsis (…) occurs, that is where I expect (demand) audience participation.

Meeting Outline

Who digs talking about feelings? Does anyone get excited talking about feelings?…

But does psychology affect our safety performance? Remember a few months ago when I talked about Joe Kramer, the south Chicago railroad welder? I talked about his positive attitude, but I didn’t say a thing about safety. Yet this very group made predictions about his own safety record, and the number of injuries he prevented in the course of his career.

Late in last turnaround I talked about 4 mental states involved in safety incidents. Can you recall them?…

I also challenged everyone to try to think of injuries or near misses, whether at work or home, that did not involve at least one of those four mental states. Was anybody successful with that?…

Who here has experienced work-related frustration? I won’t ask how often, I promise…

• Any new policies poorly communicated?
• Any new rules that seemed to make it harder to do your job? Or they came from people who don’t understand your working conditions (even if their intent was good)?
• Any personal or family issues on your mind when you were at work?
• Anyone get called in at a less-than-perfect time?
• Any criticism of your job performance that seemed unfair?
• Anyone go to do a job with a vague job plan, poorly written procedure, or patch something that should have a permanent fix?

Does this stuff happen just here?…

Since it seems unreasonable to assume that we will never be frustrated at work, what can we do when we are frustrated?…

Here are some questions I have found useful for lending perspective to frustration when something’s got to be done:

So my kid is getting bad grades or acting disrespectful. So my wife wants something I don’t want to buy. So my furnace died. So the boss said something unfair. Does that justify whatever injury I get? Does that let me off the hook for hurting myself and letting down the people who need me? Do I get a pass because I had other problems?

Who here has experienced fatigue at work?

• Has anyone sent home in the morning to come in for night shift failed to come in that evening completely rested and refreshed?
• Has anyone felt less than 100% in hour 15 of a 16-hour shift? Or their tenth straight day of work?
• Any babies waking you up in the middle of the night?

Since it’s not yet reasonable to assume perfect tranquility both at home and work, what can we do in anticipation of fatigue?…

Who has ever, even once, felt rushed to get the job done at work? I have to admit, when I worked in operations, I said to a maintenance foreman that I wanted everything done, I wanted it yesterday, and I wanted precision. What was I missing in my list of demands?

• Farmers and ranchers: do the seasons wait until you’re ready and all set to go?
• Has anyone ever asked you when the job would be done, but really meant to tell you to get it done soon?
• Anyone felt that for whatever reason you didn’t get much done that morning and wanted to have something to show for your time when you went to lunch?
• Anyone ever get edgy around 4:30 or 5:00 when a job is dragging on longer than expected?

I don’t see any solutions to separate maintenance work and time pressure. So again, were focused less on prevention and more on dealing with it. What are some ways to keep rushing from impacting our work?…

Complacency is when you know that a hazard is present but you think it won’t happen and you just decide to go ahead and “be careful.” [Tell story of contractor carrying large pneumatic cylinder up a ladder.]

Complacency lends itself to prevention more than the others. It’s a lot easier to prevent complacency than it is to prevent frustration…

On Letting Mental States Determine Our Work Method: I’d like to share a personal story about mental states and the way that we work. Many years ago I was blindsided by a negative performance review that came at a very inopportune time. Objectively, I had exceeded the goals set with my team leader at the beginning of the year, but then he left and I didn’t talk much with his replacement. I thought I was due for a promotion and had a transfer in mind, so I wanted this review to be on the high end. At what really ended up being our first real discussion of anything, period, I was put at the low end. There were really no specific criticisms, no guidance on what could be done better, or justification for being so low.

This really spoiled a lot of what I had planned and so I was less than enthused with being at work. I was so angry that for one month I resolved to do the absolute minimum required not to get fired while I worked out my plan for what was next. I really felt hopeless because I had worked hard and even done a few creative things to get my projects done on time and under budget.

But here’s what happened that month: it was the most miserable month of work I can ever remember.

So the lesson I took away from the experience is this: I do the best work I can the best I know how. Sometimes it’s recognized and I get praised or rewarded. And that’s great. Sometimes it isn’t noticed at all or some trivial aspect of it is criticized. And that sucks.

But regardless of how I feel, I try to work exactly the same way. In the end, it really doesn’t matter what the external rewards are because doing less than my best is a miserable experience.

The top ten words given to the English language by the internet

Injured Hispanic worker could not read English warning sign; sues for discrimination.

How to plan for productive and happy summer interns (and why)

The health warnings written on your face

Project Management: Teach Subcontractors to Use Project Metrics

How amplified individuals are doing what established institutions can not do [The concise description of a little-known phenomenon and some insightful suggestions makes the self-promotion of the author tolerable.]

How Small Wins Can Lead to Big Success

Fact: Funding  improvements in a large company is a bureaucratic nightmare. Potential solution: internal capital markets. [Market-Based Management goes mainstream?]

Noria lays out oil filter ratings

Flying Flashback: Before fear ruled the airport and the masses begged to be fondled, searched, and patted and thanked the Commissars so gratefully

Torquing: it should be part of your plant’s standard work process

Some things are best done badly

Unfortunately, I have to miss them when they come to Boise, but here’s Celtic Woman with The Voice:

Use the links below to download:

• Planned Experiment Planning Form (Excel)
• Planned Experiment Planning Form (PDF)

The Abilene Paradox is that sometimes, it’s false agreement, rather than conflict, that trips up organizations and causes them to go in unproductive or counterproductive directions. When people privately assess the situation one way, perceive that others think differently, and then agree with what they think the group believes, we have the paradox.

Let’s distill the article into a causemap. Here are the causal factors, evidence, and possible solutions enumerated by the article:

Click for full size

This exercise helps in a very significant way: it allows us to examine what questions have been explored, and what have not been asked. There is no shame in missing information: even a book can not explore every angle of every question. Everything is too big and too interconnected. Fortunately for us, we do not need to be a Buddha or Dalai Lama to solve many of our basic problems. [Though it might help!]

If we were to extend the cause map further, we might put in a box somewhere—perhaps as the cause of the fear of isolation—called “herd mentality.” The cause of herd mentality might be found in evolutionary psychology: bands of primitive man that hung together were more likely to survive and reproduce than those who tended to “go their own way.” But such speculation into evolutionary psychology does not lead to possible solutions.

Alternative Solutions

One more possible solution is to make the way a little easier for the “confronter.” The author acknowledges that the risk of separation is real, and that ostracization or exclusion are brutally efficient punishments. But he encourages the confronter to consider the likelihood, rather than the possibility, of these negative consequences.

An alternative approach might be to really embrace the negative scenario with all the gusto we can manage. See Tim Ferriss’ video on practical pessimism:

Not only are we fired for our actions, we are abandoned by our family, shunned by our friends, and left crying in the gutter in pouring rain with a cardboard box for cover. The absurdity of it becomes quickly obvious. You may be cured or not, but it’s worth a try.

More Resources

One resource that may help an aspiring “confronter” is Hornstein’s Managerial Courage, which studied and distilled those actions and motivations which may not guarantee success, but puts the odds in our favor.

Another resource is Crucial Conversations, which provides a framework for having safe conversations about controversial, emotionally-charged subjects.

If you are a manager, supervisor, head-of-household, or leader who wishes to avoid creating your own Road to Abilene, then reading about the MBM Challenge Process is advisable. The Science of Success is a good place to start.

It has often been said that power corrupts. But it is perhaps equally important to realize that weakness, too, corrupts. Power corrupts the few, while weakness corrupts the many. Hatred, malice, rudeness, intolerance, and suspicion are the fruits of weakness.

—Eric Hoffer

When reading Eric Hoffer it is easy to identify his work as that of an intellectual giant. This dock worker and migrant laborer turned social commentator is better read, more informed, a clearer thinker, and more in touch with reality than most college graduates.

One of the striking features of Hoffer’s writing is that it is a virtually endless supply of quotable quotes. It was tempting just to extract some juicy ones and post them. It is very difficult to “summarize” Hoffer because his writing is so concise and compact already that it is difficult to condense further.

Out of all his works, The Ordeal of Change is the third I’ve read, and the most directly relevant to management and industry. The concept of change, and human reactions to it, are of particular importance to those attuned to Market Based Management. Whether the attentive reader agrees with Hoffer or not on all points, he will come away from the book better informed about how to promote change, but more importantly what kind of change should be promoted.

Key Concepts

Key concepts are either recurring themes or strong individual points made with a fairly general application. Books with a more theoretical bent will have more “key concepts.”

• When we have no pride in ourselves, pride in one of our associations with a collective or a leader becomes overpowering. The opportunity for meaningful individual action and self-advancement prevents mass fanaticisms. Thus, weakness is as much a corrupting influence as power, and it breeds malice and intolerance.
  • [Lesson #1: If you pay people well enough to entice them to stay but give them no support or chance to succeed, you will have the worst possible outcome: you will keep them.]
  • [Lesson #2: If you give the worker no voice at all in affairs, they will probably organize in order to be better heard. The result is usually satisfying to no one.]
• The low social status of the intellectual in the western world causes them to promote many of the -isms of the masses. Communists may persecute their intellectuals, but they must take them seriously to do so. America tends to ignore them. In return, the Communist intellectuals have turned a criminal gang of psychopathic murderers into “saviors of the world.”
  • [Lesson: Give the men of words a place in the order to win them over. If you don't they will use their powers of persuasion to cause discontent. They are not necessarily wiser than the rest in identifying what is in their best interests.]
• Origination [innovation] requires a loose social order where individuals have the room to tinker and follow hunches.
  • [Lesson: A rules-based culture will struggle with innovation.]
• Not having a fixed place in the social order keeps everyone off balance. Without a guaranteed place in society, each man must prove his worth anew each day. This is not the path of fulfillment, but it at least provides men with justification for existence.
  • [Lesson: Discretionary effort will be reduced with an increased emphasis on tenure.]
• Management is seen as mostly the same to the worker, be he ideologue, profit-seeker, technician, or bureaucrat: he sees the worker as a means to an end. Complete unity of worker and management means the worker can be taken advantage of just as though management wielded coercive power. His safety, then, lies in a well-defined division of labor separating him from management. One thing is certain: the capitalist profit-seeker is a far easier taskmaster than the ideologue.
  • [Lesson: Workers are generally suspicious of philosophical or ideological persuasions for a reason. Ideology is not the sole province of the communist, and is becoming increasingly common in American business. Thus we have a prevalence of slogans.]
• The pioneers were not specifically seeking hardship, but if they had “made good” in the east then they would have had little incentive to leave and start over elsewhere. Hence, our vast western territories were cleared by society’s undesirables. America is the ironic result of what people from the low end of society can build when left alone.
  • [Lesson: Innovation will probably not come from well-rounded, socially-adjusted individuals. It will more likely come from wierdos, introverts, obsessives, and people with unconventional tastes. Does your recruiting process screen these people out? Does your culture make them feel unwelcome?]

Publisher’s Blurb

From Amazon.com:

Eric Hoffer—one of America’s most important thinkers and the author of The True Believer—lived for years as a Depression Era migratory worker. Self-taught, his appetite for knowledge—history, science, mankind—formed the basis of his insight to human nature. Nowhere is this more evident than in Hoffer’s seminal work, The Ordeal of Change, essays on the duality and essentiality of change in man throughout history.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Drastic Change

Chapter 2: The Awakening of Asia

Chapter 3: Deeds and Words

Chapter 4: Imitation and Fanaticism

Chapter 5: The Readiness to Work

Chapter 6: The Intellectual and the Masses

Chapter 7: The Practical Sense

Chapter 8: Jehovah and the Machine Age

Chapter 9: Workingman and Management

Chapter 10: Popular Upheavals in Communist Countries

Chapter 11: Brotherhood

Chapter 12: Concerning Individual Freedom

Chapter 13: Scribe, Writer, and Rebel

Chapter 14: The Playful Mood

Chapter 15: The Unnaturalness of Human Nature

Chapter 16: The Role of the Undesirables

It will be noted in the course of the presentation that the perverse incentives do not disprove the utility of the example policies, but that the negative side-effects do exist and may not be what the designers intended or wanted. [I attempted to use only examples with proven perverse incentives.]

Discussion Questions

1. Incentives to overproduce can result from production-related metrics. For example, in Soviet Russia, factories were measured on how many tons they produced (presumably with hard labor in Siberia being the penalty of failure). Thus, they produced only very large nails. What incentives to overproduce might we have here and what drives it? Define “production” very broadly here: we could “overproduce” on-spec or off-spec product, production inputs, reports, or wasted motion or time.
2. Incentives to underinvest can result from cost-related metrics. Every company has limited resources to invest, and good cost control practices benefit customers by keeping prices down and preventing waste. But conforming to year-old budgets also restricts us from capitalizing on emergent opportunities. What incentives to underinvest might we have here and what drives that? Define “invest” broadly: we could invest in efficiency, reliability, safety, and environmental compliance as well as production capacity. [Similarly, growth metrics can lead to overinvestment, but this may be a greater problem in marketing. My primary audience is manufacturing.]
3. Incentives to unproductive competition can result from conflicting incentives or narrow optimization. For example, I will be fired (or denied a performance bonus) if uptime of my operating unit falls below 90%. But the stores manager will be fired (or denied a performance bonus) if he fails to cut inventory by 20%. We probably are not going to like each other very much: I want lots of spares on hand and he will work hard to get rid of them. What unproductive competition might we have here and what drives it?

More Information

For more information on perverse incentives and unintended consequences, I recommend the following works:

• The Science of Success by Charles Koch
• Knowledge and Decisions by Thomas Sowell
• The parable of the broken window [This fallacy is often committed in pointing out the "economic benefits" of war.]
• Discussion on the morality of unintended consequences
• The reality of markets

Happy Walpurgisnacht (next week)!

Trend Alert: Milennials [younger workers] share their salary more often, expect more transparency

News Flash: Koch Industries is a leading bidder for the Tribune Company

Wild, Wild West: Samurai sword-wielding Mormon bishop comes to aid of Utah neighbor [This is too just much awesome for one news article.]

Where do you start with reliability? How about clean, tight, and lubricated?

A great article [PDF] by Mark Paradies on the difficulties of causal analysis [Is causal analysis really too hard for most people? Personal experience on dozens on incident investigations would indicate in the affirmative, but it's a hard thing to accept.]

3 great questions for changing “change management” (or “management of change”)

Before you install hydraulic equipment, always, always, always consider your strategy for maintaining oil cleanliness

Solving Gearbox Water Contamination Issues

Hiring? Past job titles just aren’t that important. Really.

A Comment Better than the Original Article ["Guest" writes on 4/17 at 6:51 AM: "Your article doesn't say anything. Yes, Thatcher was one way and could have been another way, which you admit might not be better and might even be worse. Big deal! This is the problem with Leadership as an academic subject. It's wishy washy with absolutely no answers." Had me laughing.]

Terrific checklist for manual-to-automatic lubrication systems that can apply to almost any form of automation

New Hubble telescope nebula photo

Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

How long does it take to make something a best practice? It’s about time we changed the job title of operators to operator-maintainers

This meeting agenda uses the Balmert Consulting format and my own content. The purpose of the format is to engage the crews by asking “darn good questions” about a situation relevant to their work. The format forces a conversation rather than having the supervisor or manager deliver a monologue.

This example of the importance of “management of agreement” comes from an old (1988) article called The Abilene Paradox: The Management of Agreement [PDF] which was referenced in an exercise from Success With the Gentle Art of Verbal Self-Defense. In this story, no one ever expressed disagreement with an unpleasant proposal, thus there was no conflict to manage, yet everyone ended up doing something that no one even wanted to do.

Since this is a fairly common phenomenon (the author of the article gives many examples) it is unlikely that whatever organizations we are a part of are immune. The example given is semi-trivial, yet most people have experienced it. And if it leads a company to risk its financial stability by supporting a doomed project, then the consequences can be severe.

Purpose

Extend the practice of Crucial Conversations from a one-on-one format to group discussions

Headline

No One Wanted to Go to Abilene, So Why Did They Go?

Summary of Information

The story opens with a family in Coleman, TX. The narrator, his wife, and his wife’s parents are playing dominoes and drinking lemonade on a brutally hot summer Sunday. The narrator says that it had all the makings of an agreeable Sunday afternoon until his father-in-law says, “Let’s get in the car and go to Abilene and have dinner at the cafeteria.”

I thought, “What, go to Abilene? Fifty-three miles? In this dust storm and heat? And in an un-air conditioned 1958 Buick?”

But my wife chimed in with, “Sounds like a great idea. I’d like to go. How about you, Jerry?” Since my own preferences were obviously out of step with the rest I replied, “Sounds good to me,” and added, “I just hope your mother wants to go.”

“Of course I want to go,” said my mother-in law. “I haven’t been to Abilene in a long time.”

So into the car and off to Abilene we went. My predictions were fulfilled. The heat was brutal. We were coated with a fine layer of dust that was cemented with perspiration by the time we arrived. The food at the cafeteria provided first-rate testimonial material for antacid commercials.

Some four hours and 106 miles later we returned to Coleman, hot and exhausted. We sat in front of the fan for a long time in silence. Then, both to be sociable and to break the silence, I said, “It was a great trip, wasn’t it?”

No one spoke. Finally my mother-in-law said, with some irritation, “Well, to tell the truth, I really didn’t enjoy it much and would rather have stayed here. I just went along because the three of you were so enthusiastic about going. I wouldn’t have gone if you all hadn’t pressured me into it.”

I couldn’t believe it. “What do you mean ‘you all’?” I said. “Don’t put me in the ‘you all’ group. I was delighted to be doing what we were doing. I didn’t want to go. I only went to satisfy the rest of you. You’re the culprits.”

My wife looked shocked. “Don’t call me a culprit. You and Daddy and Mama were the ones who wanted to go. I just went along to be sociable and to keep you happy. I would have had to be crazy to want to go out in heat like that.”

Her father entered the conversation abruptly. “Hell!” he said.

He proceeded to expand on what was already absolutely clear. “Listen, I never wanted to go to Abilene. I just thought you might be bored. You visit so seldom I wanted to be sure you enjoyed it. I would have preferred to play another game of dominoes and eat the leftovers in the icebox.”

After the outburst of recrimination we all sat back in silence. Here we were, four reasonably sensible people who, of our own volition, had just taken a 106-mile trip across a godforsaken desert in a furnace-like temperature through a cloud-like dust storm to eat unpalatable food at a hole-in-the-wall cafeteria in Abilene, when none of us had really wanted to go. In fact, to be more accurate, we’d done just the opposite of what we wanted to do.

Connection

[The Abilene Paradox] is as follows: Organizations frequently take actions in contradiction to what they really want to do and therefore defeat the very purposes they are trying to achieve. It also deals with a major corollary of the paradox, which is that the inability to manage agreement is a major source of organization dysfunction.

The problem with this story is not poor management of conflict, but poor management of agreement. The author proposes that management of agreement is just as significant an issue for organizations.

Darn Good Questions

1. Why is it harder to speak up when we disagree with a group than it is when we disagree with an individual?
2. What are some warning signs that tell us we’re on the Road to Abilene?
3. How do we balance the expectation to support each other and management initiatives with preventing potential problems that we might see?
4. What can we do to prevent getting on the Road to Abilene? What can we do once we’re already on the Road of Abilene?

Announcement: Currently pending in the book review index: Managing Maintenance Error by James Reason, The Toyota Way to Lean Leadership by Jeffrey Liker, Program or Be Programmed by Douglas Rushkoff, A Rulebook for Arguments by Anthony Weston, The Ordeal of Change by Eric Hoffer

How strong is the link between reliability and safety? Very strong says Jeff Shiver.

MindTools for cross-cultural communication: Avoiding Cross-Cultural Faux Pas, Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions, and The Seven Dimensions of Culture

Common Baby Boomer job security strategy: find out how to fix that critical machine and then hoard your knowledge. One way to stop encouraging information hoarding: don’t hire retirees as consultants.

By now almost everyone will have heard about the West Fertilizer plant explosion in West, TX. The location of the plant is very interesting. I wonder which came first: the plant or those houses and schools that are within 200 feet?

Click for full size

Some decent advice on self-appraisals [For rationally self-interested individuals your candor will depend somewhat on the culture where you work.]

News Flash: Grad School May Not Be the Best Way to Spend $100,000 [Balanced article: the point is not that grad school (or even college) is bad, but that neither is a universal answer. The Thiel Fellowship idea of paying high-achieving young people not to go to college is fascinating. I know people whose lives are much harder for the student debt burden they bear and their numbers are increasing.]

Pitfalls in translating best practices across cultures [The example given is specific to Chinese vs. American culture, but some of it can apply from one company to another, or even one plant to the next.]

Best Practices for Analyzing Gear Failures

The Chart Wars have begun! [Arm yourselves with knowledge!] (Tufte’s book reviewed here.)

[If you haven't seen it yet, take a look at my book review index for a complete list of previous and upcoming scheduled book reviews/synopses.]

MindTools for taking responsibility in a new leadership role, helping people to take accountability, and achieving quick wins

You probably have more latitude at work than you realize

Everything in its season, including team conflict

Will Moneyball Analytics Kill Loyalty and Leadership? [My thought: It surely won't help, but preservation of loyalty has been hit hard by many other factors in the last century. Going back a little farther, Hesiod had a few complaints about the breakdown of tribal existence in the Greek city states with the coming of "international trade" with Egypt and others in the Mediterranean. Protectionism (both cultural and economic) has a rather difficult history.]

Is preventive maintenance a second class effort?

Why the project manager should keep the books open [Great comment by The_rug: "If your project manager is 'the only one responsible for results' then I'm afraid that your project methodology and (more likely) business attitude towards projects is in a very poor state..."]

Animated introduction to Process-Based Leadership:

“To be a learner, you’ve got to be willing to be a fool.”

—George Leonard

There is a short list of books I have reviewed that I consider to have life-changing potential. [Prime examples are here and here.] Now I have another with George Leonard’s Mastery.

As the author concedes, mastery is an underappreciated path in today’s world. The pursuit of mastery very often conflicts with quarterly profits and instant gratification. The CEO who makes “too many” investments in the long-term could see his company targeted by quick-turnover investment groups (the corporate equivalent of real estate flippers). The teacher who spends too much time revisiting fundamentals missed earlier or changing course to fit their students’ passions risks missing targets on standardized test scores. Advertising promises easy “six packs”, instant relief, and “experiences” just from buying or using a product. Most television shows tie up every problem with neat deus ex machina solutions in one hour or less.

Patient perfect practice is contrary to deeply ingrained American habits of cramming for exams, crash dieting, proving your dedication with an all-nighter, and getting rich quick. But the cultural war on mastery could prove to be the undoing of one of the world’s most dynamic economies.

Yet none of this has to stop you from personally following the master’s path. Leonard mixes his distilled wisdom with fascinating yet concise anecdotes from decades of military, career, and aikido practice. With total humility he shares glorious successes and admits some embarrassing failures.

This book is highly recommended for all audiences.

[As an aside, mastery is one of Jack Donovan's four tactical virtues that typically differentiates a man's experience of life from a woman's. For more information, check out The Way of Men.]

Key Concepts

Key concepts are either recurring themes or strong individual points made with a fairly general application. Books with a more theoretical bent will have more “key concepts.”

• The definition of mastery is ”the mysterious process during which what is at first difficult becomes progressively easier and more pleasurable through practice.” See also: Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience.
• It is necessary to “love the plateau” to achieve mastery. Human nature is such that progress comes in spurts with long plateus in between. The plateaus themselves have ups and downs.
• Excluding the path to mastery itself there are three other paths that people tend to follow. When you are on these paths, you are not on the master’s path.
  1. The Dabbler approaches each new sport, career opportunity, or relationship with enormous enthusiasm. When the novelty wears off, the dabbler rationalizes moving on and the cycle repeats itself.
  2. The Obsessive concentrates exclusively on the bottom line and continual progress. They make herculean efforts to keep moving up even during plateaus. Eventually it ends in burnout and burned bridges.
  3. The Hacker is satisfied with proficiency and is willing to (and comfortable with) staying on the plateau indefinitely.
• There are five keys to mastery. If all five are in place, you are on the master’s path.
  1. Instruction: The autodidact will occasionally succeed wildly because he does not know “the rules,” but this is an exception. Most of the self-taught will spend their entire lives reinventing the wheel and not do a good job of it. The key is to carefully seek out the right instructor.
  2. Practice: Practice is mastery, and the master loves to practice. Stay on the path.
  3. Surrender: Assuming you’ve done your legwork from key 1, you’ve found an appropriate teacher. You must now surrender to the teacher (as a teacher, not a guru). They may ask you to do things you do not understand. If you have succeeded, they 1) know more than you do, and 2) have your best interests at heart. So don’t argue, just do what they say, and understand that you may get worse temporarily while you restructure your game to get better.
  4. Intentionality: Don’t just practice. Practice perfect.
  5. The Edge: Don’t disregard your limits, but “negotiate” with them.
• Homeostasis is necessary for life, but it does not discriminate. Good change is resisted with the bad. Understand that this resistance exists and what you must do to beat it.
• Master the commonplace. Most of our life is spent “in between” important events. Mastery can be applied to driving, washing dishes, vacuuming, or romantic relationships. “All paths of mastery eventually merge.”
• “To be a master, you must be willing to be a fool.” Your first try at anything new will be awkward and foolish. You will not be impressive. If you can not tolerate this, you can not be a master.

Publisher’s Blurb

From the back cover:

Drawing on Zen philosophy and his expertise in the martial art of aikido, bestselling author George Leonard shows how the process of mastery can help us attain a higher level of excellence and a deeper sense of satisfaction and fulfillment in our daily lives. Whether you’re seeking to improve your career or your intimate relationships, increase self-esteem or create harmony within yourself, this inspiring prescriptive guide will help you make anything you choose and achieve success in all areas of your life.

In Mastery, you’ll discover:

• The 5 Essential Keys to Mastery
• Tools for Mastery
• Mastery and Energy
• How to Master Your Athletic Potential
• The 3 Personality Types That Are Obstacles to Mastery
• How to Avoid Pitfalls Along the Path

…and more

Table of Contents

Part 1: The Master’s Journey

Introduction

Chapter 1: What is Mastery?

Chapter 2: Meet the Dabbler, the Obsessive, and the Hacker

Chapter 3: America’s War Against Mastery

Chapter 4: Loving the Plateau

Part 2: The Five Master Keys

Introduction

Chapter 5: Instruction

Chapter 6: Practice

Chapter 7: Surrender

Chapter 8: Intentionality

 Chapter 9: The Edge

Part 3: Tools for Mastery

Introduction

 Chapter 10: Why Resolutions Fail—and What to Do About It

Chapter 11: Getting Energy for Mastery

Chapter 12: Pitfalls Along the Path

Chapter 13: Mastering the Commonplace

Chapter 14: Packing for the Journey

Epilogue: The Master and the Fool

Keep your motors humming

“How much are you willing to reduce the amount spent on safety?”

Joy at work: where do you find it?

The role of lecturing in education

A case study in the best-laid plans going awry [The morality of intentions is abused too frequently when "selling" these changes. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with the change made, but perhaps a MBM approach of experimental discovery would have been useful.]

What’s the most likely type of mistake of operating CFOs?: errors of omission (“failing to make good investments”) or errors of commission (“wasting money”)? [I haven't worked everywhere, of course, but I've been places "run by engineers" and I've been places "run by accountants." I know where I'd rather work.]

Primal on the Playground accomplishes 2 things: it shows how to get a workout without a gym and it redefines that a “girl” is physically capable of.

Note: This blog will be slowing down—but not stopping—through the year. There will be about one book review per month rather than one book review per week. I will post ”weekly” reading 2-3 times per month instead of strictly weekly. The reason for the slowdown is that I will be working on other goals for awhile that will consume most of my free time. While I have defined this website broadly, these new projects would fall outside of that scope.

Why your company can not cease with its burdensome and non-value-added processes: because the demand on people’s time gives them prestige [It feeds "I'm so busy that..." one-upsmanship.]

Kontrarian Korner: “We could all benefit from a little more linear thinking.”

Intrade’s election “markets” had  at least three of the last presidents called months in advance and with far higher confidence than Gappup. [Even President Obama's first debate flop didn't flip Intraders.] And economists love Intrade, so why does the government hate it so much?

Stupid “philosophy” question, interesting survey showing people’s ethical malleability [The stupid question is whether it is right to push a man in front of a bus to save five other pedestrians. It's a stupid question because it has no real-world significance. You can't really know that the man's death will save five by stopping a bus?]

The following are my personal notes from the Kevin Eikenberry teleseminar Remarkable Leaders Know Serving Customers is Everyone’s Job:

Key Points

• The customer mindset is what people think about their customers all day long.
  • As leaders, we want to create the mindset that will best serve our organizations.
• Quotes on customer service from selected leaders [paraphrased]:
  • Jeff Bezos: customers are like guests at a party where we are the hosts
  • Bob Evans: treat strangers like friends and friends like family
  • Jeffrey Goodimer: helping customers, not “serving” customers
  • Peter Drucker: satisfied customers are the “results” of a business
  • Sam Walton: the customer is the boss and can fire anyone
• What is a customer? We call them many things: customers, clients, students, patients, visitors, colleagues, etc.
• Customer mindset for a ticket seller: How would you act if every customer purchasing a ticket were giving the money directly to you?
• Even if you’re in legal, accounting, or receiving, you have customers.
• 3 questions about customers:
  1. Who are they?
  2. What do we do?
  3. Why does what we do matter?
• Reasons customer service initiatives fail:
  1. Because they are “initiatives” which by definition have an end point after which we can go back to “business as usual.”
  2. Initiatives are about short-term actions.
  3. There are no clear expectations of anybody except that they “live through” the initiative.
  4. Initiatives are inconsistent with attitudes and behaviors towards employees.
  5. Customer service initiatives are not part of the culture, or initiatives are “bolted on” to the existing culture.
• How do we make customer service initiatives succeed? What can we do?
  1. Don’t let the initiative end. Eliminate the end date and make it “the way work is done.”
  2. Ask: have you done what you need to do, so that everyone understands the state of the organization?
  3. Ensure everyone knows exactly who their customer is.
  4. Create a “clear why” by personalizing customers and putting names and faces to them.
  5. Clarify expectations and hold people accountable to them.
  6. Love employees and customers.
  7. Hire/promote friendly/helpful/happy people.
  8. Move your culture toward the desired outcome.
• Components of a Powerful Customer Mindset
  1. Our beliefs about customers
  2. Words and stories used to describe or talk about customers
  3. Outcomes: are they where you want them?
• What You Can Do
  1. Start locally. You don’t have to wait for an edict from the CEO.
  2. Start personally. Lead by example.
  3. Talk about customer service and the customer service mindset in meetings and casual conversations.
  4. Learn about the customer: what they desire, their experiences, etc.

I hope that this job was not “planned” this way.

This example from a weekly maintenance “town hall” safety meeting is based upon data presented by Perry Lovelace, CMRP at the 2012 SMRP conference. Information in brackets are my comments or things will have to be filled in by the presenter.

Purpose

Identify Unplanned Maintenance Jobs as Specifically and Intrinsically Hazardous

Headline

Should We Report Unplanned Maintenance Jobs as Near Misses?

Summary of Information

[Present data on recent safety performance. It doesn't matter if that performance is positive or negative.]

According to data from the Belgian Maintenance Association, the injury rate for maintenance workers is 47 injuries per million working hours when planned maintenance is less than 25%. At 25-50% planned maintenance, the rate is 22. At 50-75%, the rate is 23. At 75% and higher the rate is 4. [Draw a simple chart on a white board.]

OSHA defines a near miss as “an unplanned event that did not result in injury, illness, or damage, but had the potential to do so.”

Connection

Given OSHA’s definition of a near miss and the data from the Belgian maintenance association, there is a definite basis to support the idea that unplanned maintenance inherently qualifies as a near miss.

Darn Good Questions

1. Is it a near miss? Why or why not? A 100 hp motor needs to be restarted after an unexpected stoppage.
2. Is it a near miss? Why or why not? Millwrights are called out to replace a pump with a broken shaft on a Saturday.
3. Is it a near miss? Why or why not? Pipefitters are diverted from another job during the week because an expansion joint is spraying process fluid.
4. The injury rate is clearly high when planned maintenance is below 25% and very low when planned maintenance is above 75%. But why does it go up between 25-50% and 50-75%?

Deming’s 14th point: accomplishing the transformation is everybody’s job.

Product Review: Remarkable Leaders Are Servant Leaders [link not available] by Kevin Eikenberry

The following are my personal notes from the Kevin Eikenberry teleseminar Remarkable Leaders Are Servant Leaders:

Key Points

• Comparison of power model vs. servant leadership
  • Power model: Leadership is about acquiring and wielding power
  • Servant leadership: the exercise of power is a means, and not an end. The end is the meet the needs of others.
• There is a moral element to the adoption of servant leadership. When you know others have needs you have three choices:
  1. Ignore their needs. [Morally defective choice.]
  2. Exploit their needs. [Morally defective choice.]
  3. Try to help.
• Where do you find the most meaning in life? Seeking power/wealth/fame or in helping people? Meaning comes from always doing your best, win or lose.
• Advantages of finding meaning:
  1. Meaning is an intrinsic motivator.
  2. You are more productive
  3. You are more innovative.
  4. You have lower stress.
  5. Your mental health improves.
  6. Meaning the the key to deep happiness.
• Survey results over time on sources of meaning
  • Uniformly highest rated source of meaning: family
  • Uniformly lowest rated source of meaning: power/wealth/fame/winning
• There is a tension between finding meaning and the cultural pressure to achieve power/wealth/fame.
• What can we do to get on the path of servant leadership or accelerate the journey?
  1. Begin with ethics: serve people, don’t use them. “Do those served grow as persons?”
  2. Never underestimate the importance of listening. The physical element is important: listening personally is better than surveys. As a new leader take your time and listen to people before making major changes. This keeps you in touch.
  3. Develop your colleagues with coaching and mentoring, not controlling. If you have coached and mentored successfully, then you can be confident in letting your people fly. “The work exists for the person as much as the person exists for the work.”
• What can we do to develop others?
  1. Talk about servant leadership, read about it, and practice it. Start teaching it as early as possible: even high schools and youth camps are not too early.
  2. Be a servant leader and lead by example. This is the most powerful way.
  3. Don’t compartmentalize: use it in all parts of your life: work and home.
• Is this a kind of Polyanna happy talk? Does it really apply to the real world?
  • It’s hard because people assume the power model is the way the world is organized. But if most operate according to the power model, they end up fighting others who think the same rather than focusing on results.
  • The power model is weak because the rewards go to those who did not help the organization the most.
  • Power-oriented leaders become disconnected because they don’t listen.
  • Power leaders can never get enough power, no matter what. Therefore, they can never be satisfied.
  • You can’t have a few people at the top exercising talent. Everybody needs to exercise their talents.
• How does persuasion and influence factor into servant leadership?
  • Persuasion and influence are tools. Servant leadership determines the end, which is helping people. For servant leaders, commands are a last resort.
• Help! I am surrounded by the power model, and I want to be a servant leader. How do I cope?
  • Just do it. Don’t march into the CEO’s office with a manifesto. You will succeed with servant leadership. When you do, people will either leave you alone, or better yet they will ask how you got the results.
• Is there a gray area between servant leadership and the power model?
  • There’s no real middle way. Either power is a means or an end.
• What’s the most important point on servant leadership?
  • When you are a servant leader you get what you need by helping others get what they need.
  • It’s not about duty and self-sacrifice. Servant leaders are not drab, boring, self-sacrificing people. It’s about your own fulfillment.
• What’s in it for me to adopt servant leadership?
  • The question sounds like it comes from a power model culture.
  • Some people just don’t want to be responsible.
  • Most people want to contribute, and servant leadership provides a way to do this.
  • You will have an impact.
  • You will get results.
  • You get to have meaning in your life.
• Further research:
  • The Paradoxical Commandments of Leadership

Toolsmanship: How to use a wrench, how to use a screwdriver, and how to use a hammer

When in Rome… On Learning Local Customs

The plant manager as change agent: part 1, part 2

MindTools for meaningful work: Intentional Change Theory, The MPS Process (for discovering work you love), and The Wheel of Life (for finding “balance”)

Does a small site really need a CMMS for scheduling?

A Prezi to introduce RCM by Robert Wilkins [Note: Wilkins tries to use Prezi like Powerpoint instead of using its unique features, but he scores points for trying new tools.]