新經濟學與台灣戴明圈: The New Economics and A Taiwanese Deming Circle

Jeffrey Kluger · Wednesday, Mar. 18, 2009

Presentation by Dr. Peter Drucker
International Knowledge Management Summit
11 June 1998
Dr. Peter Drucker began by describing himself as a management insultant
- “You have to get their attention before you can do anything else, and the best
way to do that is to be a little bit insulting.” And so it began! A wonderful almost
two hours of listening to one of the most impactful thinkers, writers, and
philosophers on organizational behaviors, management and group performance
in the 20th century. It was a genuine pleasure and honor to hear and interact with
him in person. At age 88, he conveys his experience and wisdom by telling
stories that wonderfully illustrate the learnings of a lifetime.

Those of you who have read Drucker will no doubt recognize familiar
themes from his writings. These notes are no substitute for reading the original.
But for those of you who are intrigued but have not read his work, I urge you to
do so. He is the most profound thinker in management and business.
Drucker communicates through telling stories. He often starts with a
rhetorical question:

Q: Who were the first executives, and perhaps the greatest executives of all
time?
A: The builders of the great pyramids. The projects were huge, even by modern
standards. They certainly were vaster than any project undertaken before the
mid-1800’s. Yet these men - and we presume they were men - organized the
collective work of thousands of other men, planned, arranged for materials, and
did all of the things big corporations do today. But the knowledge to do this was
in just a few men - the rest were organized to contribute their physical labor, and
that physical labor has changed very little over the years.
Thus, people who know how to manage have existed for centuries. Yet,
now society has a need for managers in greater numbers than it did in the past
and their skills are essential. This is the change from the past – that we need
such greater numbers.
But now we have many more people doing knowledge and service work.
And what do we know about managing knowledge workers? We know that there
are three topics: the knowledge worker, knowledge itself, and the resources and
tools for knowledge worker. All three must be heeded. However, Dr. Drucker
decided not to discuss resources and tools. First he addressed managing the
knowledge worker, whom he characterized as both “dismally unproductive” and
volunteers. Secondly, he said, we know that they are not employees, but
volunteers, even though they are paid for what they do.
Until recently, society ran on muscle power or skilled labor. In 1880
Frederick Taylor looked at manual work, and made great improvements in its
productivity. But even Taylor looked at the task being done, and asked “What is
the one best way to do this task/” He never asked if the task itself was
necessary.
Previously, knowledge was an ornament. Even up to World War II,
almost all work was manual or skilled labor. What we did in WWII, out of
necessity, was through management and training we learned to enable many
people to do what in the past only a few people had been able to do - produce
high quality optics, make machine parts, build complex machines. We did this
through discipline, through study and conscientious attention to process. This
efforts had enormous success, resulting in an improvement in productivity of
about three and a half per cent, which is a 50-fold increase over a century.
However, all manual and skilled work is programmed by the task. How
should the task itself be done? But that may not be the right question. In
contrast, knowledge work is not programmed by the task. Knowledge work is
driven by the results. . The first question must be: “What is the task?”
The major cause of dismal productivity is that we have knowledge workers
doing work that we did not hire them to do, and which probably does not need to
be done at all. Productivity of the knowledge worker begins with asking: “What
is the task? What is the job?” Even today, we are too quick to ask how to do the
task better, and not consider whether it can be eliminated altogether. Only the
knowledge worker himself can answer that, but all too often his job consists of
non-essentials.
For example:
· Salespeople today sell two-thirds of what they sold in 1929, adjusted for
inflation
· Nurses spend 70-75% of their time shuffling papers
· Engineers spend time writing and rewriting reports - no one applied to
engineering school because he wanted to write reports. No one was
admitted to engineering school because she was a good report writer.
Eliminating non-essential work is the key to the productivity of the
knowledge worker. This is the severe limitation of classical TQM, in that it made
perfect work that should never be done at all. (Drucker was particularly direct
about Deming on this point, but allowed that Juran was more flexible.)
As no two knowledge workers have the same job, each one must define
their own job: What should we in this organization hold you accountable for?
What contributions and results should you be accountable for over the next 15
months?
This process is iterative, however. The first attempts to do this will not be
right, but they will allow us to learn. The nurse will tell you, for example, that
while arranging flowers for a patient is not a nursing task, it is something she or
he (40% of nursing students today are men) should do because nonprofessional
contact with patients is necessary to build the patient relationship
that is necessary for good nursing care. And what is the nurse being paid for?
Patient care! Not housekeeping, paperwork, or doctor care!
The second responsibility of the knowledge worker is to educate us.
Every knowledge worker must first be a teacher, creating a wider understanding
of his or her knowledge. It is their job to describe to the organization the power
and limitations of their area of expertise. The knowledge worker must be clear
about what people should know about their area, especially what they can and
cannot produce. Ultimately, becoming a learning organization requires first
becoming a teaching organization.
Unlike manual or skilled laborers, knowledge workers are paid to know
something we don’t. You have the knowledge, we don’t. In the old labor and skill
model in organizations, managers had held most of the jobs of the people they
supervised. They came up the ladder, jobs changed slowly, the people at the top
knew every job in the plant. They were in a position, through their experiences to
specify the information and knowledge needs for employees.
Today no two career paths are the same, no two experience profiles are
the same. Knowledge workers cannot assume their managers know what they
do. Thus, it is imperative that the knowledge worker educate his associates as to
what his job and knowledge are.
Lastly, the knowledge worker must define his or her information needs. In
the past this was a management task, because information was scarce. Today,
information is becoming a commodity, and the knowledge worker will have to
learn and answer the question “What information do you need to do your job?”
The question usually has not been asked - and whatever you answer, without
testing will be wrong - never right the first time.
The nature of knowledge is that it makes itself obsolete. On the other hand, skills
change very slowly. A stone cutter from the middle ages would recognize and be
able to use the tools used today. Under these conditions, it was reasonable to
believe that when an apprentice finished training at the age of 16 or 18, he had
learned most of what he needed to know about his skill for the rest of his life.
How do you manage change in knowledge work? By organized abandonment -
by getting rid of yesterday. New ideas need good people who must be pulled off
of yesterday/s tasks. There is nothing more futile than trying to keep a boat from
sinking. Managers must plan for organized abandonment, and manage change.
Get rid of yesterday; move onto the new. The new always requires able people,
who take change for granted and see it as an opportunity.
In knowledge work, the knowledge worker now owns the means of production.
They are mobile, and can work anywhere. They keep their resumes in their
bottom drawer. Consequently, they must be managed as volunteers, not as
employees. Only the unskilled need the employer more than the employer needs
them.
Managing volunteers is an American specialty - no other country has a tradition
of volunteerism like America. What are some of the things that make people
volunteer?
I see results.
I know what I am doing.
I know the objectives.
I know why I am here.
I have responsibility.
I set the goals.
They expect me to help tell them what to do, to help set direction.
So, what does this teach us about managing knowledge workers? The job of
management is to make them effective. There are a number of ways to do this:
Make demands on knowledge workers, Hold them accountable.
Give them responsibility.
Put in stretch goals they can be proud of achieving.
Make sure they have training and education.
Place people so that they are productive.
Give them achievement so that they develop standards.
Ensure they have rewards and recognition.
Managers must change people’s behavior through appropriate rewards
and recognition. The most potent form is peer recognition. However, he
cautioned not to try to change everyone at once: “Don’t’ try to convert all of the
heathens at once. “
When setting stretch goals, knowledge workers must be involved in
setting their own standards for reaching those goals. Perhaps a way to start is
by accessing the requirement and then reviewing what contribution the
knowledge worker can make.
The key to productivity is to abandon work that does not need to be done.
To make Organized abandonment systematic, he suggested a policy of
reviewing all products, processes, and services every three years, asking the
questions” “If we were not already in this business, or performing this activity,
and knowing what we know, would we enter in to it now?” If the answer is “No”,
then, take action to stop it now - Do Not Study It! Near successes can hinder
innovation and are dangerous. They encourages continuing what should be
abandoned. Organized Abandonment must be built in to your business.
The ultimate test of management is succession. Great leaders are too
often followed by collapse of the business, because succession is too often
ignored. Too often, leaders pick their successors, and they tend to pick carbon
copies of themselves, and carbon copies are always weak. Two institutions - the
Church and the Military - have endured in part because they do not allow their
leaders to select their successors.
On Mentoring: A mentor should ask two questions about their charge:
· What are her strengths?
· What are her bad habits, weaknesses?
The mentor’s first job is to place the person where her strengths will produce
results. It is the mentor’s job to make them effective, while also helping them
learn to overcome bad habits.
The “Death of Hierarchy” is nonsense! Someone must be in charge, have clear
authority. The issue is not “leadership” in the abstract, but “leadership for what
purpose?” Great charismatic leaders can spread tragedy. On the other hand,
Harry Truman had the “leadership and charisma of a dead fish”- yet he was an
effective executive.
It’s not about Dash, but Do!
In a small session following his Keynote, Professor Drucker responded to more
questions.
His advice to a would-be CKO for deciding how to engage his organization:
Figure out what the objective needs are of the organization. Who is the customer
of your services, and what do they consider value? This is not the same as
asking for the job description - the “job” is meaningless.
Assess what the organization will be most receptive for, and consider that as an
entry point. You need to know what works in your organization. The Navy, for
example, would not accept what works for the Air Force. You will not change
personalities; work with them.
On managing knowledge workers as volunteers:
Three critical areas -
· Results - “Box Office” - They must be able to produce
· Manners - The lubricating oil of the organization. Moving bodies under
pressure creates friction, but you can function as long as you can interact.
Don’t allow bad manners, and don’t allow people to confuse “freedom” with
abandoning manners.
· Responsibility. Demand they take responsibility for the expectations others
have of them. Start with commitments to your boss, then your subordinates.
Then be clear about what you need from them. Remember, we do not know
what others do and need, and they do not know what we do and need.
Begin your examination of the business from outside. Get out! See how things
work, really. Know your core competencies, look at the environment, and look for
gaps that your core competencies can address. Don’t start with your products!
You will not see anything new, you will miss opportunities.

新經濟學與台灣戴明圈: The New Economics and A Taiwanese Deming Circle

2009年3月24日星期二

三頭六臂集 340-352

Could a Helmet Have Saved Natasha Richardson?

ひっしょう　―しよう【必勝】/ ―せふ【必^▼捷】

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新經濟學與台灣戴明圈: The New Economics and A Taiwanese Deming Circle

2009年3月24日 星期二

三頭六臂集 340-352

Could a Helmet Have Saved Natasha Richardson?

ひっしょう ―しよう 【必勝】/ ―せふ 【必▼捷】

沒有留言:

網誌存檔

2009年3月24日星期二

ひっしょう　―しよう【必勝】/ ―せふ【必^▼捷】