Lean Management vs Convolution Theory

 Lean Management or Convolution Theory?

Convolution Theory

Everybody has heard of Lean Manufacturing but not so many about Convolution Theory. I use the term Convolution Theory in reference to the way most large businesses operate. There is no organization more saddled with Convolution Theory however than the US Government. Convolution theory dictates that in order to show you are good at your job you need to add intelligent complexity to your job and function. One glaring example of Convolution Theory at it’s worst from my own experience is:

Case Study #1:

When I was running a Manufacturing Company in the Los Angeles, CA market one of my customers was Neutrogena which is owned by Johnson & Johnson. We had been doing business with Neutrogena for a few years and then all of a sudden we are told that we need to submit a Nationwide Johnson & Johnson bid proposal for the upcoming year or we would lose all of the business, regardless of how happy our customer was with our products and service. Not wanting to lose a good customer I agreed to go through the bidding process to keep the account. Johnson & Johnson sent me an 87 page questionnaire to fill out and 42 spreadsheets to fill out. If I didn’t fill all of them out then I could lose the business. When I filled in the answers to the questionnaire it was 127 pages long. I filled out most of the spreadsheets (some required confidential information that I was not going to disclose). Think about this. If for every business unit of a company like J&J there are 10 people bidding on the box portion of the business and each submitting over 150 pages of information, that would be over 1500 pages per business unit. How many business units does J&J have? How many other raw materials went into their products? That would amount to millions of pages of nonsense.

I can tell you right now that no purchasing manager in their right mind is going to read all 150 pages of complex information and data, memorize it and compare it to the other 9 companies that are all bidding for the process. The answers were not Yes or No and not a grading scale that could be graded by a computer. Someone (a whole army of people I would imagine) would have to read all of them and try to make a fair assessment about which supplier would be the best based on all of that information. This is CRAZY!!! NOBODY is going to read all of that information for all vendors and be able to make an intelligent decision. It is impossible. If they had a team of 5 people they would all have to understand all data for all suppliers in that product. How many hours did J&J put into this analysis? I am sure enough that they could have fired 20 people instead of engaging in such a wasteful exercise.

So why would they do such a thing. I would say one of two things were to blame (or a combination of the two). Either some egotistical purchasing GURU wanted to show how smart he was by creating a comprehensive analysis process to cover every possible base or they hired a consultant that didn’t know his @$$ from a hole in the ground and used this as a reason to rack up a huge amount of billable hours. If it was the latter, then they are a disgrace to the profession. If it is the former, somebody at the top of the food chain needs to use some common sense and say “NO!” we are not going to do this.

If they had used the Lean Management way of doing things the top 5 or so things that added the most value to J&J would have been included in the bid and the past performance of the current vendors and reference checks on prospective vendors would have been used to make the best decision. That could have been done by one person in just a handful of hours and I would bet to a better conclusion.

At the end of the process we retained the business with Neutrogena which really means that they spent countless hours reviewing thousands of pages of data, charts and written responses and did NOTHING with the information. In hindsight they could have saved a fortune in management costs, and wasted time on both ends and avoided the whole process. How a great company like J&J would get so caught up in the forest as to lose sight of the trees is mind boggling but it is only one example in one department in one company of the millions of companies out there doing the same thing.

Last Friday they were going to shut down the Government due to lack of funds. They did that once before quite a number of years ago. They shut down “All Non-Essential Operations” for a period of time. My big question is… If they were non-essential, then why did they start them back up when the crisis was over? Why? Politics. No politician wants to put people out of work even if they accomplish nothing all day but pushing papers that no one will ever read.

Lean Management

I use the term Lean Management to refer to the use of Lean Manufacturing techniques in an entire organization. The same philosophies that work so well in manufacturing work equally as well in an office, call center, service business, etc.

The theories behind the Lean Management approach have been around for decades before they were ever called lean. The idea behind Lean processes is to remove everything that is not value added. If it doesn’t add value then it must be waste. This challenges the traditional wisdom practiced in most companies today, even including fortune 500 corporations. Leaner flatter organizations respond much quicker and operate much more efficiently than other organizations. The idea is to eliminate everything you can and make it simple.

This can be taken too far as well. When visiting a Lean Managed Company (name withheld) it was apparent that they had some very ineffective employees working there. I asked how they could possibly consider themselves a lean company if they were not efficient. They went on to tell me how they had eliminated most of their documented processes and reduced their staff to the point that people were overworked (Lean at it’s worst) and because they didn’t have documented procedures and job descriptions they couldn’t effectively hold people accountable for their performance.

This company was so Lean they were Fat. When people are starving and malnutritioned their bellys can expand from malnutrition instead of fat. That is what happened to this company. They were so focused on the Lean Process that they lost all sight of the purpose of Lean to begin with.

The Balance of Lean Management vs Convolution Theory

The goal of Lean Management or Lean Manufacturing is to eliminate all forms of waste, from wasted time, effort, people, processes, paperwork, etc. and make it simple and manageable. Many convoluted processes are to protect us from ourselves. Ninety percent of the rules in an operation are to deal with the ten percent that cause ninety percent of the problems. The first thing you should do is get rid of those ten percent right now. Then simplify your processes utilizing the many Lean Manufacturing and Lean Management techniques to improve efficiency, sales, profit, cost and happiness of the entire team.

Put your ego in your pocket and don’t complicate a process that doesn’t need to be complicated. Simple is better.

Randy “Dr. Box” Phares is an award winning globally recognized consultant and Keynote Speaker on Organizational Improvement. His company Dr. Box Consulting helps companies around the world improve their processes, productivity and most of all Profit. If your company needs the cure then call the Doctor. (www.askdrbox.com)

Love is a Business Strategy

Love as a business strategy?  

Really? When we talk about the need to “Create Value” we’re talking about making a very real and discernable difference.  For all of us, no matter whom we depend upon for our daily bread, that means making our customers love us.

Love as a business strategy?  Really!  If people buy from you because you give them the cheapest price, they’ll buy from the next guy for the same reason.  When we create business propositions around cutting prices, I’m reminded of a joke about a man and a woman in a bar.  The punch line concludes with the recently face-slapped man answering, “We’ve already determined what you are.  Now we’re just haggling over the price.”  That type of transaction in the bar and the ones that we engage in predicated on discounting are not healthy, are of questionable character and are devoid of value and meaning.  We not only can do better than that — we must.

If your customers buy from you because of the love that you show them and because they love you, you can profit more — both in your bank account and your heart.  You need to know this—People don’t buy with their heads.  They buy with their hearts.  You don’t compete for their money.  You compete for their feelings and emotions.  If you touch the hearts of the people you serve, they will be loyal and become partners.  Engage their emotions and they’ll become raving fans.  Raving fans don’t just give you referrals.  They become your ambassadors and evangelists.

Is there room for softhearted words like “Love” in the world of business?  In our self-important universe of trade and commerce, can we use this kind of language?  I believe it is critical that we use it and live it.  Speaker and author, Tim Sanders wrote the bestseller, “Love Is The Killer App” and challenges business people to become “love cats.”  He argues that the way to fix your future is to fix yourself and that in today’s world the road to prosperity is paved with a commitment to generosity.

Milton Mayeroff in his philosophical book, ”On Caring”, defines love as “the selfless promotion of the growth of the other.”  When we help others grow and become their best selves, we are being loving and we grow.  It is one of the most amazing counter intuitive realities of this world; the more we give, the more we gain.  I speak of this in the presentation that I’ve given at several industry events entitled “How Full Is Your Bucket?” We each carry an imaginary bucket and when that bucket is full of positive feelings, we operate in our zone, at our best and at peak performance.  When our bucket gets emptied through the negative emotions of others, we cannot be or do our best.  But the very best way to fill our own buckets back up is to consciously and conscientiously be filling the buckets of others.

So what does it mean to bring love into our professional lives and how does that create value?  I like Sanders’ definition:  “Love is the act of intelligently and sensibly sharing your knowledge, networks, and compassion with your business partners.”  When we are openly human with each other great things can happen.  We can operate from the perspective of assuming positive intentions from each other and not creating drama skits of ulterior motives.

Some brilliant business minds have stated that the purpose of business is to make a profit or to maximize return to share holders.  I could not disagree with that more.  It leaves no room for the most powerfully motivating force on the planet — Love.  Love can propel you forward and give you a sense of meaning and satisfaction, which will help you do your best work and be your best YOU.  The purpose of work is not to maximize profit.  It is to come together to do good things, to help each other and bring about important and lasting changes to our society and our planet.

We can build relationships, learn from each other and openly share our knowledge; expand and connect our networks of value-driven people, and express our true selves despite the harried pace we set for ourselves and our business partners.  We can hold each other to higher standards and demand from each other that we leave everything we touch better than we found it.  And we can live out our values and do good things not because we expect a Return on Goodness, but simply because it is the right thing to do.  We can believe in a karmic quid pro quo, but it should not order our days.  Do the right thing because you want to be the right person.

The passion and compassion that you bring to your customers, your supplier partners, your associates and your world are what defines you.  Compassion and generosity are the best strategies for individual and organizational prosperity.  We must be people of value with the right values. Together we can make a difference for good.  Really!  Love is the best Business Strategy!

A “Special Secret” for Building Your Business

Do you know the “Special Secret” for building your business?

In the past 24 hours, were you made to feel special in any way? Did someone send you a handwritten “thank you” note? Did you receive a gift basket? Maybe someone called to invite you to lunch as their guest. My guess is that your answer is “no.” Now think back to the last time you were on the receiving end of ANY of these gestures. I’ll bet it’s been a WHILE … hasn’t it? And I’ll guarantee that your clients would say it’s been some time since anyone made THEM feel special, either.

My friend, Phil, a marketing consultant, went out of his way earlier this week to introduce two professionals who work in the same industry, believing that they could take mutually benefit from a business relationship. He took the time to send an e-mail to the two people, stating what each of them did and how they might be able to build their business as a result of working with one another. That was a few days ago, and he still hasn’t heard from either one. Phil’s act of kindness was not even acknowledged!

 Are you doing all you can when it comes to building your business, including following up on leads?

 How about thanking people for making introductions that could ultimately put money in your pocket? Taking the time to make other people feel special is one of the best, most fulfilling ways to build your business. Whenever someone connects with you on Linked In or Facebook, do you just accept or confirm? It only takes a minute to respond with a cheerful, “Thanks for connecting; please let me know how I can help you.” You’ll be surprised at the results you’ll achieve. In fact, I recently accepted a friend request on Facebook from a woman near the city where I grew up. I asked her if we went to school together. Her reply? “No, but you went to school with my sister.” That was just a few months ago. Today, that woman is a client of mine; she’s hired me as her mentor AND she is going to appear in a personal development movie I am producing. I benefitted and have ALL THIS as the result of responding PERSONALLY to a Facebook friend request! Talk about building your business!

Professional decency seems all but lost, lately.  And with today’s technology, it has never been easier to reach out to someone or send a quick “thank you” note. You don’t even have to buy a card and put a stamp on it. A quick acknowledgement or “thank you” with an e-mail is all you need to do to make someone feel important and appreciated. If you know any personal facts about the people you are working with, be sure to inquire about those, such as the status of their family, children, dog, new home, or even a new hair style.

When building your business, make notes on any information your clients share.

I would always do this. Then, weeks later, when I would ask, “How is your son doing in school, now that you’ve hired a tutor?” my clients would respond enthusiastically. I could tell they were impressed that I remembered our conversation and what they were dealing with at the time. I made them feel special!

When it comes to building your business, there is nothing you can do that will net bigger results for you than making the people you work with feel special.

Go out of your way to put others first and see what you can do for THEM, and they will want to do for you, too.  In fact, I call it the “special secret for sales success.” It’s just the act of making others feel special.

Do you know how long you have to return a phone call or e-mail? It is 24 hours. We are all guilty of not meeting that deadline on rare occasions, but if you consistently fail to return calls or emails, you run the risk of offending people. Even if you would take a moment to dash off a quick note to let someone know you are at deadline, you are overwhelmed at the time, or whatever the reason is that you can’t give a proper reply, people will appreciate it. Otherwise, those people will likely feel neglected or ignored. 

Yesterday, I shared a tremendous source for leads with a colleague. She immediately e-mailed me some information I can use. When you do favors for others – out of the goodness of your heart – others will want to return the favor to you. And if they don’t? You’ll still feel good about doing all you can to grow your business! For more on the “Special Secret for Sales Success,” or to share any stories from your own experience that stand out, please visit my site at www.RobinJay.com or send a quick email to me at Robin@RobinJay.com. Following these tips will have you building your business beyond your wildest dreams!

How to Reach Your Goals in 2011

Now that the winter is rapidly coming to a conclusion and you have been busy thawing out you may feel a little behind on your New Year’s goals and objectives.

The good thing about being delayed is it gives you time to regroup and rethink about what you really need to succeed this year.

By now the holiday high and cabin fever is slowing melting away and you are most likely falling back in to the same patterns that created last year’s results that you swore you would change. If you are going strong good for you…if you are feeling a little sluggish when it comes to reaching your goals,  keep reading I have something to help you.

Reach Your Goals By Asking for What You Need

Asking for what you need is going to do several things:

• Get you to focus on what resources you NEED right now  

• Create clarity on your next step to get results  

• Allow me to continue to help you find these resources and share information that REALLY makes a difference in your life and business  

I have created a short survey to help you get organized and take a look at what YOU need to have the best year ever. Take a few moments and answer the questions I have created for you.

Click here complete the survey

I promise that you will get a lot out of answering the questions for yourself and get some cool things from me through out the year.   I look forward to hearing from you.

In return I am going to give you a few  tips to get you started on your spring success.

Set an Intentions vs.  Goals

An intention is what you would like to receive at the end of each 90-day period, what you would really like to receive and have in your life.  It is the end or outcome.  Intentions are the destination.  Goals are the vehicle or the journey you take to get there.   An intention represents how will you know you are there.   It must be specific, measurable, action-oriented, realistic and time-lined, based upon the 90-day guidelines.

Restore your integrity

This is the place where you want to record what you need to either release, realign or restore, in yourself or your life, in order to receive your intention of what you asked for.   Once you write down what you need to release, restore or realign, you go to the next heading, which is:

Manage your big rocks

This is where you list the five most important things that you need to manage in order to make sure everything you need and require get done.  These are what I call your big rocks.

Identify Your Six Most Important Things to Do

Under the “six most important things to do” heading, you write down what the six most important actions steps are that need to happen within this 90-day period, to prepare you to receive what you asked for.

Your Six Most Important Things to Do Are Your Goals

If you have anything under “restore your integrity”, those become part of your six most important things to do.  So if you wrote two things under “restore you integrity”, you have two of the six to-dos already listed, and you fill in the rest, so you actually have six things that are most important to be accomplished.

Receive and Succeed

If you do these things, then you have prepared yourself to receive your intention. Make sure they’re in the “S.M.A.R.T. format”. Make sure your six most important things to do are specific enough, they’re measurable, they’re worded in an actionable way, and they’re realistic based upon the 90-day time-line. Anything that you’d like to accomplish beyond the 90-day time-line, put under “future activity”, “help others”, “future planning”.   With that done, you’ve completed your success blueprint and you are ready to reach your goals and live your intentions.

Retirement Killers: Avoid the top 6 retirement investment mistakes

Retirement is the number one goal of investors.

Yet, looking at the numbers, it’s clear that many investors are undermining their good intentions with unfortunate actions in their retirement plan.  

Here are five mistakes to avoid if you want your retirement dreams to become a reality.

1.  Cracking your nest egg before retirement.  A study by Hewitt Associates found that 45% of workers cash in their 401(k)s when they switch jobs.  In other words, they take the money — paying income taxes and a 10% penalty if they’re not yet 59 1/2 years old — rather than leave it in a retirement account.  That’s no way to build the retirement of your dreams.  When you change jobs, you can transfer the money in your employer-sponsored retirement plan to an IRA.

2.  Spending your retirement savings too fast. If you’ve made it to retirement, congratulations.  You’ve amassed enough money to create your own portfolio-generated paycheck.  Excellent work.  But you can’t take it too easy, because you’ll receive a severe pay cut if you deplete your portfolio too fast.  How much can you take out each year and be almost certain that you won’t outlive your savings?  Just 4% a year.  That’s the withdrawal rate that would have sustained a mix of stocks and bonds over most 30-year historical periods. Sure, if you retire on the eve of the next bull market, you can take out more.  However, if you quit working right before the next bear market, then taking out more than 4% a year could have your portfolio beating you to the grave.

3.  Trying too hard to beat the market.  You basically have two choices: You can be a master stock-picker like Warren Buffett or Peter Lynch and try to find the next Wal-Mart.  Or you can broadly diversify your assets, mostly via low-cost index funds. This way, you enjoy hefty exposure to all the great companies.

4.  Paying too much for help.  There’s nothing wrong with getting financial advice.  But I firmly, strongly, passionately believe that such help should be objective and affordable.  Paying too much for advice (especially if it’s bad or at least conflicted) does a lot for your broker’s retirement, not yours.  Paying just 1% a year on a $100,000 portfolio over 20 years could result in your forking over more than that amount in fees. That’s a hundred grand that could have been in your pocket. Of course, if the advice you received had your portfolio performing better than what you could do on your own, then the price might be worth it.  But if you’re paying 1% or 2% a year to lose to an index fund — as most mutual fund managers do — then you’re better off taking control of your own investments.

5. Retiring permanently when you really just needed a break.  If you’re in your 60s, you should plan on living at least another two decades.  Can you stand full-time leisure for 20 years?  Sure, it may sound good now, but many retirees find they get pretty bored after a while.  But by then, they have already severed many of their professional ties.  Before you decide to retire fully and permanently, discuss a phased or gradual retirement with your employer and/or business partners.  Or the possibility of working on a project basis, allowing you to take several months off each year. Or maybe just a one-year sabbatical. Explore your options before you no longer have them.

6. Retirement planning is easy.  Much easier than you have been led to believe by the investerati.  Check back next time for some great retirement tips or see them now here.

Leadership: Rise up to the challenges to find opportunities.

The Opportunity of Leadership

How to turn challenges into opportunities with leadership

To provide true leadership and to flourish and remain relevant in this highly competitive and rapidly changing environment, you must be very clear about who you are, what you are and what you deliver in terms of value, meaning, leadership and professionalism.  This requires a consistent, integrated message and experience with your brand for your clients, your employees, your industry partners and the community you serve.

True leadership means having Clarity and Consistency. 

You are called to be a leader.  Leadership demands clarity and consistency.  You need to demand NOT that you are consistently good.  You must be consistently “world class.”  You must consistently deliver great experiences.  You need to change the dynamic so that you are the standard that your competitors aspire to and not the other way around.

Brand Leadership.  You Are the Brand.   You cannot be everything to everybody. You need to discover your purpose and live it.   It is your reality.  The reality of today’s economy demands that you react faster, deliver more consistently and never settle for “good enough.”  The standards keep getting tougher and you may either chase them or set them.  I challenge you to set them.  It’s going to require creativity, innovation, and a consistent push for higher standards.  You must work every moment of every day to make Brand You the standard of excellence.

New Thinking.  There are some very, very old standard operating procedures in every industry. You need to in the words of Steve Jobs, “put a dent in the universe.”  You need to get excited about innovating around the changes and challenges that are yours to conquer in today’s marketplace.

Leadership is not about being liked.  It’s about doing what’s right.  That means being visionary and looking beyond your corners of your world.  It means you must connect with all of the stakeholders in your universe and engage and interact. You must ruffle feathers or you’re probably not doing your job as a leader.  You were hired or started your business to lead — not to be a caretaker.  You need to have the courage to describe the current landscape and define the ways to strengthen your clients’ organizations in the context of today’s market realities.

Windows of Opportunity including leadership ones  not only open and close, they get bricked over and disappear.  Your destiny will be shaped by how you respond to opportunity when it presents itself.  You cannot allow yourselves to be blinded by fear nor paralyzed by it.  And if you want to look for opportunity, you need look no further than your fears.  Usually, if you will just pick up your fears and turn them over, you will see the beautiful opportunity that it presents.  We are currently living in a time of the most opportunity that we will ever see in our lifetimes.  If you are in the business of solving problems and taking away pain, you are living in what should for you be – the best of times.

Commitment starts at 100%.  Leadership begins at the extra mile.  If you are to become the organization that your competitors will try to emulate rather than the other way around, you need to have skin in the game.  In leadership you cannot fear failure.  Tom Peters said, “Screw-ups are the mark of excellence”.  The most successful people on the planet have failed more than ordinary ones.  The only failure is the failure to try and dream and dare.   But not dreaming big, setting big hairy audacious goals (thanks, Jim Collins “Good to Great” http://tinyurl.com/cyjh7a), not setting new standards of excellence and possibility would be the greatest failure of all.  It is learning to be discerning enough to realize that when you say yes to something that is unimportant, that you have just said “no” to something that is.

Reinvent.  What would you do if your very survival were at stake?  What if you faced a challenge so enormous that immediate, drastic changes and shifts were needed and need now?  Pressure and challenge will make you bigger, stronger and more relevant.  It can be your catalyst to greatness.  But you cannot afford to wait.  The small, independent, mom and pop business landscape is littered with the corpses of those who failed to have a value proposition relevant to today’s world.  Office supplies.  Travel Agencies.  Book Stores.  The Internet demolished some.  Giant competitors crushed others.  Only a few who have differentiated themselves and created unique value have flourished.  It may be time to burn your boats, and move with courage to completely overhaul your structure, your message, and your ways of doing business so that you can be an example to your employees and your clients and inspire them.  (Recommend: http://tinyurl.com/aq8tl4)

Create To Be Great.  This is my theme and my passionate belief.  I do not believe that you can have relevance as a commodity business.  I do not believe that you can survive if you fall into the price trap.  That means you need to educate, motivate, inspire and to identify and increase the value that inspires loyalty and builds brands.  As a marketer, you need to create value for your clients.  You need to lead by adding value to your offerings in ways that amaze your clients and create unique experiences.  You will do that by being real, by touching them and allowing them to touch and move you.  Yes, this is touchy-feely stuff, but I fully believe it.  All business at its core is about love.  It is that emotional.  The CEO of Saatchi and Saatchi, Kevin Roberts (http://tinyurl.com/bonnmr) said, “By touching emotion you get the best people to work with, the best clients to inspire you, the best partners and the most devoted customers.  The essential difference between emotion and reason is that emotion leads to action while reason leads to conclusions.”  Wouldn’t be wonderful if you could instill a culture where every employee woke up every day and asked, “What can I do today to add value and solve problems for our clients?”

More opportunity exists today than you have ever seen in your lifetime.  This recession will end.  There will be winners and losers.  Which are you going to be?  How are you going to get there?  With a sense of urgency, with the knowledge that today is the day that you can end the bad times and start the good ones.  Go out there and Create To Be Great.  Create opportunity.  Create solutions.  Be the aspirin for the pain that your clients are facing.  Whose pain are you focused on?  If you’re focused on your own, you are not creating value.  If you’re focused on serving your clients and taking away their pain, everyone wins. You are a leader. You define leadership.