This is the sixth in a series of blog posts that are based on some writing I did a long time ago and a lot of thinking I have done since. The basic premise is that the principles espoused by W. Edwards Deming to help manufacturers improve the quality of their products can be applied by individuals to improve the quality of their relationships. Previous posts in this series are linked at the end of this post.

Chapter Five

Drive Out Fear

“Point 8.  Drive out fear, so that everyone may work effectively for the company.”

 –W. Edwards Deming

“The only thing we have to fear is . . . fear itself.”

 —Franklin Delano Roosevelt

Note to the reader: Previous posts in this series have largely been comprised of the text from my original manuscript, written around 1989 (give or take a couple of years), with some updating and revision. This post consists of almost entirely new material.

Previous posts have also appeared in the sequence I had in the original manuscript. If I had it to do over, I would have moved this chapter up in the sequence because I think it may be the most important. In the 25 or more years since writing the original text, I have experienced and witnessed management through fear and intimidation in the workplace, and seen its devastating impacts on morale, productivity, and work environment. In my own life, I have come to understand how fear has often hampered me from developing and expressing some of my abilities.

This chapter has been entirely rewritten to include some understandings I have gained in recent months and years, and to provide the sources of some of those understandings. I think “driving out fear” could be the most critical step in improving relationships, helping an organization to function well, and living a happy and successful human life. 

———

In Out of the Crisis, Deming writes, “No one can put in his best performance unless he feels secure. Se comes from the Latin, meaning without, cure means fear or care. Secure means without fear, not afraid to express ideas, not afraid to ask questions.” [1]<p. 59>

He goes on to describe these “actual expressions of fear” in the workplace <p. 60-61>

• I am afraid to put forth an idea. I’d be guilty of treason if I did.
• I am afraid to contribute my best efforts to a partner or to a team, because someone else, because of my contribution, may get a higher rating than I get.
• My boss believes in fear. How can he manage his people if they don’t hold him in awe? Management is punitive.
• I’d like to understand better the reasons for some of the company’s procedures, but I don’t dare ask about them.
• I am afraid to admit a mistake.

Fear impacts many aspects of our personal lives – educational choices, career pursuits, where we choose to live, and, of course, our relationships. Some actual expressions of fear in our personal lives:

• I am afraid to express disagreement for fear of losing this friendship.
• I am afraid I would lose my father’s approval if I major in this field I really enjoy.
• I am afraid to ask a question because it could show my ignorance.
• I am afraid to pursue this career I would love because, basically, “I’m not good enough.”
• I am afraid of rejection.
• I am afraid I will fail.

Continue reading →

This is the fifth in a series of blog posts that are based on some writing I did a long time ago and a lot of thinking I have done since. The basic premise is that the principles espoused by W. Edwards Deming to help manufacturers improve the quality of their products can be applied by individuals to improve the quality of their relationships. Previous posts in this series are linked at the end of this post.

Chapter Four

Break Down Barriers

“Point 9: Break down barriers between departments.  People in research, design, sales and production must work as a team, to foresee problems of production and in use that may be encountered with the product or service.”

–W. Edwards Deming

————

Deming adamantly believed that separations within a corporate organization are detrimental to innovation and responsiveness to customers.  In his view, all barriers between departments and across organizational levels should be eliminated to allow open communication and to facilitate product improvement.

Similarly, shrinking or eliminating barriers in our own lives is a significant step toward improving our relationships. What barriers are there and how do they arise?

Continue reading →

This is the fourth in a series of blog posts that are based on some writing I did a long time ago and a lot of thinking I have done since. Previous posts in this series are linked at the end of this post.

Chapter three

Value Individuality

Point 6: Institute training on the job.

Point 12: Remove barriers that rob workers of their right to pride of workmanship. This means abolishment of the annual review or merit rating.

Point 13:  Institute a vigorous program of education and self-improvement.

 –W. Edwards Deming

“Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole life’s cultivation; but of the adopted talent of another you have only an extemporaneous half possession.”

 –Ralph Waldo Emerson

 ————-

The recognition that every employee is an individual, and deeply appreciating their individuality, underlies several of Deming’s fourteen points. Cultivating and celebrating our own individuality is vital to improving our own quality of life. Deming’s teachings on quality improvement have two lessons applicable to this:

1. Avoid rankings and downplay the importance of competition.
2. Pursue training, education, and “self-improvement.”

Hugh Prather writes in his book Notes to Myself: “There is no such thing as best in a world of individuals.”

Deming strongly disagreed with the predilection of our society, and businesses, to rate people. Rating systems are ubiquitous in our lives–grades in school, Nielsen ratings of television shows, scoring in athletic events, and, for many of us, merit ratings in job performance evaluations. It is difficult in this milieu not to compare ourselves to others, and, more often than not, feel we come up short in some way. It hardly occurs to us that we each have our own gifts, most of which cannot be graded or scored or awarded with prizes.

Continue reading →

This is the third in a series of blog posts that are based on some writing I did in the early 1990′s and a lot of thinking I have done since. Previous posts in this series are linked at the end of this post.

Chapter two

On Purpose

“Point 1.  Create constancy of purpose toward improvement of product and service, with the aim to become competitive and to stay in business, and to provide jobs.

Point 11.  Eliminate work standards (quotas) on the factory floor.  Eliminate management by objectives.  Eliminate management by numbers, numerical goals.  Substitute leadership.”

–W. Edwards Deming

Deming chose “create constancy of purpose” as the first of his Fourteen Points Toward the Transformation of Management, and the lack of a purpose was the first of the “deadly diseases of management.” This is how central it was, in Deming’s view, for an organization to have a purpose.

Having a purpose is also an important element of a human life.  As our society has developed to allow more individual expression–young men are no longer relegated to follow in their father’s footsteps, nor are young women restricted to marriage and children–the notion that our lives fulfill some purpose nags at us now more perhaps than in the past. In Deming’s view, a suitable purpose for a business was “to improve the standard of living of mankind.”  This example illustrates two qualities of a purpose.  First, a purpose is not an objective so much as a direction.  Secondly, it has a basis of service to others. Continue reading →

This is the second in a series of blog posts that are based on some writing I did in the late-1980′s and a lot of thinking I have done since. Click here to read the first post.

Chapter One – The System

W. Edwards Deming was among the first prominent systems thinkers in the US. As shown in the illustration above from page 4 of his book Out of the Crisis, Deming instructed managers to include every aspect of manufacture when they strive to improve the quality of their product.  Deming was specifically battling the pervasive notion that defects resulted from poor workmanship, that is, the poor performance of individual workers.  Deming made the point that, in fact, quality depends on the tools and equipment, raw material, plant layout and other factors, all of which are management’s responsibility and none of which are under the control of individual laborers.  Moreover, Deming urged managers to work closely with workers, suppliers, customers, and competitors to encourage innovation, productivity, and higher quality.

Before exploring Deming’s ideas further, we need to think about what the components of “the system” of our personal lives might be.

The starting place is to identify a product. I will hazard a guess that most people, if asked the (somewhat bizarre) question, “What, in your life, would you regard as ‘your product’?” would respond with something about their work or their career. I disagree. I believe that

our products are our personal relationships.

Using this metaphor, we create new products or build on existing products each day. Most of us also have a huge range of product—everything from a committed spousal relationship to the relationship we have with the friendly cashier at the neighborhood store, from a parent-child relationship to the relationships we create when we nod or smile at someone we pass on the sidewalk.

For those of us who lack the inventiveness or genius of Edison or Einstein, our only enduring legacy will likely be the quality of our relationships.  Deming’s approach to improving the quality of manufacturing can, with some adaptation, provide excellent guidance on how to improve the quality of our relationships.

From Deming’s flow chart above, we can identify the components of the manufacturing system and find the counterparts in our own lives:  management and labor, customers, suppliers, competitors, tools and equipment, raw materials, design and redesign.  In pursuing this analogy, I hesitate to identify and segregate aspects of ourselves that are, in fact, not separable, but I feel there is value in doing so in this introductory phase. Continue reading →

This is the first in a series of blog posts that are based on some writing I did in the late-1980’s and a lot of thinking I’ve done since. 

The principles of W. Edwards Deming, developed to help transform the management of a manufacturing business, adapt remarkably easily to help transform the management of our lives.  In this post, I present a brief history of Deming’s work and a broad outline of his basic principles.

Dr. Deming pioneered the idea of setting product or service quality as the top priority for any business.  He developed guidelines to help a business continually improve the quality of its products or services.

During the early 1940s, W. Edwards Deming’s Ph.D. research focused on finding how to quantitatively measure and improve product quality.  He and his mentor, Walter Shewhart, devised a means of determining whether fluctuations in any process of manufacture were due to random variation or systematic problems.  This is important to know because random variation cannot be avoided whereas systematic variation indicates a problem that can be identified and rectified.  The result of their work was “statistical process control” and is still widely used in many industries.

Under sponsorship of the War Department during World War II, Deming introduced these ideas to manufacturers of military equipment.  It had become imperative to improve the quality of some items because American soldiers were being killed due to defective equipment.

Deming’s most notable success occurred after he was invited to Japan in the early 1950s.  Deming instructed engineers and managers from some of Japan’s struggling companies in his philosophy of business and the nuts and bolts of statistical process control.  He predicted that, if they followed his guidance, the quality of their products would be the envy of the world in five years.

It came to pass in four years.

Meanwhile American companies, driven by a prosperous marketplace, shifted their focus from quality to rate of production.  It was no longer imperative that products be of high quality; there must be many of them to satisfy the high demand of prospering America.  Deming’s ideas were forsaken and replaced by emphases on production quotas and rosy financial goals.

Not until his later years, when Japanese automobiles were making serious inroads into the American automobile market, was Deming again called upon to train executives in American industries.

After many years of instructing engineers and managers in the use of process control, Deming formulated Fourteen Points for the Transformation of Management.  These Points were the basis of his quality philosophy and he urged that all members of a transforming organization, from the CEO to the night custodian, needed to understand and live the Fourteen Points.

Deming always felt that workers always do their best.  Specifically he felt that the usual assumption of management that defects in production were due to ineptitude on the part of workers was erroneous.  Defects are caused not by individuals, but by problems in “the system” in Deming’s view.

Deming learned and taught that a company’s complete approach to business had to change if the quality of the company’s product or service was to improve.  He knew for this systemic change to occur, the top levels of management must be trained to think in new ways:

• All aspects of the company—production, sales, engineering, design—plus the suppliers, competitors and customers must be viewed as an integrated whole.  Deming’s term was the system.  It is this system that must be the focus of management as they assess how best to improve the product rather than blaming a few individuals.
• Statistical process control is a valuable mechanism that can help identify what processes in the system need adjustment.
• Operating a business by focusing on quotas (sales quotas or production quotas, for example) results in poor workmanship or dishonesty on the part of employees to meet the quotas.  By focusing instead on providing each individual in the company with high-quality tools and materials as well as premier instruction (not only for their jobs, but for their lives), quality of the product improves and customer loyalty results.
• Improving product quality produces a chain reaction:  better quality results in lower costs and higher productivity which lowers prices which increases customer loyalty and market share which allows the company to expand and provide more jobs.
• Rather than compete for a niche in a limited market, cooperation with “competitors” can lead to innovations which in turn expands the market for both (or all) companies.
• Management through fear and intimidation not only discourages employees but also is often damaging to the company. If workers are threatened with “consequences” if quotas aren’t met, for example, then to “meet quotas,” numbers may be fudged or incomplete or faulty products may be shipped.  Management may be satisfied, but customers won’t be. Deming advised companies to “drive out fear” in all its forms.
• Working with a single supplier for each item necessary for production improves the quality of the product and can also stimulate innovation.  This is contrary to two common practices regarding vendors—awarding contracts to the lowest bidder and second-sourcing.  (Second-sourcing is identifying standby vendors and obtaining material from them if the first source has some problem.)  Often the material from a second source (or the lowest bidder this year) differs from the regular material and the end product is of lower quality.  Once poor-quality product is on the market it is difficult to recover a reputation of producing quality.
• A business should have a purpose that gives them focus through difficult economic times.  Quarterly dividends and annual reports pale in comparison to the pursuit of a worthy purpose.
• Including customers and suppliers in the design of new products expands possibilities and can open new markets.  It also enhances customer loyalty.

Deming was adamant that his philosophy could not be administered in a piecemeal fashion, but must be embraced fully to be effective.  Nonetheless many companies use statistical process control or a few other elements of his teachings without incorporating the fundamentals.

The fundamentals of his philosophy have proven undeniably successful in achieving product quality and long-term financial stability.  With adaptations described in subsequent chapters, those same principles can bring improved quality to our personal lives.

Deming’s Fourteen Points for the Transformation of Management can be distilled down to seven principles that can be applied to our personal lives.  We will examine one of those principles in each of the next several blog posts.