Did Deming and Drucker Agree on Important Management Practices?

Response to, Help needed fleshing out differences between Drucker & Deming? on The W. Edwards Deming Institute LinkedIn group.

Here are some links about the topic

• video of Drucker discussing Juran, Deming and himself
• Driving Out Fear and Other Similarities Between Drucker and Deming by Kelly Allan
• Podcast with Kevin Cahill and Joyce Orsini where they discuss the interaction between Deming and Drucker and their ideas

There were cases where Deming and Drucker disagreed but in many ways the ideas they proposed were compatible.

Drucker did propose MBO, his version was not the same thing we criticize. Drucker did criticize how it was being implemented. I think you can argue even with the way Drucker wanted it done, but that way isn't nearly as bad as the way it was done in practice (so don't think Drucker was promoting managing in the way MBO has often been practiced).

And also don't tie Drucker to just MBO, he had lots of ideas over a very long career and many work fine with a Deming management system. I think in many ways Drucker's stuff can be more easily molded to whatever someone wants it to be - this is one reason I think you see Drucker taught in business school. They can claim Drucker wouldn't object to many things, even though, really I think he would - I am not sure Drucker spoke out so directly (especially compared to Deming).

But Drucker was direct on some things, like how bad excessive taking of company's money by executives was. And MBA programs seem perfectly fine ignore this, even though what Drucker found horrible has become mathematically 10 times worse than it was.

I think Drucker was ahead of Deming on this. I don't know that Deming ever was clear on how bad this practice was, but I think he would be clear about it today (though that is just my guess, I could be wrong). I think Dr. Deming would add that to the list of deadly diseases. Remember the original list was 5 before he added 2, to make it 7.

Related: Deming's Point 11.b of 14 - Deming versus Drucker - Why There's No Right Way to Do MBO - 3 Deming-Based Alternatives to Management by Objective

I Don't Take "Better Management" for Granted

My response to a post on Management Innovation is at the Top of the Innovation Stack [the broken link was removed] and the authors reply to my first comment:

JD Meier: "I think we are so used to 'better management' now that we take it for granted."

You are much luckier than I (both as an employee and customer). I find very few companies show evidence of practicing what Deming, Drucker, Ackoff etc. talked about many decades ago. Better management is still a distant hope for most organizations in my opinion.

I do think Hamel talks about lots of good stuff. I admit my study of his is not extensive, but from what I remember he does tend to (as do nearly all these people trying to sell their ideas) make more of what he is saying than is merited.

It reminds me of college when about 50% of my professors in the first lecture had some version of: In [this class] we are studying the true core of knowledge, everything else is just a different take on what we will study here. If it was physics then chemistry, biology... are really sub-disciplines of physics. If it was philosophy everything else was a sub-discipline of philosophy. I thought it was pretty funny. And that passion likely made them great professors, even if I think they lost perspective on reality.

I think even many fairly good management thinkers get hung up on the wonderfulness of their thoughts and how critical their details are. I do still I do like Hamel but I think he is too caught up with his ideas and thinking what he has been looking at is more important than it really is.

My first comment:

I agree with what I think is the premise - that better management is critical for the ability for an organization to successfully innovate. And that bad management can kill otherwise excellent innovation in the other domains you list.

I think calling it management innovation however is misleading. It is true management at very valuable companies (and less valuable ones) needs a great deal of improvement. But it is mainly adopting good management practices people like Deming, Ackoff and Drucker talked about many decades ago.

Related: The Need to Improve Management While Building Organizations Fit For Human Beings - Quality and Innovation - New? Different? How About Better?

Ex-Toyota Manager Consulting with Porsche in 1994

Interesting article from 1994. Shock therapy for Porsche [the broken link was removed]: The prestigious German car firm was speeding to destruction, so its chief swallowed his pride and hired Japan's top consultants to improve outdated methods of production. John Eisenhammer charts the brutal remedies they prescribed at the company's plant near Stuttgart:

The results are already impressive. The production time of the new Porsche 911 Carrera has been reduced by a third, to 86 hours. That is still some way behind the best comparable Japanese time of 50 to 60 hours, but Porsche claims to be well on target. Whereas 70 per cent of Porsches three years ago required expensive rectification at the end of the production line, the proportion is now half that. Inventory levels have been reduced by 44 per cent: 7,000 square metres of shopfloor space have been freed and rented out. A worker suggestion scheme, which in the past generated fewer than 20 ideas a month, has now exploded to around 2,500

While respect for people is an important part of the Toyota Production System, the practice of former Toyota managers were often the "tough love" variety. Today, many people are often too timid, in my opinion, to call out things that need to be improved for fear of making someone uncomfortable. Where that balance properly lies though is based on the culture of the organization (and what needs to be done - occasionally there is a need to "shake people up" in order to make change take place more effectively).

In his own gruff way Mr Iwata agrees. 'We are not here to praise,' he growls. 'But there is hope for Porsche.'

Related: Early "Lean" Thinking - Pay Practices Say More About Respect for People Than Words Say - Respect for People and Understanding Psychology - Respect for Everyone Funny item from the story:

When not discussing production-line changes or conducting workshops, the Shin-Gijutsu people are ambushing staff. 'When I see one of Porsche's fine engineers, I do not say 'good morning',' grins Mr Nakao. 'I say, 'show me your hands. They must be dirty - engineers must always have oily hands'.' Used also to checking the soles of shoes worn by managers in the finance department, to see if they spend enough time walking around the factory, Mr Nakao was devastated to discover the trick did not work with Germans, who are used to resoling old shoes. 'We do not do this in Japan,' he says. 'How can I see if a man is doing his job properly if he keeps changing his soles?'

It is also illustrates that your practices need to adjust to the system. Time at the gemba is important and transfers. Your specific means of checking that might have to be adjusted.

Lean v Innovation is a False Dichotomy

The whole idea that process improvement efforts are harmful to innovation frustrates me. It is due to misunderstanding what is labeled as process improvement. Lean isn't about just making whatever process exists less wasteful. Lean focuses on value added to customers but people forget that.

A separate idea people have is that in order to improve processes you need to improve all of them the same way. Wrong! The way you improve the internal operations of a fast food restaurant are not going to be the same things you do to improve a think tank or research lab. But both have processes. The results of both can be improved by improving how the systems work.

Yes a think tank or research lab would not be served well by the same types of processes as a fast food restaurant. And a fast food restaurant wouldn't be served by the type of process improvement that would benefits a research lab.

I have written about this several times, including:

• New – Different – Better
• Process Improvement and Innovation

Response to: Lean v. Innovation…Wrong Question!

Related: Clayton Christensen on Innovation and Macro Economics - Accept Taking Risks, Don’t Blithely Accept Failure Though

Boston Lean?

Kanban And Lean - A Challenging Association

I've come to refer to American Lean literature as "Boston Lean" to clearly differentiate it from Toyota materials generally translated from original Japanese. What makes me uneasy about Boston Lean is its focus on "the pursuit of perfection" through "waste elimination" where waste is "muda" (or non-value-adding activities). The typical Lean consulting firm, and again, I find myself mentioning, McKinsey, offer Lean through a defined approach that involves value stream mapping, identifying non-value-adding activities in the workflow, designing out those activities and then managing a change initiative to install the new, leaner process with the waste designed out. Like yesterday's post, my objection is to the process-engineering-centric approach and the notion that the process engineer knows best. This designed and managed change approach is truly the antithesis of of the Toyota kaizen approach where the workforce is empowered to make their own changes and processes evolve.

I think your kanban ideas are excellent. I think you are defining "Boston lean" to really be badly done lean. There is a lot of badly done lean - just as it seems to me every management system is poorly executed very often (specific practices or management tools can be adopted quite successful fairly frequently but overall system just are not, from what I have seen). I am not sure if management ideas are necessarily poorly executed so often but they certainly are quite frequently.

There are tons of great lean blogs by people based in the USA (Jon Miller, Mark Graban, Kevin Meyer, Jamie Flinchbaugh, Tracey Richardson, Mike Stoecklein, Bill Waddell, Bob Emiliani ...). If people read what those people are doing and saying I don't think any of the negatives of "Boston lean" are present.

I am guessing "Boston lean" is a swipe at the Lean Enterprise Institute (since they are based in Boston). I don't really think that is accurate. It seems to me LEI support lean done right - a system that help employees improve, not some top down dictate approach. I agree with you that much of what is called lean is bad management. I think LEI and those I listed about (and many more) practice lean as it should be, and I don't think that practice of lean has the drawbacks you mention.

Related: Lean Manufacturing and the Toyota Production System - Why Use Lean if So Many Fail To Do So Effectively - Rethinking or Moving Beyond Deming Often Just Means Applying More of What Dr. Deming Actually Said

====== David's comment on his blog ===========

Please take the time to observe what Lean consulting firms actually do. Do they sell managed transition initiatives that involve value stream mapping, designing out the waste and then deploying the expert designed "lean" (waste reduced) process definition? If you can refute that this is actually not what they are doing and how they make their money, then we can talk. Please show me the case studies where a true kaizen culture has been coached into organizations by these firms? Please show me the evidence where the workforce are empowered to perform their own kaizen events and that the consulting experts involved didn't actively design the new processes and manage the transitions.

====== my response to David's comment =======

You can look at what the people I suggested are doing, or you can chose not to. I am just suggesting that you would benefit from looking at them. I don't feel it is my job to provide the evidence packaged up for you. I also understand you have no reason to listen to anyone unless you feel like doing so.

I think your claims are what I said, looking at bad implementations calling themselves "lean" (and as I said, there are many) and defining that as Boston Lean. That is your right but it isn't so useful it doesn't seem to me. The main problem I see is that you seem to have missed all the good stuff being done with lean in the USA - that is your right, but I think you are missing a good opportunity to learn from others good work.

A great deal of great work is being done with the real lean principles -- respect for people and continuous improvement -- in the USA, and it has been done for decades.

You can ignore the good work being done by some because there is lots of bad stuff labeled lean. I just think the great stuff being done is useful and those interested in managing their organizations better would benefit from paying attention to the people doing good work (the ones I mention above and plenty of others).

Always-On: Trivial Urgency

I think the problem is in expectations of responsiveness. People focus on the trivial "urgent" instead of the important, as Covey said.

One of the issues I have with the complaints of "always on" is looking at my father. He was always on for his whole life and had no downside. He loved what he did. He thought about it when he was taking a shower, or walking to work or having friends over for dinner or raking leaves in the yard. It never was a matter of being burdened by work. He was a professor and consultant. I think it is a mistake to see the problem as always being on. Expectations of responsiveness to thee trivial urgent though I can see as a problem.

I think there is a difference between being also on and energized by your work (that is pretty much how I am, and my father was - I am working for myself, I can work whenever I want) and feeling burdened by being expected to be always on.

The problem is I keep reading about how thinking about work all the time is horrible for people. Well in my experience that isn't true (granted it is a small set of people). But it points to, I think, an issue that the "problem" is imprecisely defined and therefore inaccurate. I do think there is an issue expecting people to be available for trivially urgent matters.

Related: Carve Out Time to Think - Circle of Influence

Do We Really Need Management Consultants

Do we really need consultants?

Consultants need to assist Managers and Employees work together to Map out what their current processes are and draw out new innovative solutions which takes account of what is of real value to all internal and external customers. This is a "Lean approach" to consulting and is diametrically opposed to the "Audit approach" followed by many consultants.
...
A skilled consultant can bring together cross functional teams to both discuss and resolve difficult even politically charged issues and problems within the organization. A skilled and experienced Lean consultant can also coach Managers and Employees as they seek to use Lean thinking, tools and methodology in their own work space. Good consultants facilitate and coach teams as they find their own solutions to problems they have identified themselves.

You said it exactly right. I would say most consultants now are very poorly used - maybe not using them would be better. But using consultants the right way (to coach leaders, to provide insight from the outside, to provide specific expertise) is very valuable if you get the right consultants.

I do think there is also a problem that many consultants now are focused on the wrong style (how to sell more consulting, spreadsheet management, not developing internal expertise, not having an understanding of variation or respect for people...).

Related: Management Consulting Failures - Toyota Production System, Lean Manufacturing... Consultants - Problems with Management and Business Books