Forest Environmental Management Systems

Deming and Welch: On Leadership, Quality, and More

I have no idea how history will treat the transformation of General Electric from an aging industrial dinosaur to what we think of it today. Neither do I dare think I know how history will treat GE's long-time CEO Jack Welch, alias Neutron Jack.

Right now, however, both Jack Welsh and W. Edwards Deming are both credited as masters at getting organizations to perform better, moving toward excellence. There are similarities and differences in their approaches. I stumbled onto a comparison yesterday, and decided to share some of it, adding just a bit of my own spin as I go. I am putting this together to aid us as we evaluate both our approach to EMS and our ongoing consideration as to EMS as a path to quality improvement.

Jack Welch's "Strategies" (compiled from here, and here)

1. Embrace change, Don’t' Fear It.
   
2. Stop Managing, Start Leading. There is no substitute for leadership.
   
3. Cultivate Managers Who Share Your Vision.
   
4. Face Reality, Then Act Decisively.
   
5. Be Simple, be Consistent, and Hammer Your Message Home.
   
6. Be Number 1 or Number 2, But Don't Narrow Your Market.
   
7. Look for the Quantum Leap! Then go for it!
   
8. Fix, Close, or Sell—Whatever Isn't First-Rate.
   
9. Don't Focus on the Numbers.
   
10. Always assume that out there, somewhere, somone has a better idea.
    
11. Plagiarize — It's Legitimate: Create a Learning Culture.
    
12. Get Rid of the Managers, Get Rid of the Bureaucracy. Every layer is a bad layer.
    
13. Be lean and agile like a small company. Managing less is managing more.
    
14. Tear Down the Boundaries.
    
15. Three Secrets: Speed, Simplicity, and Self-Confidence.
    
16. Take the "Boss Element" Out of Your Company.
    
17. Create an Atmosphere Where Workers Feel Free to Speak Out. Enabling Fierce Conversations.
    
18. S-t-r-e-t-c-h! Reach for the stars!
    
19. Have Global Brains—and Build Diverse and Global Teams.
    
20. Live Quality: Drive cost and Speed for Competitive Advantage.
    
21. Make Quality Every Employee's "job." There is a better way, find it!
    
22. To Achieve Quality: Measure, Analyze, Improve, and Control.
    
23. If You Cannot Rely on an Employee's Integrity, Get Rid of That Employee NOW.
    
24. Energetic People Create Energetic Companies. The opposite is also true.
    
25. The past? Never heard of it!

Different Verison of Jack Welch's Strategiesas sorted out by 1000 ventures.com {Note that this hyperlink give more information on each of the Strategies.}

1. Lead
   
2. Manage Less
   
3. Articulate Your Vision
   
4. Simplify
   
5. Get Less Formal
   
6. Energize Others
   
7. Face Reality, Act Decisively
   
8. See Challenge as an Opportunity
   
9. Get Good Ideas from Everywhere
   
10. Follow Up
    
11. Get rid of bureaucracy
    
12. Eliminate Boundaries
    
13. Put Values First
    
14. Cultivate Leaders
    
15. Create a Learning Organization
    
16. Involve Everyone
    
17. Make Everybody a Team Player
    
18. S-t-r-e-t-c-h!
    
19. Instill Confidence
    
20. Have Fun
    
21. Be No. 1 or No. 2
    
22. Live Quality
    
23. Constantly focus on Innovation
    
24. Live Speed
    
25. Behave Like a Small Company

W.Edwards Deming's "14 Points" (for comparison)

1. Create constancy of purpose for improvement of product and service
   
2. Adopt the new philosophy—of intolerance for poor workmanship and sullen service
   
3. Cease dependence upon mass inspection. Quality is not an outcome of quality control inspections. Rather,quality comes from basic improvement in organizational processes, where workers are enlisted and gain ownership in the process.
   
4. End the practice of awarding business on price-tag alone
   
5. Improve constantly and forever the system of production and service
   
6. Institute Training
   
7. Institute leadership. The job of the supervisor is not to tell people what to do or to punish them but to lead.
   
8. Drive out fear—of change, of being victims in the blame game, etc.
   
9. Break down barriers between staff areas, etc.
   
10. Eliminate slogans, exhortation, and targets
    
11. Eliminate numerical quotas
    
12. Remove barriers to pride of workmanship
    
13. Institute a Vigorous Program of Education and Retraining
    
14. Take action to accomplish the transformation. It will take a top management team with a plan of action to jump-start the quality revolution. Thereafter, top management must commit themselves completely to the task of overseeing the revolution. Workers can't do it on their own, nor can managers. A critical mass of people in the company must understand the Fourteen Points as well as the Seven Deadly Diseases.

I view Welch's approach to be tough-love Deming, perchance better suited to the cultural rigidity of many US large industrial and governmental organizations. Deming's approach is one more geared for organizations ready to step up to the responsibilities of managing as adult communities. Either way, the organizations that come from living these strategies are far different from those many of us live in today.

Deming and EMS: Our Challenge

W. Edwards Deming’s leadership and management method includes a healthy dose of organizational transformation at its core. Throughout his work Deming focuses on 7 Deadly Diseases and 14 Points Way back in 1992 I cross-walked both to the US Forest Service. The Forest Service didn’t fare well then, and still doesn’t in terms of Deming’s essentials. Maybe EMS will help. Maybe it won’t. We’ll have to see how we do with this next big thing for the agency.

My emphasis then and now is to help the Forest Service and other organizations to embrace responsibility for self-improvement in the simplest of ways. Deming’s dreams was similar I believe. In recent years both Peter Senge, e.g. The Fifth Discipline and Margaret Wheatley [pdf] (e.g. A Simpler Way, coauthored with Myron Kellner-Rogers) have followed in Deming’s footsteps. They follow a leadership/management path with a heart, but don’t include or advocate an auditor’s trail—as it may at once violate notions of simplicity and trust.

EMS, on the other hand seems to be a management model that embraces Deming as well, but emphasizes auditing and associated data and information requirements--what used to be called the "paper trail." Does EMS have a heart as well? We’ll see, as our journey continues.

Right now I continue to be very concerned about the data/information systems needed to make EMS work. Will we once-again bury ourselves with process? I also am concerned about whether or not the Forest Service can convince its managers and employees that trust (e.g. Deming's "Drive out fear") is at the core of EMS along with process improvemement.