Quality Improvement – Six Steps to Improving Quality

Step 1 - Reason for Improvement

Objective – Identify the Problem (Theme).

What key activities should be undertaken?

Research for Theme(s) (Problems)

- Review key processes and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

- Survey internal/external customers

- Identify what the team knows (brainstorming)

- Conduct interviews

Determine Process Ownership (related to problem/improvement)

- Document the “As Is” processes

- Determine customer needs

- Determine what improvement is needed using available data

- Show likely impacts of the solution/new process

- Get to work on the new solution/activities

Tools to Utilize

* Control Charts

* Brainstorming

* Process Maps

* Relationship Interaction Diagram

* Variance Analysis

Key Questions to Ask

* What do we produce? (Work products)

* Whom do we do it for?

* How well do we do it?

* How do we know we are doing it well?

*** Note: The other five steps will be posted in the coming days.

Interesting and Enlightening Video

McCain and Obama Dance Off

They can do scary things with video software these days.

General Colin Powell and Leadership

General Colin Powell spoke at this year's PMI (Project Management Institute) Global Congress in Denver, CO.

The PMI website summarizes General Powell's remarks below.

“Leadership is leadership is leadership,” says General Powell, who served as a U.S. National Security Advisor for former President Ronald Reagan and held executive positions at several organizations.

“At the end of the day you have to convince a bunch of followers to do what you want them to do—and [convince them] that they want to do it.”

The goal, he says, is to make sure every member of the team knows what is expected of them and to create a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. That means providing support, plus clear, concise missions and inspiration.

“The leader’s passion has to be the example of excellence in the organization and people will want to follow you,” he says.

Sometimes, though, the difference between a good leader and a bad leader is as simple as the ability to recognize when an employee is worth the investment—and when they are not. While it’s important, General Powell says, to capitalize on strengths and build on weakness, leaders can’t “carry dead weight.”

In Denver,CO and a Mile High!

Waiting for the PMI global conference to start. I attended the ISSIG business meeting today and walked around the city. Denver is a great town.

See You at the PMI North American Global Congress 2008

I'm traveling to Denver on Saturday to attend the PMI Global Congress. Anybody else going? Want to meet up? E-mail me at sfseay(at)yahoo.com

PMI North American Global Congress 2008 Announcement

PMI is proud to host its Global Congress 2008—North America in Denver, Colorado, USA. The city of Denver is the largest city in Colorado and is also the state’s capital. The nickname of "the Mile-High City" was given to Denver because it is situated at an elevation of one mile above sea level. Denver has the largest park system in the U.S. and experiences more than 300 sunny days in a year, which makes it sunnier than San Diego or Miami Beach. Because of this and its proximity to the mountains, Denver has gained a reputation as being a very active, outdoor-oriented city for skiing, hiking, climbing and camping.

Denver lies at the foot of the Rocky Mountains and experiences a semi-arid type of climate. Autumn (October through December) has a warm climate with sunny days and cool nights. The climate of Denver can be quite unpredictable and does experience frequent weather fluctuations. A popular saying in Denver is that if you don’t like the weather, just wait a minute; it will change.

John McCain shows he is a Statesman.

Thanks Senator McCain for bring some civility to the conversation.

New World Order and One World Bank?

Our politicians have failed us.  

Our National Debt

Gosh, I owe the Federal Government a lot of money!

Principles and the Leader

Principles are mile posts that help to guide our conduct. They come from natural laws that are recognizable by all cultures. Principles have been around since the dawn of time. They are timeless and aren’t dependent on us making them a permanent part of our lives.

I believe a most of our problems in society come from the fact that many of our leaders don’t live principle-centered lives.

What are principles that are easily recognized? These are a few: Patience, Kindness, Tolerance, Integrity, Honesty, Encouragement, Empathy…

Principles should guide our conduct, and when they do, they are easily recognizable by others. When our leaders decide to reject principles in order to gain power, influence or money, the organizations they lead are in deep trouble.

Many times leaders attempt to put aside principles to get short-term gains. They believe by making speeches filled with empty promises they will gain the trust of others. This happens all the time in our organizations and results in the same mistakes repeated over and over. Having said that, we keep electing the same people to office over and over, don’t we? Where has this gotten us?

Albert Einstein said, “The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them”. To solve the tough problems we need to look at our paradigms and habits and be willing to change them. Sometimes this means firing (not re-electing) our current leaders.

Do we really think we can just buy our way out of the current mess on Wall Street without fundamentally changing the way things work (paradigms and habits) and putting principled leaders in place? Can you or your organization really change things for the better without focusing on principles and rethinking your paradigms and habits? Do organizations really believe that layoffs alone change anything when their current broken paradigms and habits are left intact?

I have seen the results of unprincipled leadership, and the behaviors these “leaders” exhibit can have a profound, lasting, and negative influence on others. The sad part is these leaders believe they are part of the solution, however we know better. You can’t lead your way out of a problem that you don’t fully understand, and if you try to do it without principles the results are easily predicted. DISASTER!

Big problems cannot be solved by small people and small mindedness. Remember, principles aren’t values. The Mafia has values, but their practices certainly aren’t related to principles. As Stephen Covey say’s “Principles are the territory. Values are the map”.

The Bailout is a Crime!

We are being ripped off. See the article below from John Dvorak (http://www.dvorak.org/blog)

Give the Public $600 Billion By John C. Dvorak

The administration talks a big game about economic stimulus packages and claims that the public is the winner when taxes are low or they are simply given a handout to spend. So take $600-plus billion and give each man, woman and child $2000 each. That will distribute all this money. A family of 5 would have a nice $10,000 nest egg for a down-payment or to rent a house and pay off their credit cards thus sending the money back into the system.

The trickle-down bail-out is designed to go to the same people who gave themselves huge salaries and ran these firms into the ground? It gets them off the hook. They can then slither out of town when they all should be tarred-and-feathered.

Why not let the public buy up the mortgages at these low-ball prices and move in? Why can’t that be arranged? Use the FHA to do it if the banks cannot. Why do the crooks get to re-buy the bad mortgages at the low price? So they can gouge later?

There has never been economic stimulus from the top down when the money is given to these weasels. These are people who will sell dollars and buy Euros, or horde the money or move to Switzerland to spend the money there. All of the CEO’s of these failed companies have offshore villas. The average Joe spends his money in the USA, not Europe. It stays in circulation. Good things happen.

According to the pro-bail-out “experts” the economy should have melted down on Tuesday hurling us into a depression. Instead the market went up. So how does that work?
Start looking at this bail-out and you start to see that it is an exit strategy for Paulsen and his friends at Goldman, Sachs. There was a need to rush it through before anyone discovered what it was all about.

No oversight, a finance Czar, more free reign than ever.

Exactly why is there such a rush? It’s like the sleazeball salesman telling feeble-minded customers that they MUST buy now. It just makes no sense.

Destructive Leadership Behaviors Are Killing Good Organizations

One bad leader can poison an organization. Have you seen the destructive behaviors listed below? 

Here are some of the "bad leader" traits that I have witnessed.

Destructive leaders often...

treat people as things or objects

rarely arouse, engage or inspire

aren't good at fixing problems, but excel at assigning blame

are great delegators, but don't like to follow-up

don't trust people that aren't in their close knit group (sometimes their close knit group is them)

believe in a sense of order, as long as they define the order

are greedy (more power, success, money)

believe people are easily expendable (they often have a history of failed personal relationships, marriages, business relationships, etc.)

don't have many (if any) true friends and close business relationships

aren't trustworthy and don't usually trust others

don't possess a common code of decency that others can easily recognize

consistently put their needs above those of their followers

aren't satisfied with what they have (jealousy and envy often drive their behavior)

take advantage of others in a way that can be personally destructive

usually can't create or implement lasting beneficial change due to non-involvement, personal courage, and conviction

are unwilling to have a personal stake in outcomes

often have personalities traits that are out of sync with mainstream thinking (this can also be a positive leadership trait)

often possess an uncanny ability to have both a blind eye and a deaf ear when dealing with others

take personal credit for group accomplishments or the accomplishments of others

are deceptive or intellectually dishonest. They muddy the truth with distorted language or they change the subject to attack your beliefs

rarely give public praise to another

aren't specific or can't be pinned down regarding their position

often leave others asking them to clarify their remarks or explain their position (often a hopeless cause)

love to communicate via e-mail to avoid facing others

often don't understand that the big picture is sometimes just one of the snapshots

use politics to gain power in a way that is unethical, unnecessary, and unwelcome

are self-centered vs. organization centered

often leave their followers "hung out to dry"

say one thing while actively planning to do something different

are poor role models

often make important decisions based upon sketchy information, emotion, or something out of the latest trade journal

believe they are smarter than everybody else

don't like to debate or participate in brainstorming sessions (this is beneath them)

are as transparent as a sheet of glass

Be careful when dealing with these people.  Many of them have great power and aren't afraid to use it.  Remember, when dealing with them to put personal feelings aside and treat them as you would want to be treated.  Bad leaders are inevitable, however we often have to work with them, and we often need their help.  

Remember the Golden Rule!

Ten Words for Thoughtful Planning

It has been said that many new projects never flourish, they just fade away. This is a sign of a broken organization.

To help fix your organization in a small way, think about these ten things (I like the letter "S") to help you regain your planning focus:

______________________________

Strategy - Where are you going? Why do we need this? What is important?

Scrub - Scrub your data, scrub your processes, scrub your silos and across the silos to understand how things are managed and how work is accomplished.

Sort - Think about how work is done and who does it. Sort the work into distinct areas or functions. Plan for rework.

Scrutiny - Carefully review all information. E-mail isn't always your friend.

Sacrifice - Be willing to go to extraordinary lengths to have project success. Take your project's success personally.

Systems - Routines and processes for managing systems of things.

Strength - Focus on relationships. Focus on your strengths for each project.

Standards - Procedures that are followed. Continuous process improvement.

Stand - Be visible. Let the project members know where they are going and why. Lead!

Success - Define success for the project, and define success for your team.

The Measure of a Project Manager

I like what the article below is saying, however a project manager would need time for the usual processes of Initiation, Planning, Executing, Monitoring/Controlling, Closing.

Project management by the numbers

Why I use a Mac

Ron Paul Comments on the Financial Crisis

You saw this video, right?

Free Book- "Your Business Brickyard" (pdf)

Good review by Tom Peters!

Click here to download

Project Sponsor Responsibilities

In my experience most projects don't have a real project sponsor. A project sponsor is the senior manager or executive that champions the project in the organization. The sponsor provides support for obtaining resources, provides strategic direction, and acts as the decision point for questions outside of the project manager’s authority.

Every project that crosses functional lines of authority needs a project sponsor to remove barriers, assist in resolving conflict, and mediate negotiations. The sponsor can also act as a mentor and coach to the project manager and team members.

The project sponsor is usually chosen by senior management, but sometimes the sponsor volunteers because the project directly impacts their resources or budget the most.

Typically Project Sponsors are responsible for:

Providing project direction

Monitoring project progress

Assisting the Project Manager to define the Project Management process for the project

Approving final scope, project objectives, schedule, resource assignments, roles and responsibilities

Providing accurate, relevant and timely communications in writing when appropriate
Approve scope changes

Obtain or resolve issues surrounding resources (people, money, equipment)
Setting project priorities and removing barriers to project success

Personally responsible for project success or failure.

Weekend Humor - One for the Guys