Pain Drives Innovation

Pain drives innovation, suggests Tom Floodeen, a change management expert in the electronics industry.

When the reality of business is not going our way, we experience pain, says Tom.  This may come in the form of negative feedback from customers or an imbalance in the laws of supply and demand within the organization.

Business reality is recognizing an organization’s goals to stay in business, survive cuts and improve profits.

When business reality is going our way, we feel happy, our customers are satisfied and our team is motivated.  Stability is our result when the general experience of happiness is greater than the experience of pain.  When this balance threatens to flip to the opposite side, we consider innovative changes.  If the perceived value of the result is intense enough, it will be enough to overcome the fear of losing more stability and the discomfort of change.

Instead of tracking an individual employee’s performance to validate a proposed innovation, Tom tracks the organization’s process.  The organization’s process is a team of individuals with specialized talents working together to reach a common goal.  He looks at this process by generally tracking increased productivity, efficiency of process and customer satisfaction.

An organizational team is like an orchestra of musicians all playing different instruments. Each may be able to play their instrument with excellence but how well can they sync up with each other?  How well can they listen to the conductor?  And how well can the conductor bring the specialized talents together to orchestrate a harmonious presentation that results in happiness, not pain?

After 28+ years of experience, Tom concludes that incorporating an active sensitivity to the customer’s and employee’s pain/happiness through surveys and consistent communication reduces the pain of business reality and increases happiness.

He believes in making the conflict resolution process a team effort as opposed to a top-down effort in order to promote participation and motivation to succeed.  Employees shouldn’t be regarded as droids—mere processes who implement all of their manager’s bright ideas.  They should be apart of the cause—the group mind that internalizes the conflicts and forms the resolution processes. He has found that recognizing the conflict resolution talent in team members returns some of the best solutions and promotes the most successful implementations.

Check out his full text:  "Pain Drives Innovation" by Tom Floodeen

Project Management Relations

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While I’m looking to hire a Project Manager for the Cats (PMCats) (see blog post:  Project Management), it is also helpful to note that I am a Project Manager for the Kids (PMKids).  Furthermore, I am managed by a Project Manager for Adults (PMAdults)—for me that’s the laws of God and the laws of the land.

I have found with Project Cats that unless I sit down and delineate the responsibilities in the beginning, the PMCats may not have the same vision as I do.  She may envision less or even more.  When the day to day management of the project begins, the lack of communication causes conflict between PMKids, PMCats, and ultimately PMAdults. 

As a PMKids, I recognize the delineation of commitments can be over the top—micromanaging.  I have to be careful not to overstep my boundaries.  I recognize my kids’ current INabilities to manage a project on their own.  I set up a training window where I don’t expect them to hit every commitment on the nose all at once but I do expect them to make consistent progress towards that goal. 

A PMCats also has boundaries that she needs to take care not to overstep.  I desire her to respect my direction and recognize my responsibility.  She needs to expect me to  communicate the commitments to her and train her in how to keep them.  I’m looking to hire someone for the PMCats position who has these qualities (and I’m willing to do Temp to Hire).  If she refuses to submit to learning to care for the cats, I will outsource them to another home—hire someone else.  This leaves the ball in her court if she decides to drop it.

This relationship will experience conflict if either PM doesn’t keep her commitments.  I push her over the edge when I micromanage her.  I give her too little structure when I under-manage her.  She disqualifies herself for the position when she resists my management.  She pushes me over the edge when she tries to manage me.

It is important to have meetings with my PMCats where it is safe for her to express her desires in regards to my management techniques.  But this too is a two-way commitment.  When she is disrespectful in her assessments, I’m not too attentive.  On the other hand, when I take every evaluation as an unfounded criticism, I miss opportunities to improve our relationship.  These meetings quickly get out of hand if both PMs use a tone that ignites defensiveness.  Ground rules set out before the meeting have aided us in keeping the peace.  When either of the PMs can’t keep the rules, the meeting is adjourned until a recommitment takes place.

Ground Rules for Evaluation Meetings

·      Start with Positive Reinforcement

·      Express Desires, not complaints

·      Objectively deal with each Conflict—look for the solution instead of putting the blame on each other but don’t be afraid to objectively look for and take my share of the blame

·      Don’t take the other person for granted.  My most important goal is to see our relationship as valuable—worthy of nourishing, and treat it with the utmost care.

·      Teach the PMCats about the PMAdults so she knows I’m also subject to certain commitments when it comes to caring for her.

·      When things don’t work out after spending sufficient time in regular communication,  the Project Management relationships have to be altered. (i.e. if either the PMCats or the PMKids is bullheaded and unwilling to work with the other over an extended period of time, one or both projects will have to be outsourced.)

Going Deep vs. Going Wide

When my kids were younger and thinking about sports, we talked about their choice of going deep vs. going wide.  Did they want to pick one sport and become a specialist in it or did they want to play a variety of sports?  We would invest in their training according to their choice but they needed to make the choice.

Some people talk about this concept as the breadth and depth of experience in their careers.  The breadth is their wide diversity of experience and the depth is the time they spent learning one trade really well.

The following two quotes are from an article in the “Journalof Book of Mormon Studies” entitled, “No poor Among them” by Lindon J.Robison.  It speaks of the advantages of going deep—specializing.

“From observing pin makers, Adam Smith learned the benefits of specialization.  Whereas one worker could scarcely produce one pin a day, 10 men working together and performing different pin making tasks could produce 48,000 pins a day…Workers can increase their productivity through specialization because their ability to perform the same task improves with practice.  Furthermore, as workers repeat their tasks, they often invent tools that increase their productivity….Ralph Waldo Emerson summarized the connection:  ‘That which we persist in doing becomes easier for us to do; not that the nature of the thing itself is changed, but that our power to do is increased.”

And Joseph Smith said, “The greatest temporal and spiritual blessings which always come from faithfulness and concerted effort, never attended individual exertion or enterprise.”

I instructed my kids to go wide first, be a jack of all trades to figure out in what sport and which position on the team they excelled at.  After they found that out and obtained a depth of experience in a specialized area, they could go wide again using cross-utilization--to make use of in an additional or different way.

Project Management

We have three cats.  The responsibility to care for them has increased over the past several years.  It’s time to outsource Project Cats.

A few years ago the vet told me that wet food was better than dry food.  Wet food takes more time to serve and clean up.  We have one cat that sheds like crazy.  We have learned by experience that cats with claws shred furniture.  Yet they need their claws for protection and maneuverability when they go outside.  And since we have already cut off the commandment to multiply and replenish the earth in them, going outside to explore and hunt are some of the only activities left to obtain excitement and satisfaction in their kitty-cat lives. 

Furthermore we recently moved into the city of Aurora that has an ordinance that states, “CAT AT LARGE: Cats must remain on the owner’s property or be physically restrained when off the premises.” 

 All of these “laws” increase the workload to own a cat.   I’m okay with seeking alternative homes for at least two of the cats.  They would be much happier living on a farm.  But my kids also have a law:  “You can’t get rid of the cats Mom!” (tears rolling down cheeks)

My resolution process is to teach my kids Project Management.  Up until now, I have been the manager of Project Cats.  The kids help when I ask them.  I have to tell them to feed the cats, to clean their litter boxes, to vacuum up the cat hair, to take them outside and watch them, to sweep out the garage, clean their enclosure, etc.

But a Project Manager (PM) takes the name of the project and runs it.  Maybe we have an initial meeting where the main tasks are discussed but the ability to Evaluate with Accuracy the needs of the cats is the highly prized skill I’m looking for in a good PM.  Does she recognize when the cats are hungry?  Does she know the schedule?  Cats can come in sometimes but not all the time, they need to be put in the garage at night, their water fountain needs to be monitored so it doesn’t run out of water, they need to be pet and brushed.  All of these expanded details are learned through experience.  It is difficult to teach every little thing.

I believe that teaching my kids to be Project Managers is one of the most important responsibilities of my job as a mother.  I don’t want them to grow up, go to their first job, and basically time out after every specific instruction his/her boss gives.  I don’t want them to have to be micromanaged.  I want them to be able to take an entire project as their own and run with it.

About a year ago I ran into a professional study on this concept entitled, “Professional Development” by Christopher W. Blackwell,Ph.D., ARNP-C who bases his thoughts on Patricia Benner’s book “From Novice to Expert.”

Conquering Fear

After discussing the events in Mark 9:17-29 , Elder Holland comments:

“I would say to all who wish for more faith, remember this man! In moments of fear or doubt or troubling times, hold the ground you have already won, even if that ground is limited.  In the growth we all have to experience in mortality, the spiritual equivalent of this boy’s affliction or this parent’s desperation is going to come to all of us. When those moments come and issues surface, the resolution of which is not immediately forthcoming, hold fast to what you already know and stand strong until additional knowledge comes.”

~Elder Jeffrey R. Holland,
“Lord, I Believe” April 2013 General Conference

In times of fear and doubt the only thing that helps me is holding the ground I have already won.  I do this by remembering my past conflicts that have been resolved.  It is telling the stories when Christ was there for me.  He came through even though things got very difficult in the climax.  In the end my desire was obtained.  My conflict was resolved.  And I have become a better person having gone through what I did.  When I dwell on those true stories my faith is strengthened in my present leap of faith.

Group 1 Crew - "He Said (feat. Chris August)" (Official Music Video)

Short Term Memory Loss: Finding Nemo

"I suffer from short term memory loss.  It runs in my family...at least I think it does...hmm....where are they?"

            -Dori, Finding Nemo
 

Sometimes I wonder if I suffer from short term memory loss? 

Marlin, the orange clown fish, searches for his son, Nemo, who has been caught by scuba divers. The boat he saw speeding away is Marlin's only clue to finding Nemo. He runs into Dori, the blue fish, and tells her his conflict. She says she can help. She has seen the boat!

I too make commitments to the Marlins in my life.  Varying lengths of conversations occur before I finally understand what he needs me to do.  But at some point I say, "I have seen the boat.  I know how to find it.  Follow me!"

So my "Marlin" allows me to swim ahead and he follows me.  I said I would be able to help.  I said I could do it.  Immediately following the making of the commitment, I rush out with excitement. Nothing else is in my mind but to find that boat.  For one reason or another as time goes by, I forget that I even made a commitment.  I forget about the boat.  Maybe I couldn't find it right away like I thought I would. Maybe something more immediate distracted me.  I slow down, start to swim side to side, looking for ways to entertain myself because there is nothing better to do.  No goals.  No desires.  No boats.

What is the remedy for Short Term Memory Loss?