May
28
Those of you that know me, know that Adhocracy by Robert H. Waterman Jr. is one of my favorite books. I estimate that I’ve given away over 5,000 copies of the book in the last fifteen years.
Every once in a while, I get reminded of what great advice is given there. One of the burning questions in managing culture changes is why ____________ (insert appropriate label here - such as Lean, Six Sigma, LSS, TPS, xPS, reengineering, …….) does not work. First of all, all of them work if they are tied to strategy, supported, and allowed to bring in new tools as needed. Of all the tools taught under any of the labels, we never talk about the #1 tool - time.
Anyway, Waterman took the time to lay out very succinctly what to do whether you are the executive (champion), the change agent (task force leader, project leader, BB, GB, Lean Master, …..) or a member of the task force team. I will take the time to lay each of those out over the next few weeks, but let’s start with advice to Executives on getting started (I have made small edits to the original text where I thought I could make it clearer) -
Executives - Suggestions for Getting Started
Your main job is to create the environment for effective problem-solving, not to solve the problem yourself.
- If you are the leader of the business, you should never lead project teams. The same applies if you report directly to this level.
- Make yourself available to your team on the first day of the project and block time for regular interaction (daily or weekly depending on importance of effort.)
- Your role is to pay attention, act as coach, to help the team cut across traditional organizational boundaries, to encourage it to think boldly, and to ensure that is has the necessary resources.
- Match the scope of the task force activity to the breadth of your own responsibilities.
- Be fussy in picking task force leaders and be involved in helping them select team members.
- Provide the financial resources necessary to make Adhoc Projects work.
- Learn how to contribute to or effectively manage project teams. Create a special training program that teaches necessary techniques to enable success.
- Don’t start projects until you are committed to their importance.
- Focus is pivotal to Adhoc Projects.
“We talk today as if our main problem is rapid change. I don’t buy that.
The problem is our inability to take change in stride.”
Robert H. Waterman