The Manufacturing Zone 

I don't mean the vision statement that is in the Annual Report or that's framed in the lobby. Those vision state­ments are valuable, but we need to go to the next level of detail. We need everyone in the organization to clearly see where we are going. They must understand what this business will look like and how it will be run.

The vision doesn't have to be achievable or even practical. We're not going to measure the success or failure of reaching the vision. We are going to set goals and measure success as achieving the goals. The goals will be consistent with the vision.

World Class Manufacturing Menu

Many people are often stuck in their comfort zone because of the paradigms that filter new ideas and blur their vision that the new ideas will work. They often respond with "Impossible." Joel Barker points out that when there is a major paradigm shift, everyone goes back to zero. The skills and ability that enabled a lot of people to get raises and promotions become worthless. Picture the Purchasing Manager who was promoted from Buyer because of his or her ability to play hardball negotiating and now we're asking that they become part of a friendly partnership! How about the Shop Foreman whose strength is maximiz­ing utilization, and keeping everyone busy who is now asked to empower the people, letting them make the decisions, and his job now is to "facilitate!"

Many of these people have not had an opportunity to be exposed to new concepts and ideas. For example, consider the laborer in the field digging a two foot deep, three foot wide ditch for a hundred yards and we ask him, "Why aren't you using a backhoe?" His response, "What's a backhoe?" Give the same individual a backhoe demonstration, an opportunity to learn how to use it, and they'll gladly lay down the shovel. The same holds true for the Purchasing Agent, the Shop Foreman, and a host of other people that we're asking to make a paradigm shift. An initial invest­ment in making key people aware of new ideas, i.e., educating, is essential.

"So much to do and so little time"—The most common complaint I hear.

How do we get more done? We aren't going to add more people. We probably have too many already. We aren't going to get the people to work more hours because they're already working six or seven days a week. The answer is to raise the effectiveness. How do we do that? Focus on doing a few things really well. The challenge becomes picking the right few.