| Compression - Dealing with a Changed World | | 
by Jahn Ballard
As if you didn't know, the world has changed. The real question is not whether it has changed, but how has it changed, and what can we do about it? There are some very obvious things on the surface that we can all see. Gone are the days of unlimited markets and growth opportunities, random diversification (M&A mania), or limitless natural and human resources. What is not so obvious is the degree of the issue. Do you know the total product/non-product (read:waste) ratio for the US Economy? How does 6% product, 94% non-product strike you? Surprised? How about 80% of that 6% becomes non-product within 180 days? What are the implications of the fact we throw away 98% of our material and energy inputs within 0 to 6 months?
The Lean Manufacturing movement has struggled for more than two decades to replicate Toyota's waste reduction through continuous improvement culture. Sustainability is a topic that can no longer be avoided, even if you wanted to. However, as Bill McDonough points out in his seminal work, Cradle to Cradle with Michael Braungart, becoming less wasteful, or more 'eco-efficient' will not shift the fundamental patterns. It just makes them less bad. He calls for, and spells out some detail, a design revolution he calls 'eco-effectiveness', in which everything within everything, within everything, is designed to be a technical or ecological nutrient at the end of its life cycle.
Doc Hall of the Association for Manufacturing Excellence has coined the term 'Compression' to describe the this global turning point in the reality of society, the economy and the marketplace. Doc defined Compression as "Globally sustaining at least the same quality of life as in industrial societies today, while using less than half the energy and virgin raw materials, and cutting toxic releases to nearly zero." In his upcoming book of the same title, he points out that expansion began with European colonization 500 years ago. Our present economic system and business legacies are descended from that expansion and from others that ensued, notably the industrial revolution and the computer revolution, starting in just the last 60 years.
A very tall order
The challenges to the old system are multiple, overlapping and ambiguous, so no silver bullet answer will be forthcoming. To meet these challenges, we need to learn the right things to do and how do them whenever needed. High productivity in the expansionary sense might not count for as much, depending on what needs to be done at the time. Doc proposes that "vigorous learning and work enterprises" that are mission driven, with a mission appropriate to Compression, is the direction we must go to cope with this overwhelming change. Guidance must come from pursuing the mission always, quality over quantity, with financial results as a performance specification, not goals in and of themselves.
That which made the mess can't undo it
We have come to the point where command and control in any form will no longer be workable, hence the endemic overwhelm, overlapping bottlenecks and cascading ambiguities that dominate the work lives of CEOs and senior leaders. As social, environmental and market disruptions continue to accelerate, any organization that cannot learn to distribute influence broadly to enhance decentralized control over their system will be struggling more and more.
We will continue to explore in depth how this situation is changing everything, what is really changing, and what we need to do to respond to the challenges and leverage the opportunities in the following venues:
· The Network's Leadership Retreat on Compression in late September
· In the July issue of this E-Zine, and
· The 1st Annual Lean and Green Summit in Boulder July 17- 18*
Inherent in this situation is the current and continuing reality of what will most likely emerge as the most profound change in human life in the shortest period of time that humanity has ever seen.
Next Issue: What is the difference that will make the difference?
* See The Lean and Green Summit web site to learn details of another of Doc's many projects (see sidebar), on which he is collaborating yet again with Jim Huntzinger and Dwayne Butcher, creators of the breakthrough Lean Accounting Summit.
Jahn Ballard enables Owners/Entrepreneurs/CEOs and their senior teams to design their ideal jobs, focused primarily on fully leveraging the talent available and evolving the business' value. Employees spend more of their time doing what only they can do for the good of the enterprise, and their time overwhelm and distractions are transformed.
| | Landscape Forms Named a Top Small Workplace | | 
Scanlon Leadership Network member Landscape Forms has been selected as a finalist in the Top Small Workplaces 2008 competition. The contest, put on through a collaboration of Winning Workplaces and The Wall Street Journal, is an effort to identify exceptional small organizations - private, nonprofit or publicly held. To be eligible for consideration, each candidate must be a North American organization that:
- is independent - not a unit of a larger corporation
- has no more than $200 million in annual revenues
- has 500 or fewer employees
- has been in business at least five years
Following Landscape Forms' nomination by Paul Davis and Majel Maes, Becky Fulgoni coordinated and completed a very extensive application. The application, according to Becky, is designed to identify organizations that are able to "create and maintain an employee-respectful and involving culture." The application delved into numerous areas and activities of the organization, such as company practices, employee suggestions, diversity, and much more. It also required a wide variety of references including customers, employees, and vendors.
Following completion of the application, Winning Workplaces followed up with all references, judged each of the 406 applications they received for 2008, and selected 35 finalists, including Landscape Forms. The process now continues with Winning Workplaces talking to organizational attorneys, CPA's, and surveying every employee. While being selected as a finalist is a very high honor, 15 winners will be selected from the 35 finalists. These winners will be announced in October of this year and information on them, and all of the finalists, will be published in the Wall Street Journal.
When asked how the Scanlon Principles helped Landscape Forms to achieve selection as a finalist, Fulgoni talked about many of the questions included on the application. She said, "I could write something about Scanlon for every question asked." This seemed to be an interesting reflection for her because she went on to talk about Scanlon as "not like the frosting on a cake, but rather like Scanlon being baked totally and integrally into it." She said, "You can't extract Scanlon from what we do. You can't talk about it as a separate entity." In other words, Scanlon Principles are the central, guiding principles of Landscape Forms. Every decision and activity in the company is tested against Scanlon Principles.
It is clear to Fulgoni that top companies have to operate under a superior set of guiding principles. Based on Landscape Forms' selection as a finalist, the Scanlon Principles seem to have, once again, made the cut for excellence.
You can read more about Top Small Workplaces 2008 competition at Winning Workplaces.
| | 3M GRIT: Innovation in Action | |  A number of the Twin Cities based GRIT attended the Scanlon Leadership Network Annual Conference in Dearborn in May. What is the "GRIT "? GRIT stands for Grass Roots Innovation Team and it was formed a number of years ago at 3M Corporation in St. Paul, MN. The GRIT gathers twice a month for what they term "Metalogues," which is different from a Dialogue, since it is composed of having a conversation amongst and between others.
The GRIT has evolved beyond only 3M associates to include anyone who is interested in exploring and sharing new ideas about innovation. They hold a variety of events, but the heart of it is the Metalogue. A different topic is brought forth each time and a recent topic was a report-out on the experiences and learning from the Scanlon Conference.
At the Conference, the GRIT was highly engaged and impressed with what Scanlon Leadership Network is doing. They had nothing but good to say about the pre-conference Inventor's Tour of Greenfield Village, reception keynote speech by Sarah Miller Caldicott (Thomas Edison's great grand niece) and conference keynoters Charlie and Maria Girsch of Creativity Central. Individual members shared their insights gained from breakout sessions. Most importantly, they offered feedback on the Network's new Innovation Simulation, which many of them helped facilitate.
"I appreciated seeing the "figure it out" aspect of the simulation. I could see the energy level of the group rise as participants engaged in the design of the waiting area."
"I think the Innovation Simulation is terrific. There is so much fit into it that can be learned in many different ways, strong on interaction and multiple learning style engagement features."
"It was excellent that many different kinds of learning styles were implemented in the training: visual, auditory, kinesthetic, mathematic, musical, etc."
"It does a great job of demystifying the innovation process and demonstrating that it is an everyday and everybody endeavor."
They talked about their car trip out and back and how seven of them rotated between two cars. This provided them an abundant amount of time to bounce ideas and concepts back and forth; hours and hours of doing what the GRIT team does! On these trips, they used a "Yes, and" dialogue format. This means that whenever anyone shares any idea, responses are not to include statements like, "Yes, but . . . " etc. In other words, it is a very simple practice that generates more and more and more ideas that build rather than tear down.
Melody Martin, a motivational speaker and first time attendee of the group, added three principles from one of her talks that complement both the GRIT's objectives and Scanlon philosophy. These are:
1. You are totally awesome! 2. You have more power than you claim or use. 3. You DO make a difference so what are you going to put forth into the universe? The GRIT meeting discussions and Melody's contributions reminded me of the Scanlon concept originally put forth by D.J. DePree that, "Every meeting with another person should be a fortuitous encounter." The components of a "Fortuitous Encounter" are: 1. Every person is a child of God. 2. Every person is competent. 3. Meeting someone should make a significant difference to both parties. Looks to me like the GRIT is an intentional, ongoing "Fortuitous Encounter."
During the summer the GRIT founder, retired 3M scientist Dave Braun, returns from his home in Arizona and the group gathers for a monthly Jazz Nite. This occurs on the 4th Tuesday of every month, with a two hour Innovation Shop Talk before the music begins. The GRIT is also part of a Minnesota Innovators Network group that meets quarterly and is rotated among those in the network. This network has been around for about three years and some of the organizations participating are Carlson Companies, Mayo, Cargill, Ecolab, 3M, Thomson-Reuters and many other small to mid size organizations. All in the spirit of creativity and innovation! | |
