In this issue:

Industry 4.0 and lean equipment

Discussing the links between industry

4.0 and the development of lean.

Industrial method yields results

How the municipality of Odense used industrial methods to improve

their administration processes.

Benchmarking survey on

autonomous maintenance

How automotive maintenance has effected the food and drink sector.

the-lmj.com April 2016

Organisations and interviews in this issue include:Vaillant, Go Process Design Ltd, Industry Forum, Global Academy of Finance and Management

Changing IndustryHow lean fits in the rapidly changing world of industry.

Bill Bellows (bill@deming.org) - Out of the Blue - Apple Pies, Grilled Cheese Sandwiches, and Systems Thinkers

Reprinted by The W. Edwards Deming Institute®, with permission of the Lean Management Journal, www.the-lmj.com

30 April 2016 | the-lmj.com

Beginning with the June 2015 edition of the Lean Management Journal (LMJ), I will be preparing a monthly column, titled “Out of the Blue.” As with the articles I have been writing for the LMJ since 2009, these columns will highlight concepts associated with an integration of ideas from W. Edwards Deming, Russell Ackoff, Genichi Taguchi, and Tom Johnson, amongst many other systemic leaders, with applicability to improving how individuals and organisations think together, learn together, and work together. The concepts will be presented through a wide range of anecdotes, united in a way that offers a new lens for revealing and adopting the Toyota Production System. In keeping with the use of the expression, the aim of these articles is to present concepts to the LMJ community, which might appear to be “out of the clear blue sky,” yet, could be immensely valuable to lean practitioners.

Apple pies, grilled cheese sandwiches and sysyem thinkersBill Bellows, President, In2:InThinking Network

A few decades before The Big Bang Theory introduced television audiences to fictional theoretical physicist Sheldon Cooper, with guest appearances by Stephen Hawking, astronomer Carl Sagan was one of the most well-known non-fictional US scientists. Amongst Sagan’s research interests was the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence, including the odds of finding it amongst the planets surrounding his estimated “billions upon billions of stars.” Sagan was also known to have once offered his advice to chefs, specifically on how to prepare an apple pie. “If you wish to make an apple pie

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from scratch,” he offered, “You must first invent the universe.” With a similar regard for seeing systems, the 19th century Scottish-American conservationist John Muir once reflected, “When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.” Such wide views surely qualify Sagan and Muir as systems thinkers, where a system, to borrow from organisational theorist Russell Ackoff, “is more than the sum of its parts, an indivisible whole. It loses its essential properties when it is taken apart. The elements of a system may themselves be systems, and

every system may be part of a larger system.”

An apple pie, like an automobile or a football club, can be taken apart, but, to do so, one is left with disconnected components, not quite the same as an after-dinner sweet. Whether collecting a list of ingredients for baking, or preparing for holiday travel, each element in a plan is eventually joined to the other elements to achieve the successful output of the system. In his book, The Checklist Manifesto, physician Atul Gawande offers story upon story of the advantages of preparing and

Bill Bellows (bill@deming.org) - Out of the Blue - Apple Pies, Grilled Cheese Sandwiches, and Systems Thinkers

Reprinted by The W. Edwards Deming Institute®, with permission of the Lean Management Journal, www.the-lmj.com

31April 2016 | the-lmj.com

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following checklists, whether as a pilot organizing for a transatlantic flight or a heart surgeon planning to install a pacemaker. Time and again, he reminds us of the potential value of a checklist as a foundation for creating what is commonly referred to as Standard Work. Gawande well appreciates that we are pragmatists and have things to do besides construct lists with infinite detail. By way of example, consider the response of our then 7-year old son to the question of how to prepare his favorite lunch, a grilled cheese sandwich. “Easy”, he said, “you only need three things – bread, butter, and cheese.” This is a very practical list and one that would match the responses of a fair number of readers. But, one might ask, what about the rest of the universe to which these three things are hitched? Well, of course, it depends on our starting point. Given the initial condition of a ready supply of cheese, butter, and bread, plus a hot frying pan, this is all one would need. Given the “10 foot view” of “bread, butter, and cheese”, would any of us be regarded as a systems thinker in comparison to Sagan and Muir?

Using a favorite example for constructing a checklist, I recently asked six audiences of college students to list at least five things they need to wash a table, with the subject table in the hallway outside of the classroom. In borrowing an illustration from W. Edwards Deming, responses in each session included water, soap, a bucket, a sponge, a towel to dry it, and someone to do the work. Similar to “bread, butter, and cheese to make a grilled cheese sandwich,” this is a very practical list, regarding preparation of the ingredients. Typically missing

the use of “rock logic”. To become part focused or piece focused is rock logic.

Stepping back, is the “universe” perspective of Sagan and Muir the “right” size? While it is true that the whole universe is connected to the bread, butter, and cheese that go into our son’s grilled cheese sandwich, it is unnecessary, if not a distraction or nuisance, to consider the universe during the act of producing the sandwich. On the other hand, if one is attempting to solve a complex, history-rich problem, such as reducing world hunger, one would benefit from a larger system view.

As another example of seeing systems, consider a picture of our daughter’s youth football team, including players, coaches, and our team mom. In seminars, I have used the photograph to ask “Who is on the team?” Would the list be limited to the players, or expand to admit the parents, other teams, and others not shown, including the grounds crew? What about great-grandparents? At what point would the list end? Such questions offer another reminder that every system is part of a larger system. Also, to reference Ackoff, when working to improve a school system, is the system a classroom, a school, a school district, or the education system of a country, including colleges and universities? He suggests we start where we have the largest control, for to

from the “List 5 things needed to wash a table” list is consideration of the eventual use of the table, perhaps for dining, arts and crafts, or playing cards.

As noted by Russell Ackoff, systems thinking implies an awareness of the relationships between the “parts of” a system. Lacking awareness of these interactions, a system is but a collection of independent parts, absent the “of.” From this perspective, one could count the number of parts in a product, the number of steps in a process, and the number of employees in an organization. The existence of the relationships between the elements of a system can be defined with three orientation questions, “What is this part of?”, “Where did this come from?”, and, “What will this lead to?” From a systemic perspective, the sequence of these questions may be represented by the connection (or flow) of the parts (pieces or events) below:

Further expansion of a given system can be achieved by repeated use of these questions, or logic (as in, “where does the “To” lead to ?”). As defined by Edward de Bono, a noted authority on thinking about thinking, one’s awareness of the existence of the “flow” pattern connecting these elements stems from the use of “water logic”. Conversely, the inability to connect the pieces, or the lack of awareness of water logic, gives rise to a part perspective. Under such mechanistic circumstances, one would not be aware of a flow. This situation is defined by de Bono as

1. From Where? 2. This Part/Piece/Event 3. Lead To?

“When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to

everything else in the universe.”

Bill Bellows (bill@deming.org) - Out of the Blue - Apple Pies, Grilled Cheese Sandwiches, and Systems Thinkers

Reprinted by The W. Edwards Deming Institute®, with permission of the Lean Management Journal, www.the-lmj.com

32 April 2016 | the-lmj.com

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work on a system too large, for which we have little control, would lead to unnecessary frustration. But, he adds, this is only the starting point for those who desire further gains which systemically-minded leaders are capable of.

Previous Out of the Blue columns have conveyed the limitations of viewing performance in black and white terms. For example, some of us could be classified as systems thinkers, others as not. Using this binary logic, many would label Sagan and Muir as systems thinkers and our son and others with a list of “bread, butter, and cheese” as “not systems thinkers”. Closer to home, you might consider yourself

to be a systems thinker and label your boss or another executive in your organization as “not a systems thinker”. Or, could it be that all of us are thinking about systems and what differentiates us is the size of the system that we consider in a given situation – 100 feet, 1000 feet, 100,000 feet, the universe, or larger, when looking for intelligent life in other galaxies? Moving from physical size to a timescale, how far into the future or past are we looking for the system in question? A week, a month, a year, or more? For example, is a business decision based on a one-year payback, and, if so, why one year? Towards this end, how far into the past do we look for explanations of September 11th, 2001?

“Given the “10 foot view” of “bread, butter, and cheese”, would any of us be regarded as a systems thinker in

comparison to Sagan and Muir?”

“As noted by Russell Ackoff, systems thinking implies an

awareness of the relationships between the “parts of” a system.

Lacking awareness of these interactions, a system is but a

collection of independent parts, absent the “of.””

Just as the answer to “Is there petrol in the car?” does not reveal the amount of petrol in the tank, commenting on whether or not someone is a systems thinker, yes or no, does not focus attention on the size of the system at hand and why this size was chosen. Far better would be to recognise that we are all systems thinkers and avoid the use of this label, in the same way we need not label each other human beings (unless there aliens amongst us), and recognise that all systems are boundaryless, even though they are often modeled as closed, finite systems for the sake of convenience or practicality.

Simply put, what is the boundary of the system in question and why was this size chosen? Both questions offer insights on thinking patterns that are of potential interest when systemic solutions are needed. To borrow from Deming, “The boundary of the system…...may be drawn around a single company, or around an industry, or as in Japan in 1950, the whole country. The bigger the coverage, the bigger be the possible benefits, but the more difficult to manage, The aim must include plans for the future.”

Bill Bellows (bill@deming.org) - Out of the Blue - Apple Pies, Grilled Cheese Sandwiches, and Systems Thinkers

Reprinted by The W. Edwards Deming Institute®, with permission of the Lean Management Journal, www.the-lmj.com