Deming's SoPK (System of Profound Knowledge) Discussion

[David Hartman]

(ASQ members can check my total Profile over there, which says (in part):

My entire career has been centered on the concept ‘Quality should be involved in every aspect of a company - including executive planning, administration, marketing, purchasing, design, production, shipping, and service.'

Is psychology really important? Absolutely! From the CEO right down to the guy who cleans the toilets (in startup companies, that's probably the same guy), understanding our motivations is important. Some are motivated by money, others by pride, or fear, greed, etc. Managing those various motivations for the betterment of the organization is critical to survival. Our individual lives and those of our organizations are intertwined for better or worse. Individuals who are able to make a fair assessment of their own motivations are usually more successful than those who never consider the question.​

Wes,

Keeping in mind that phychology is really important to a SoPK, and it is important for all of the companies players to be aware of the corporate culture ("from the CEO right down to the guy who cleans the toilets"), shouldn't your central concept be:

Every aspect of the company - including executive planning, administration, marketing, purchasing, design, production, shipping, and service should be involved in quality. Don't give them food, teach them to fish.

Perhaps I'm misinterpretting your thoughts, but I just want to ensure that we all understand that Dr. Deming was not a promoter of "the Quality Department".

​

 

[Wes Bucey]

Wes,

Keeping in mind that phychology is really important to a SoPK, and it is important for all of the companies players to be aware of the corporate culture ("from the CEO right down to the guy who cleans the toilets"), shouldn't your central concept be:

Every aspect of the company - including executive planning, administration, marketing, purchasing, design, production, shipping, and service should be involved in quality. Don't give them food, teach them to fish.

Perhaps I'm misinterpretting your thoughts, but I just want to ensure that we all understand that Dr. Deming was not a promoter of "the Quality Department".

Absolutely, Dave!

If I had my druthers, I'd eliminate the Quality Department (in every organization) as a separate entity and require everyone else to have a "hybrid" job which included "Quality" as a major factor.

In my experience, I have seen some Quality departments view themselves as police who earned the hatred of other employees. (Think of how Internal Affairs (IA) Departments in police forces are viewed on the average TV cop show.)

In theory, the IA dept. in police work is to assure the quality of the service. A well-meaning and fair acting IA guy is treated as an anomoly on TV shows. Do TV shows reflect the true perception within police departments? I think so - else there would be a louder outcry against such portrayal.

Is it any different in many organizations? Sometimes, the introduction of 6S techniques in organizations resurrects that "police" bugaboo: "If you don't march to the new drummer, you're out!"

How does this apply to SoPK?
Somebody in charge has to have an overall vision of the organization. If he is able to organize and systemize that vision, then he has a better chance of communicating that vision to his employees, customers, suppliers, regulators, and the public at large. Communication of that vision is an important part of inculcating the basic tenets of the organization and the subsequent processes necessary to implement the vision.

Understanding the various methods of how people learn makes it easier to use a combination of methods to reach ALL of the intended audience effectively.

Understanding the psychology of the different players (employees, customers, suppliers, etc.) helps in forming the vision in the first place and secondarily, in determining the parts of the message to get most emphasis when communicating to those parties.

The thing many of us so-called experts often lose sight of is that we are not dealing with a blank slate when we set out to "write" our message on our target audience. We have to consider and accommodate all the previous messages, biases, misinformation, etc. After 40 years in business, I'm still struggling to "stay on message." So, that's the second thing, we often lose sight of - it is a continuous process, NOT "once and done."

 

[Kevin Mader]

O.K. then, it appears that we are rolling. Wes makes a very good point that folks learn in different fashions, so we should observe that some folks may not make a lot of sense our of our visual map, at least in the start. It’s important to post some thoughts behind a visual map entry, which is pretty much what’s happened in an earlier thread.

Dr. Deming based his SoPK on Lewis’s “Mind and World Order” where Lewis outlines the three tenets of his philosophy: Appreciation for a System, Theory of Variation, and Theory of Knowledge. Deming added the Theory of Psychology (formally in 1982, I believe) to make his 4-part arrangement. Both of these men recognized that the ‘System Thinking’ was what held it all together, “the glue” as promoted by Peter Senge, but each is equally important. The trick question sometimes asked by Dr. Deming was which part was most important. Nonetheless, Dr. Deming recognized that Psychology was an important contributor to the System. How could it not have been? SoPK was the focus of his last efforts before his death.

Wes acknowledges that he isn’t a purist and has a blended theory. I’m sure many folks are this way. But you don’t have to be a purist to explore SoPK, just an interest to learn and refine one’s own theories. What I hope happens with this thread is that folks challenge their convictions, from whatever side of the fence you’re on to see if you gain deeper understanding.

So what is the Aim of the System? Any thoughts on what it might be?

Back to the group…

Kevin

 

[Mike S.]

Absolutely, Dave!

If I had my druthers, I'd eliminate the Quality Department (in every organization) as a separate entity and require everyone else to have a "hybrid" job which included "Quality" as a major factor.

In my experience, I have seen some Quality departments view themselves as police who earned the hatred of other employees. (Think of how Internal Affairs (IA) Departments in police forces are viewed on the average TV cop show.)

Wes,

Using the "eliminate the Q department" philosophy wouldn't you also then say we should eliminate the Sales Department, Finance Department, HR Department -- all departments?

I understand your thoughts about the Q Dept. being viewed as the hated "police" etc. but the same views can be (and often are) taken of other Departments as well. So what about them?

I believe to some varying degrees the popular chants that "everyone is responsible for quality" and "everyone is in Sales" but I think the same can be said of HR, Finance, Purchasing, Production, etc. So I don't advocate getting rid of areas (call them departments, sections, groups or whatever) where a certain amount of expertise and primary responsibilities reside so long as everyone understands (from a system viewpoint) that just because you are in Sales or Production doesn't mean that you aren't responsible for Quality or HR related issues and vice-versa. JMO.

 

[Wes Bucey]

Wes,

Using the "eliminate the Q department" philosophy wouldn't you also then say we should eliminate the Sales Department, Finance Department, HR Department -- all departments?

I understand your thoughts about the Q Dept. being viewed as the hated "police" etc. but the same views can be (and often are) taken of other Departments as well. So what about them?

I believe to some varying degrees the popular chants that "everyone is responsible for quality" and "everyone is in Sales" but I think the same can be said of HR, Finance, Purchasing, Production, etc. So I don't advocate getting rid of areas (call them departments, sections, groups or whatever) where a certain amount of expertise and primary responsibilities reside so long as everyone understands (from a system viewpoint) that just because you are in Sales or Production doesn't mean that you aren't responsible for Quality or HR related issues and vice-versa. JMO.

These are good questions, Mike. Let's explore them as one concept - "relationship and understanding between functions."
Using the "eliminate the Q department" philosophy wouldn't you also then say we should eliminate the Sales Department, Finance Department, HR Department -- all departments?
I love hyperbole as well as the next guy. It often makes a point a pure fact can't. Dave's original line was, "Every aspect of the company - including executive planning, administration, marketing, purchasing, design, production, shipping, and service should be involved in quality. Don't give them food, teach them to fish."
My hyperbole was to reinforce the concept of "blending" the functions and removing an often misunderstood way of perceiving the quality function. To clarify, I would rather the people within the various departments of an organization have a strong understanding and appreciation of the contributions each function within an organization provides and how all those functions relate to each other for the betterment of the organization. Every operations manager can tell tales of short-sighted [in his opinion] folks from other departments who "just don't understand what we do out here."

I'm sure there are Finance guys or HR guys with similar tales. SoPK, properly implemented, would remove those veils of misunderstanding.

I think, Mike, you are closer to embodying the concepts which make up SoPK than you realize. The next step for you is to organize your ideas into a system which you can communicate easily to others. That step of communication will help you refine your ideas until you feel they can work as a SYSTEM. I pretty sure no one, least of all the Old Man Deming, himself, believes a person has to have a "cookie cutter" system exactly like some one else's.

 

[David Hartman]

How does this apply to SoPK?
Somebody in charge has to have an overall vision of the organization. If he is able to organize and systemize that vision, then he has a better chance of communicating that vision to his employees, customers, suppliers, regulators, and the public at large. Communication of that vision is an important part of inculcating the basic tenets of the organization and the subsequent processes necessary to implement the vision.

An old Chinese proverb states, "If we don't change our direction we're likely to end up where we're headed." Dr. Deming stated, "Without an aim, there is no system." Although I agree that the culture of an organization (any organization) should be set by the vision cast by the company leader (the President/CEO); I also feel that in-lieu of a formal vision being cast by this leader, the organization's culture can take on the character/vision of any charismatic within the organization.

Leadership comes in many forms (be they formal or informal) and an organization will always develop a corporate culture (although without a formal vision that culture may change over time). Dr. Rosabeth Kanter refers to these informal leaders as "Change Masters" in her book of the same title. In the visionary vacuum left by some formal corporate leaders the informal leadership structure takes over and a corporate culture is developed from within.

But one of the downsides to this type of leadership role is that every charismatic individual within the company has the ability to influence the vision/culture of the company, which can lead to mixed priorities, confusing directives/directions and an un-focused workforce.

Along the same lines many companies (especially those that have been family-owned and run by the founder for years) suffer many of the same symptoms when formal leadership changes hands. I may be from the same family and hold many of the same values, but I am an individual and my personality does differ from even my siblings. Which means that my leadership style, my vision, and my values will differ at least to some degree. Although there may be no significant changes with any immediacy, they will occur and some may even be sever. So what happened to consistency of purpose? How does this impact the system? Can a system be developed so robust, that these changes have no impact? Should it be? How do we ensure that we hold to those values that have made us successful, and yet yield to those that may even make us better?

Can any of these system establishing efforts even take place within the ranks, or are we at the mercy of the formal leadership?

 

[Wes Bucey]

An old Chinese proverb states, "If we don't change our direction we're likely to end up where we're headed." Dr. Deming stated, "Without an aim, there is no system." Although I agree that the culture of an organization (any organization) should be set by the vision cast by the company leader (the President/CEO); I also feel that in-lieu of a formal vision being cast by this leader, the organization's culture can take on the character/vision of any charismatic within the organization.

Leadership comes in many forms (be they formal or informal) and an organization will always develop a corporate culture (although without a formal vision that culture may change over time). Dr. Rosabeth Kanter refers to these informal leaders as "Change Masters" in her book of the same title. In the visionary vacuum left by some formal corporate leaders the informal leadership structure takes over and a corporate culture is developed from within.

But one of the downsides to this type of leadership role is that every charismatic individual within the company has the ability to influence the vision/culture of the company, which can lead to mixed priorities, confusing directives/directions and an un-focused workforce.

Along the same lines many companies (especially those that have been family-owned and run by the founder for years) suffer many of the same symptoms when formal leadership changes hands. I may be from the same family and hold many of the same values, but I am an individual and my personality does differ from even my siblings. Which means that my leadership style, my vision, and my values will differ at least to some degree. Although there may be no significant changes with any immediacy, they will occur and some may even be sever. So what happened to consistency of purpose? How does this impact the system? Can a system be developed so robust, that these changes have no impact? Should it be? How do we ensure that we hold to those values that have made us successful, and yet yield to those that may even make us better?

Can any of these system establishing efforts even take place within the ranks, or are we at the mercy of the formal leadership?

Wow, Dave! This is good stuff!
You made a lot of points. Let me concentrate on this one:
Can a system be developed so robust, that these changes have no impact? Should it be? How do we ensure that we hold to those values that have made us successful, and yet yield to those that may even make us better?

Yep. I think a system can be developed so robust, the changes have no impact.
Nope. I don't think the system should be so robust as to be "bullet proof," because it tends to eliminate the "continuous improvement" aspect we all claim to aspire to. Just as evolution in nature has lots of "false starts" and "dead ends," so, too, do "organisms" or organizations created by humans.

Let's not confuse "values" with procedures and processes and systems. If a "value" is to maintain good working conditions for employees, we would expect the processes necessary to implement that value would change over time.

Sometimes, the process necessary to implement one value may conflict with the ideal process to implement another. (Customer satisfaction versus keeping all production domestic, for example.) HOW an organization resolves that conflict is a measure of whether its members are truly using SoPK, where they consider ALL options to determine the best course of action. Often, sadly, EVERYONE will not be pleased with the final decision, regardless of what it is.

From my point of view, it is crucial that the organization tries to consider the best possible outcome, rather than grabbing at the first straw which drifts by.

 

[Wes Bucey]

Although I agree that the culture of an organization (any organization) should be set by the vision cast by the company leader (the President/CEO); I also feel that in lieu of a formal vision being cast by this leader, the organization's culture can take on the character/vision of any charismatic within the organization.

Leadership comes in many forms (be they formal or informal) and an organization will always develop a corporate culture (although without a formal vision that culture may change over time). Dr. Rosabeth Kanter refers to these informal leaders as "Change Masters" in her book of the same title. In the visionary vacuum left by some formal corporate leaders the informal leadership structure takes over and a corporate culture is developed from within.

But one of the downsides to this type of leadership role is that every charismatic individual within the company has the ability to influence the vision/culture of the company, which can lead to mixed priorities, confusing directives/directions and an un-focused workforce.

Let's take up this point. I think it bears exploring as part of SoPK.
As I mentioned in my "evolution" reference earlier, Nature is rife with false starts, dead ends, and new branches.

When there is a vacant niche (vacuum) in any biome, (such as a missing predator to keep populations of herd animals in check), Nature finds a way to fill that niche, with predators moving in from another area, with small predators [wolves, coyotes, humans] learning to cooperate to bring down larger prey or large predators migrating in from other areas or disease taking a toll or food for the herd animals running out, causing death by starvation.

The point is NOT that stray charismatics can influence the direction of a leaderless organization, BUT whether there is a possibility that from the seeming CHAOS which surrounds conflicting charismatics, a new and better organization might ultimately arise.

Throughout history there have been rebellions, palace coups, wars between nations. Do many people mourn the deposing of leaders like Hitler, Idi Amin, Sadaam Hussein, etc.?

First and foremost, we must accept that CHANGE, alone, is not the outcome to be feared. We must strive to understand (with Profound Knowledge?) the factors involved in change and determine whether to:

1. resist
2. go along
3. create our own path.

I'm sure each of us could list wonderful outcomes from examples of what seemed at the time to be intolerable CHAOS.
(plasma as a response to a need for blood to remedy wartime injuries, for one)

 

[Kevin Mader]

Questions...

What's causing the change: Anxiety or Insight?

And, should a vision/aim be so easily swayed by the insurgence of a charismatic type?

Kevin

 

[Wes Bucey]

What's causing the change: Anxiety or Insight?

And, should a vision/aim be so easily swayed by the insurgence of a charismatic type?

Kevin

Just as an aside, but pertinent to the idea of "charismatic insurgent":
Frequently organizations which have a long, stable history face the problem of an aging leader, who, through tradition or pride, chooses to remain as the titular head until his death.

Outsiders often respect the title and defer to this leader as if he were still in charge, but insiders usually insulate this leader from day-to-day oversight to mitigate damage he might cause to the organization.

Underneath a facade of respectful calm, pretenders to the throne are jockeying madly for position to become the next leader. Plots are laid to derail the heir apparent anointed by the aging leader.

Ultimately, the inevitable happens and a new leader steps forward when the old one dies. He may be a "caretaker" who keeps all the policies and plans of his predecessor. More likely, he comes in with a new broom and cleans house, eliminating all his former rivals by either outright firing or exile to some far corner of the globe to run a small, insignificant piece of the empire, far removed from his former collaborators and allies.

Are these changes "good" or "bad?" It may all depend on the SoPK the new leader does or doesn't have.

Anyone ready to take up the discussion or do you need a concrete example of such an "organization which has a long, stable history and is now facing the problem of an aging leader?"

Perhaps you'd like to propose your own candidate for discussion on a factual rather than theoretical basis.