Genuine Curiosity

Author Dwayne Melancon is always on the lookout for new things to learn. An ecclectic collection of postings on personal productivity, travel, good books, gadgets, leadership & management, and many other things.

 

Cosmic nudging

OK, so stick with me on the following sequence:

  1. A couple of days ago, Bren (Slacker Manager) wrote about a "cosmic nudge" that caused him and me to listen to the same audio book at about the same time. 
  2. Today, I found out that my friend Gene Kim just finished reading the same book, "Leadership and Self Deception."
  3. Today, I re-read Bren's post and noticed that he also mentioned Eli Goldratt, of whom I'm a huge fan (I've read all of his books, along with related works).
  4. Even freakier: as part of some research and "evangelization" of IT best practices we're working on, the aforementioned Gene Kim talked with Goldratt a few months ago
  5. Here's where the nudge comes to fruition: I've had an article on Goldratt fermenting in my drafts folder for about 6 weeks, but haven't gotten around to finishing it up.

Consider me nudged. Here is the article, in all its obtuse glory:

Back in the 80's, I read a book called "The Goal" by Eliyahu Goldratt. It is a "business novel" used to discuss Goldratt's "Theory of Constraints" model for productivity and throughput (keep in mind, this is not about individual throughput - rather, it's about the throughput of systems and processes).

Goldratt's theory (called TOC by us fans) is very complex, and was originally written about in very sterile, technical papers. It was geared toward optimizing manufacturing processes, but Goldratt recognized that it had applicability in many other aspects of business.

Back when Goldratt began writing about this stuff, he held what were considered to be contrarian views about process optimization, inventory, and other aspects of manufacturing resource planning. I found his analysis and premises to be very intriguing and, even though I'm a software guy and not a manufacturing person, in the last 20 years or so I have found that his concepts apply to lots of other contexts if you squint just right.

For example, one of the core assertions of Goldratt is that achieving "local optima" within a system will not optimize the system's throughput. Instead, you have to find the system's constraint (or bottleneck) and elevate it by subordinating all other parts of the system to the constraint.

The premise: throughput of the system can never exceed the capacity of the bottleneck, so what's the point in optimizing the usage of non-bottleneck resources?

Goldratt's principle follows a methodical approach to resolve constraints, at which point you always uncover another bottleneck. So, the cycle repeats as each bottleneck is discovered and resolved.

You can adapt this philosophical approach to many things, such as personal workflow - at any given time, there is probably one key bottleneck preventing you from optimizing your effectiveness. Focus on it and subordinate all other activities until it's resolved, then rinse and repeat.

If you are a GTD follower, your constraint is probably one of your next actions that you've either neglected or have failed to articulate. OK, so maybe I'm stretching it a bit, but I'm one of those people who looks for patterns all over the place (which, of course, means I find them).

If you're interested in more about the Theory of Constraints, check out this link to my top 8 list of TOC books, listed in the order I recommend.

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Make it up, make it happen

Over on Steve Pavlina's blog, he writes about the movie "What The Bleep Do We Know..." and says he's "...convinced that there is definitely some kind of linkage between intention and reality that bypasses direct action."

I've often pondered that connection myself, as well as his question: where's the limit? This is, of course, not a new concept - I've always been a big believer in the power of prayer and the human spirit.

This is also embodied in "the power of positive thinking,"  force of will, and all that sort of thing, isn't it? And, it's what David Allen describes with the premise that a huge part of Getting Things Done is to "Make it Up, and Make it Happen."

All of this reminds me of a book I read recently, called "The Message of a Master" which tells a story about someone who learns a 'secret' from a guru of sorts. In the book, the secret he learns is that all the potential in their world exists for your benefit, and all you have to do is focus on your goal and your psyche becomes a force of attraction that brings all the necessary elements into your life to make the goal a reality. There are, of course, rules that this secret cannot be used for evil, etc.

All in all, a very intriguing concept. Remindes me of the notion that anything in the universe begins to exist the moment someone formulates an idea about it within their mind.

Thanks for provoking the thought, Steve.

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Oh what a tangled web we weave...

I just came back from a trip to Orlando for an Internal Auditor conference, and got a chance to listen to some audiobooks on my fancy new iPod Shuffle. I just finished the audiobook version of "Leadership and Self-Deception", which could very well be one of those life-changing sorts of books.

The book is one of those that takes a business teaching and wraps it up in a story designed to guide you through a series of "a-ha" moments. In this case, it's about a new manager at "Zagrum Corporation" who is invited to a meeting with a senior exec at the company, and is told he has a "big problem" that he needs to solve if he's ever going to make it at the company. Things proceed from there, and some very powerful concepts are revealed.

From the title, it should be apparent that self-deception plays a major role in the book. The book not only deals with this, it deals with how your self-deception negatively impacts your dealings with others because it puts you "in the box" where you have tainted dealings with others, causing them to initiate tainted dealings with you, causing a vicious circle.

This is basically a primer on how to change the results you get in life by adjusting how you choose to approach, deal with, and think about other people. At times, I felt like I'd already gotten to the a-ha quite a bit before the author chose to spring it, but that doesn't change the value of the lesson they are trying to teach.

The book covers a set of concepts that look deceptively simple, but which could be very difficult to apply. My gut says this will definitely be worth continual effort - they will make you a better person at work and at home if you get better at the techniques.

Worth a read or listen, for sure. The link above is to the book version on Amazon - you can get the audiobook from Audible. Oh- by the way, as audiobooks go, it's pretty well done with good voice characterizations by the reader.

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Showing up

I hear all the time that we live in a "service economy." But that doesn't necessarily mean the service you get is very good.

I was hanging out with several co-workers the other day, and they started comparing horror stories about dealing with general contractors. One guy's contractor lied about having permits for some work he did on their house (litigation ensued). Another had a contractor take his deposit and then file bankruptcy.

Another story kind of summed it up for me, though. My friend wanted to have a room added on to his house, but he had heard about problems with contractors so he decided he'd be really careful. He spent a lot of time interviewing and checking references on contractors. Eventually, he narrowed the list down to two different guys:

One who cited his experience, the quality of his work, his attention to detail, and his ability to create a distinctive room for them.

The second, who basically said, "I'll show up and I'll do a good job."

My friend went with the experienced guy who promised to create a distinctive room for them. Things got off to a good start, but a couple of days into the job, the contractor didn't turn up. Over the course of the next few weeks, he came by a few times for a few hours but didn't make much progress. My friend hounded and hounded the guy. No luck.

Finally, he terminated the contract with the first guy, and called the second guy. Guy #2 came to his house every day until he finished the room, and did a good job.

Promises can sound really cool, but at the end of the day there's a lot of value in just showing up and doing a good job.

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Being unavailable in a high availability world

This past weekend I went undercover. Well, sort of.

You see, I've been looking at how I spend my time - time diaries, workflow analysis, that sort of thing. (If you want to do a time audit on yourself, I highly recommend Steve Pavlina's article on "How To Triple Your Personal Productivity")

I've been traveling around 80% of the time for the past couple of months, and decided that this past weekend I would do home chores and things with the family for a change. So, I left my laptop in my bag, I left my Treo 600 on the cabinet connected to the charger, and I disconnected.

It was kind of odd, but I think it helped me recharge, as well. It was good in a lot of different ways. For example, I spent some relaxing, fun time with my kids. And my wife's van fits in the garage again for the first time in ages (that was an enduring fixture on my Someday/Maybe list).

I think I'll plan on "no tech weekends" more often.

P.S. The email didn't miss me, as far as I can tell.

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