Great papaer

bad_theories_destroy_good_practices.pdf

This is in my eyes a good paper. I reccomend to read it. I know we are all striving with project (oh my God) but i will give a great perspective for your future obligation within the business life. It also depicts that we are lucky because we studiesd in an excellent department. . . . .

: 24 Jul 2011 11:44 |  Comments (4) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

3 weeks on work

I have been observing facts for three weeks in a small and medium enterprise in Greece. When i come back home i am thinking of what i have seen all day. . . . . . It is amazing. . . . . If we conduct a gap analysis between Deming's view and the current practices we will see that there is no chance for having having a bridge.. . . . . .

Every paragraph of his book is so so so so absolutely true.. . . . . .Fear is everwhere. People do not give feadback to the management for mistakes because of it. Quality is bad. People lack in pride for their work. There is no constancy. Philosophy of management is restricted in pure numbers. Characteristically i have seen producing a mould of thousand euros in 3 days..................... Oh my God........... Without thinking of it. I am pretty sure that there will be a problem on that. Just like previous moulds of the company which had a problem. Where is Design for six sigma philosophy? Where is the common aim? Where is quality?

We have work to do after MBE. I think we will make it. . . It is our duty to serve and lead the change..........................

: 05 Jul 2011 07:37 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Appreciation for the system is lost

We have never learnt to respect the sytem. Never never. . . . I am trying to work in my project. The word trying referes not in perosnal problems (like i want to go to the sea or i want to see my girlfriend) no no, i am more than willing to work on it and i am doing so. However i am trying to write my observation and make the necessary statistical analysis on my PC while the Greek Electricity Provider Company stops providing with electricity the place that i am working.

They react and protest against the new economic reformations of the Greek Goverment. I accept their fear of losing their job. I accept their problems and their fights (i have never said that management is right in that country) but i do not acept the fact that they are terminate electricity provision in the industrial territory of Greece. To make the things worse they industries are open when do that.

Just think how much money was Toyota loosing when they stopped working per hour............... Oh my Gosh

: 27 Jun 2011 09:22 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

I feel depressed. . . . . .

Coming back in my country and I was in front of a great surprise. I was reading in the news papers that the country has problems but I didn?t expect this. The country is devastated. . . Analyzing this situation I tried to understand what is going on. I have spoken with people around the country from every social class so that I can understand all the arguments.

Yesterday I was for dinner with some managers. We started discussing about the crisis. I started speaking about the necessary transformation without giving specific points so that they can argue what they conceive as transformation.

They gave me the following answer

yes we need a transformation, we need to push more the working force that doesn?t work. . . . . We have to reduce their salaries make them fear that they will lose their work so that we can increase the productivity.It came as a shock to me. I have spoken with people from the working class and they were telling “The only thing we want is to work with dignity”.

They argue that people do not work in productivity when the 300 members of the parliament cannot find a common ground so that they can fight united the crisis. Our people were sacrificed in the temple of short term thinking and easy profit which is responsibility of our management. Out people are misused and abused.

Another example came yesterday when I was participating in a meeting within a Greek SME. During the meeting the managing director-owner of the company stood up went to a window to see the production line came back and said:

“We are spending to much time here and the workers on the shopping floor do not work because they do not have someone to force them they are lazy” This reminded me Paul and Graeme who were telling us “When people feel fear they will both hide the mistakes and do what is enough so that the boss will not shout at them. “Someone in Germany called it Management by fear, which is still better” Dr. Edward Deming

: 25 Jun 2011 12:26 |  Comments (1) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Working for the application of the project

I am working one week now for the practical part (case study) of my project. While till now I have not discussed in depth the project but I have some free dialogues with in respect to the topic I have noticed the following contradiction. On one hand they understand the need of doing about the topic of the project. . . . . On the other hand when you try to start talking about the best practices identified from the literature you find resistance. When I am thinking of that in my mind comes the father Deming. “Doing your best is not enough” or “The system cannot understand itself”……. He was so f***king right. . . . (Sorry but he was). What I have to say is that I start to realize that conducting transformation to a system it will be more difficult from what we expected to be . . . . . . However MBE has given us all the knowledge that we need so that we can understand ourselves the system and its problems as well as what we have to challenge. . . We love MBE…………… :)

: 20 Jun 2011 08:48 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

SoPK for our PMAs and project………….

I was thinking which is the best way to face a PMA……….. After nine months in MBE when I am trying to answer a question I first look it through the eyes of SoPK (I love it)………………… So the same took place here as well.

What really should happen when we face a PMA are the following four categories of questions. We ask ourselves:

·        “Which are the world theories that have been developed in respect to our PMA¢s topic?” Then we ask ourselves “How this theories could be applied in the specific case of our question so that the cycle of knowledge could be developed and answer the PMA?”

·        What are the differences on the theories out there? Can we understand variation? Are all of them inside the limits or there is a special cause opinion? What the different approaches support and how the special causes- theories break the rules?

·        Can the different theories and contradictions be utilized under the concept of a common system so that they could develop a unite force, despite the differences, that will answer the PMA? How we critically assess and combine those theories so that we can create a complete and homogenous answer?

·        How these theories have been applied and how they have affected people¢s psychology? Did they have positive or negative outcome in their application in respect to the core asset of organizations named people? How this could affect our case?

Of course we should not forget that everything starts with personal transformation and if we are not ready to accept the challenge we will fail despite the correct application of SoPK in our work………

Also by correcting the bias of scale this principles could be applied in our project as well . . . .

Keep on blogging guys we learn a lot from that … … … … ..

: 03 Jun 2011 18:36 |  Comments (4) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

When the end comes we move to another dimension

More or less we have reached the end of (this is my personal opinion) the most exciting year of my life. Yes it was, and still is, exhausting but I bet that we will miss it. Thinking today of what we learnt I came to a conclusion that first of all we realized and self-determine ourselves. Yes, I think that we have gained knowledge of what we really are which are our strengths or weaknesses, and based on that we can plan our actions so that we can improve our lives.

This made me think of one philosophical phrase that I really like:

The self-determination of the “I am” derives by understanding the “We are”. . . . . . .

Thinking of that phrase and linking it with the MBE experience I think that I realized the magic of this course. We understood our selves through the eyes of the “we”. We allow other people to reflect their perceptions regarding us and we reflect on them. We didn¢t act us individuals without philosophical orientation; we know what we have to do because we were aware of the external environment. We took into consideration of our colleagues and take care of them. We achieved our aims – purpose by being helped or helping the rest of the people. More or less MBE gave us a vision and showed us the way to it.

Of course we are different and our personal vision will be different (variation is part of our life) but we are a common cause. We all know what we have to do so that we can introduce excellence. We were a team and we learn how to act as a team.

This is the difference that forced a WMG tutor (not from MBE) to say that “MBE works” when he show our presentations. It is not that we are better from the other student. Maybe we can say that we are different. However we can give an alternative, a new vision. We can say tomorrow in the organization that we will work “I have a dream”…

Yes my friends we have understood ourselves and we know what we have to do. As Deming says it is now time to do our best…………….

: 31 May 2011 18:01 |  Comments (2) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

The first thing you do when you do not know something …….. . . . . . Is that so simple?

Have we ever thought of the first thing that we do when we are not aware of something? Personally I Google it. . . . I want to learn about it. . . . Even if they are health symptoms, I Google it. Is a process that we take it as granted since we belong in information generation. However have we asked our parents or even our grand-parents about that??????? When my grand-mother saw internet she said “Do Germans spy us from that” (With all the respect to Germans but you have left your sign after world war 2 :P)……..

Her mind went that someone can observe your actions and learn about you through internet. Absolutely normal reaction in my eyes... In the same way it can have implications in organizations as well. Tomorrow we can use it for obtaining information from every corner of the world instantly. Why we shouldn¢t do so?

However there is something that made me be cautious about internet and generally the easy access to information. . . How we evaluate it? There is a lot of information out there? How we judge their use? Tough I think to give an answer on that! It is our theory that will manipulate and translate all that information into knowledge. However on what is that theory based?

The only sure is that we should be very cautious about the sources we use as well as our aim….. I do not have any idea on that????

: 21 May 2011 13:11 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Thoughts in Knowledge……………

Authors support that there are two types of Knowledge including tacit and explicit……….. However I am thinking of that a lot and I am tending to support the argument that explicit knowledge is not knowledge.

Can knowledge be transmitted? I really do not know. . . . . For understanding that we have to see the difference between knowledge and information………. Knowledge requires information and theory to be created (see Deming information is not knowledge). . . . Are all these that we read in the papers knowledge. . . . .. I think it is information. We filter them with our theory and create our personal (tacit Knowledge)………….

There are authors who supported that the difference between explicit knowledge and information is meaningless and that they are almost the same…………..

That is a great dilemma. . . . If we do not clarify their differences, we cannot manage knowledge since data and info constitute the basis of knowledge pyramid………...

: 20 May 2011 16:44 |  Comments (3) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Variation on information interpretation . . . How we differentiate ourselves from the others?

There was an era when having internet in your company was a competitive advantage by itself... However in our days internet is a necessity or else a must. . . . Think that in Kano¢s model of needs . .... .

So how you can gain competitive advantage, in manipulating and exploiting the infinite sources of information? I think it is the process itself and not the IT support. . . .In KM terms it is the soft aspect (people, culture, structure) rather the hard aspect of KM. This is why in my eyes organizations should focus more on people than in IT when it comes to KM. . . . .

MBE learnt as how to search for information. Instead of providing us with lectures and offering us the knowledge, out tutors gave us the driving forces supported as and let us search for knowledge by ourselves. ,. . . . I think this is a success that can highly be attributed to MBE culture. . . .

We tomorrow will find easier to search for info than other students of traditional courses. . Again MBE is different and made us different as well……….. Also we have learnt how to filter this info. . . Paul today said our problem is that we have a lot of information available and easy accessible………………. Yap we can find anything any time we wish……. Then the thing that will differentiate us from the rest is the way we translate the same information into knowledge ……..

This differentiation some of us will call it competitive advantage. I prefer to call it variation necessary for improving the whole system….. :P

: 18 May 2011 20:18 |  Comments (4) |  Close comments |  Report a problem