The Back of the Napkin | Dan Roam | Penguin Portfolio

What first caught my eye about this book was its subtitle, Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures. Dan Roam believes that almost all problems can be solved, communicated, and solutions sold through a process of seeing and drawing picture.  I thought I’d read the book because these things makes sense to me from a lean standpoint (genchi gembutsu, vsm, and A3 process).

I also read the book because I hate long powerpoint presentations made up of a bunch of slides consisting of bullet points, countless chart, and the occasional awkward, out of place clipart.  This book suggests some alternatives.

The book is easy to read, most pages have some pictures illustrating the author’s point.  It can be read in three or four sittings of an hour or two each.  The author describes a process for visually thinking through and communicating problems and ideas.

Roam gives pretty good examples throughout the book he uses both real world examples from his work as well as simple made up examples that are simple enough that most readers will understand the author’s message without being lost in the details of the actual problem.

The book is a little more than a how to think and communicate visually.  Roam has apparently done some research visual thinking.  He makes light reference to how we see stuff and process it cognitively and precognitively.  He includes a plain language appendix that summarizes what he has learned about what we see and how we see it.

I thought the book was a good read.  I am thinking about buying a copy for my library (I borrowed the copy that I read from the public one.)  If you have an interest in visually thinking through problems and ideas as well as ways to communicate them in simpler, more visual ways then this might be a good read for you too.  I’ll give the author one paragraph to make his pitch (from chapter 1):

What if there was a way to more quickly look at problems, more intuitively understand them, more confidently address them, and more rapidly convey to others what we’ve discovered?  What if there was a way to make business problem solving more efficient, more effective, and — as much as I hate to say it — perhaps even a bit more fun?  There is..  It’s called visual thinking, and it’s what this book is all about: solving problems with pictures.

Roam’s process of visual thinking is a four step process: looking, seeing, imagining, and finally showing.  Looking is a semipassive process of collecting and screening information.  By looking you should be able to understand the big picture of your problem.

Seeing is a the active side of the visual input coin.  In seeing you focus on selecting and clumping.  When you see you select inputs which warrant more detailed inspection.  You should begin to recognize patterns in the see phase.  Roam says that we see things in terms of who/what, how much, where and when.  Based on some combination of these we can can see the how.  Then we begin to make guesses as to the why.

Imagining comes after you have collected and select the relevant information.  The imagine phase typically takes one of two forms: seeing with our eyes closed (what a lot of people call imagination) or seeing what is not there.  It is this phase that Roam comes up with a really interesting exercise that he calls SQVID.  This is really about asking five questions about how I want to show the problem.  We should think about showing while we are imagining (I didn’t get it at first either, but it makes sense if you read the book).  Here is a table that represents the five questions:

Simple	Quality	Vision	Individual	Change
Elaborate	Quantity	Execution	Compare	Status Quo

You can ask ask yourself how you can show your problem simply and how you can show your problem elaborately.  Also, ask yourself how to best show your problem to the intended audience using this diagram.  You would repeat this for each column SQVID diagram above.  The D in SQVID is for delta or change, the other letters just come from the first letters of the top row.  Roam associates the top row with right-brain or “warm” and the bottom with left-brain or “cool”.  Warm is simple, visionary, and qualitative whereas cool is complex, quantitative, execution oriented.  (You can see the author’s .pdf of the diagram here.)

Finally showing is making everything clear for your audience.  Roam offers a set of ‘frameworks’ to help you show your ideas.  You can use his <6><6> rule for working through how you are going to show your idea.  He suggests that you should select a framework based on the what was most important from you see phase using this table (nice .pdf here):

Roam sums up his visual thinking approach with what he calls his codex.  It is a matrix with SQVID across the top and the framework type down the left column (see it here.)  The way you use it is you go down the right column to the desired framework then slide across until you find the most most relevant version of that framework.  It is a pretty interesting way of looking at things.

The four step process is not linear, you may have to stay in a look – see loop for awhile before you can begin to imagine for instance.

Roam then runs through an example of each type of problems (Who/what, How much, etc.)

The author then closes with a chapter on selling your ideas where he basically suggests that you make your idea visual by using the visual thinking codex then “look” aloud, “see” aloud, and “imagine” aloud.  Basically walk the audience through how you came up with your picture.

All told,  a worthy read from someone who shares a lot of our lean practitioner paradigms (he might not know it but he does.)  Should be interesting for people who value the A3 process.

Bruce

So far I only have one image rendered up of this character work in progress.

Click the image to view in full.

Complete plans for this character are:

• Hair (with fits to A3,V4,M3,M4)
• Outfit(with fits to A3,V4)
• Morphs and textures for the wolf

Reganne/Lupa will be sold exclusively through my site (once it’s finished).

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Jon Miller at the Gemba Panta Rei blog had a really cool idea and I think I am going to try it.  He suggested that you should abandon A3 thinking and adopt A1 thinking (he didn’t really say abandon but I think he he meant you should give A1 thought a try.)  His idea is that an A1 size paper, which has roughly 4 times the area of an A3 (see diagram below), is better because people can ‘huddle’ around it and that increases collaboration, flow of information, speed, and visibility (you should read the post (linked above) for yourself.  I am going to try it.

Image by Wikimedia Commons

Here is a slide of my whiteboard:

I probably won’t get a chance to use it until into January when I plan on using it during some autonomous maintenance activities.  I’ll keep you posted on how it goes.

Bruce

The Crew was really feeling the color combo on this pack!  Good deal Solebox!

Solebox has gotten together once again with Saucony and presents this time around the Oldskool vs Newskool Pack. The pack consists of the classic Shadow 90 and its modern equivilant, the A3 running model. In terms of colors, Solebox used black and salmon on both sneakers. We will provide more on this release date when we get it.

The Shadow 90 is a monster!

via Highsnobiety -> Sneaker Freaker.

Breaks are always awesome. It’s that time of the year you can attempt to regain all that sleep you’ve missed so sorely in between work and your academics.

And then you realize you have this party and it’s your obligation to get drunk, great. So, in reality, we don’t really get to sleep do we?

Block Dinner

A3 Block Dinner:

Because of our different tracks and schedules, I guess we really don’t have time to see each other. And despite our busy schedules I’m glad that we were all able to find a Thursday night at Teriyaki Boy followed by Sex Lessons at McDo. What was really nice was that fact that even if we don’t hang out as often as we should be, that night we spent as a block seemed as if we’ve just hanged out. It was awesome, I hope that all of us are able to get our schedules together, because I predict our next block dinner or drinking session will still be on March.

To the closest NSTP block ever

NSTP Group Outing:

I’ve told people about this little outing and everyone was surprised about how close our NSTP Group is. We did miss Pauleen, Froi, Huwey and Pam, and we almost left Reg behind for being 2 hours late (oh I’m sorry, it’s Reg time) but anyway, we did enjoy Tagaytay and all that food we shouldn’t have eaten. Till next time guys! Brgy. Tatalon awaits us.

Guidon Christmas Party

Guidon Christmas Party:

The Guidon Christmas party. Got smashed, embarrassed myself and did my “daddy” duties as well. I like this picture particularly because we were all sober. Once the other pictures show up, where we all looked, well, smashed, it could be a pretty sight.

Point is it’s only been 3 days since the start of Christmas vacation and there’s a lot of stories already to be told. I think this break is going to be epic, I mean, we miss a lot of people and spend good times with friends. Tomorrow is Search-in, Tuesday is Barkada, and Wednesday, well, I’m sure something will be planned out And I even haven’t talked about Yule Ball yet

On another note, there are never shoe sizes available for me, or shirts. Will go back in January to get those that I want! Or, I will go to Green Hills on Tuesday and get that damn fake shoe.

Do the knowledge if you don’t know his resume. Hastings and Christian Cortez were responsible for one of my favorite videos from the 1990’s.

Saw this over at Artek.

Word to Justin.

This 06′ Audi A3 Sportback is legit. Belongs to a Mr. Jason Escolar of the Bar Society. Comes hard with the dark blue paint. Looks dark enough to be a mysterious black in the day, but with a little light exposure it’s a nice deep blue. Got the unique colored BBS RS’ with blacked-out barrels (I know, I know again with the BBS), and bagged to obtain that proper fitment.

Overall awesome car, never thought I’d dig a wagon but this one hits a home run!
@ Night.
In the daytime.

We love the jack-of-all-trades nature of sporty hatches and wagons.

Credit: peteSwede (top), boharaphoto (bottom)

If you’re looking for a way to celebrate Christmas the old fashioned way, i.e. with a gigantic robot Santa destroying the central business district of a city, or just stuck for a last minute present then take a look at this.

Landrobot is offering the below print in A3 size for a tenner a print.  That’s right.  For just ten Euros, or equivalent, you can be the proud owner of a very destructive Christmas and, for a change, it doesn’t have to involve your family!

Fifty are available so grab one while you can.

Also, Merry Christmas and all that.

It was icy out there. Good thing we had Quattro winter tires.

Audi A3 kleur bouwjaar extra’s noem maa op

Los Angeles, 04 Desember 2009 – Meski baru diluncurkan sebulan yang lalu, namun varian hatchback diesel produk pabrikan asal Jerman Audi yaitu Audi 3 Turbo Diesel Injection (TDI) berhasil menggondol gelar Green Car of The Year di gelaran Los Angeles Auto Show, Kamis (03/12). Dengan demikian, mobil ini sekaligus menyingkirkan sedan hibrida andalan Toyota Prius.

Seperti dikutip Reuters, di ajang kompetisi tahunan yang digelar Green Car Journal Magazine itu, adalah Volkswagen Golf TDI diesel, Honda Insight hybrid, Ford Mercury Milan hibrida dan Toyota Prius hybrid masuk jajaran finalis 2009.

Ron Cogan, editor Green Car menyebut, dewan juri terkesan dengan tingkat efisiensi konsumsi bahan bakar mobil tersebut. “Tingkat efisiensi Audi A3 TDI ini, 50 persen lebih tinggi ketimbang mesin-bensin (dari model A3 lainnya). Namun, (tingkat efisiensi itu) tidak memengaruhi performa mesin,” papar dia.

Presiden Audi Amerika Johan de Nysschen mengaku penghargaan itu akan mendongkrak citra mobil bermesin diesel yang ternyata ramah lingkungan karena bersih. Pasalnya, di negeri Paman Sam itu, masyarakat masih melihat mesin sebagai suatu kontradiksi untuk menciptakan lingkungan yang bersih dari polutan.

Sementara itu, Jeff Kuhlman Juru Bicara Audi pusat di Jerman, menyebut di Amerika Serikat Audi A3 TDI selama November lalu terjual lebih dari 500 unit. Mobil ini hanya dibanderol kurang dari US $ 30.000 atau kurang dari Rp 282 juta.

Sedangkan pesaing beratnya, Toyota Prius sepanjang sebelas bulan 2009 ini terjual 128.000 unit. Toyota Prius menguasai 60 persen pangsa pasar mobil hibrida di Amerika Serikat.

Para juri Green Car ini selain dari editor Green Car Jurnal juga melibatkan kolektor mobil Jay Leno, aktivis lingkungan dan penjelajah laut Jean-Michel Cousteau, perancang mobil legendaris Carroll Shelby dan pimpinan Sierra Club, Carl Pau.

Sumber foto

This is my wife’s car. I will (try) to give you a fair review of this car.

Looks

It’s a matter of taste, it’s not quite as sexy as the alfa 147 and nowhere near as cool as the mini, but imho it’s the best looking german premium hatchback (the bmw 1 series looks pretty much like a shoe (as Clarckson said) and the Mercedes B-class is… eerrrm… well… boring to say the least).

Even if the hatchback-station wagon mix is not a heart-stopper the 17″ inch rims (standard on Ambition) and open sky panoramic roof (optional extra) make it stand out from the crowd.

Audi A3 sportback

Interior

The interior is the best part of this car, and it was the main argument for buying this, instead of it’s cheaper sisters – the golf/leon and octavia. Even though this is a compact you get interior trims better than in most mid-sized sedans.  If something in the interior of an A3 looks like aluminium or wood, than it’s actually made out of those materials (I really hate alu and carbon-fiber painted plastic bits in a car… it’s lame, it’s not a shame to use plastic, just don’t pretend it’s something else).
The steering wheel is one of the best I’ve ever tried: it’s small and meaty, it actually makes you feel like you’re in sports car (even if you’re actually in a diesel powered hatchback). Better yet as far as I know all trim levels (there are 3 of them) come with this lovely steering wheel, so you won’t find any plastic steering wheels on a A3.

Since I mentioned trim-levels there are 3 of them: Attraction (entry level), Ambition (the sporty one) and Ambiente (the “luxury” one). Unlike most German premium cars where everything except the steering wheel is an optional extra, the A3 came very well equipped (though pricey). Even the entry level A3 came with 16″ alloy wheels, leather steering wheel and climate control while the Ambition added 17″ alloys, sport suspension (not present on my wife’s car), and other gizmos.

Audi A3 sportback interior

Ride & comfort

Since it’s a compact you shouldn’t expect much more than you get from this class. The front seats are incredibly comfortable while giving you plenty of lateral support. The suspension (even the standard one) is rather “sporty” and while it gives you an almost go-kart like feeling do not expect it to smoothly glide over bumps.

It’s also not the roomiest car in the class (though I think it’s marginally larger than the golf V), front seats are OK and actually you have plenty of legroom in the back too but the rear seats are quite uncomfortable and the low roof can literally cause headaches to taller passengers.

Dynamics

“Power is nothing without control” but this car has too much control and not so much power. I’m pretty sure this car was developed with the 2.0 TFSI in mind rather than this lazy oilburning TDI engine. Stability is way over the standard of it’s class. With 105 hp it’s almost impossible to spin it or take it off course, at this small amount of power even understeer is very well controlled.

It’s quite frustrating that such a great combination of chassis, suspension and gearbox (excellent gearbox btw) is powered by such a lazy engine. So if you really want to take advantage of the cars “sporting” credentials you should go for the 1.8 TSI or 2.0 TFSI turbocharged petrol engines.

It might not be as good as the 1 series on the track (I’m quite sure it’s nowhere near as good on the track) but it can certainly put a smile on your face on a twisty road.

Audi A3 Sportback Ambition

Reliability

We had this car for 4 years, the problems so far where:

• the armrest got stuck in a weird position (fixed under warranty)
• the sunroof roll-shutter broke (fixed under warranty)

Pros:

+ Very nice interior and premium interior trim
+ Great stability – can deliver sporty performance if powered by proper engines
+ Feels very solid and reliable

Cons:

- Price ! It’s highly overpriced.
- A bmw 1 series will be faster on a track.

Specifications:
Carfolio.com
Fastestlaps.com

Promotorii lui Geoană se adresează, prin intermediul televiziunilor “Realitatea TV” şi “Antena 3″, unora de la care speră un vot: CRETINII.
Căci numai unor cretini le este necesară repetarea în loop a “filmuleţului”, de dimineaţă până seara, zile la rînd, pentru a-l pricepe suficient de bine.

“Antena 3″ repetă, la fel, pentru acelaş tip de cretini, din 10 în 10 minute, un fel de viral trucat realizat după clipul cu Băsescu făcându-se că plouă.

Sper că nu liberalii…

***

© Alexandru Dan Mitache • 2009

Trei indivizi care au redus instituţia societăţii civile la nivelul de celulă de partid bolşevic, Cristian Pârvulescu, Mircea Toma şi Victor Alistar – adică un mic dictator care a modificat statutul “Pro Democraţia” pentru a se putea realege şef, un interesat care a şovăit să se pronunţe în legătură cu cazul Roşca Stănescu & Bogdan Chirieac şi un cercetat de către ANI– au inventat, înaintea primului tur al alegerilor prezidenţiale, noţiunea de… PREFRAUDARE.

Mişcarea lor subersivă îndreptată spre suspendarea democraţiei în România a fost, din fericire, anihilată de justiţie. Tribunalul le-a respins obraznicia, iar Curtea Constituţională a validat referendumul. Pârvulescu, Toma şi Alistar au fost puşi între parantezele absurdului şi în boxa nesimţirii. Unul dintre ei – sinistrul Pârvulescu – mai cerea şi “reglementarea” internetului, după un model neomaoist.

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Televiziunile isterizante – “Realitatea TV” şi “Antena 3″ – şi-au umplut programele de duminica trecută (între comunicatele BEC), în ţipete de matracuci stătute şi zbierete de papagali solemni, cu ficţiuni şi cu mistificări privind… FRAUDAREA alegerilor prezidenţiale.

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A trecut o săptămână de atunci. Am aşteptat-o cu sufletul la gură. Ca de obicei n-a mai venit. Nici de la pulifricii care au scornit PREFRAUDAREA, nici de la cei cu FRAUDAREA.

Aşteptam de la ei, naiv… POSTFRAUDAREA!

De fapt, îi postdoare-n cur!

***

© Alexandru Dan Mitache • 2009

Filmuleţul realizat de “?”, prezentat şi garantat de “Gardianul” şi de Dinu Patriciu, distribuit de “Realitatea TV” şi “Antena 3″ a fost văzut de toată lumea. Ne-am strepezit ochii în nuanţe de chelii şi de mâneci, în culori de copil şi în fotograme comentate. Ni s-au tocit lentilele ochelarilor holbându-ne la stop-cadre.

Citind presa on-line şi comentariile aferente, am ajuns la concluzia, relativ tristă, că ne-am obişnuit atât de mult cu parateleviziunea telenovelelor şi a genurilor “uşoare” încât am uitat să mai şi gândim ceea ce vedem. Suntem mereu gata să participăm la concursul de dat sentinţe.

Să ne imaginăm că FILMUL NU AR FI EXISTAT. Să ne imaginăm că incidentul ar fi fost relatat verbal sau în scris, cu lux de amănunte – exact aşa cum apare în film – şi că ar fi fost comentat exact aşa cum s-a întâmplat aseară la “Realitatea TV” de către Dinu Patriciu şi Lavinia Şandru care au certificat, veridicitatea faptelor din postura de martori oculari. În faţa unor acuzaţii atât de grave, cu siguranţă că, în lipsa “dovezii irefutabile” a imaginilor, în lipsa lui “am văzut cu ochii mei”, am fi apelat puţin mai mult la creier, la logică, la bunul simţ logic al îndoielii anterioare certitudinii .

Din păcate, imaginile difuzate au produs efectul contrar: am ajuns la îndoieli plecând de la certitudine.

Suntem asaltaţi cu analize spectrografice, cu marturii ale mătuşii, ale copilului, ale vecinilor, ale celor de faţă la adunarea electorală din 2004. Toate au valoare de întrebuinţare nulă! Toţi cei menţionaţi pot fi cumpăraţi, toţi pot fi ameninţaţi, toţi pot fi corupţi sau şantajaţi, fiecare poate fi subiectiv sau părtinitor, habarnist sau mincinos.

Vă propun, aşadar, ca dincolo de imagini, dincolo de mărturii, dincolo de politică şi dincolo de antipatii sau de simpatii să (ne) răspundem la opt probleme simple şi elementare, având ca arguent că PROPRIA NOASTRĂ INTELIGENŢĂ NU POATE FI CORUPTĂ:

1. În afara de Lavinia Şandru, despre care ştim cîtă credibilitate are, de ce nu a intervenit până acum niciun alt participant la acel miting aflat atunci pe scenă (Meleşcanu, Tăriceanu, etc.), care ar fi trebuit să fie martorii celor două loviri?
2. Întrebat de ce nu a relatat sau de ce nu a devoalat până acum “monstruozitatea” la care a fost martor, Patriciu a răspuns că nu a făcut-o pentru că nu a avut dovezi. Nu pare hilar că într-un mediu în care se împroaşcă, de 20 de ani încoace, cu calomnii sfruntate, pe domnul Patriciu l-a apucat brusc discreţia morală în legătură cu omul despre care crede că i-a dictat arestarea? Apoi, pentru a întoarce spatele unui “scelarat” nu-i trebuie nimănui dovezi. Declari ceea ce ai de declarat despre persoana respectivă, îi retragi sprijinul acordat până în acel moment şi te retragi din grupul ei. Eu am avut cunoscuţi turnători şi atunci cand am aflat acest lucru m-am despărţit de ei, fără să trebuiască să dovedesc ceva.
3. Din problema expusă mai sus se naşte întrebarea firească: de ce au mai mers Dinu Patriciu şi prietenul său Călin Popescu Tăriceanu liniştiţi, zâmbitori şi triumfători împreună şi alături de “sceleratul bătauş de copii” Traian Băsescu, câteva luni bune, până fix în momentul în care acesta a refuzat favorul cuprins în faimosul bileţel roz, care era galben?
4. Dinu Patriciu a afirmat că a vazut cu ochii lui ÎNCĂ o lovitura în… PLEXUL copilului. Plexul este situat la nivelul cavităţii abdominale. Cum a putut ajunge Băsescu cu mâna la acel nivel? Dacă această a doua lovitură despre care vorbeşte Patriciu a avut loc când copilul era pe scenă, la îndemâna lui Băsescu, este evident că ar fi fost văzuta măcar de câteva zeci de oameni, dintre cele câteva mii care erau prezente acolo.
5. Cum de n-a ieşit la iveală această înregistrare video în momentul referendumului de suspendare a preşedintelui, cand ar fi fost cu adevărat distrugătoare şi când ar fi putut scuti câţiva cercetaţi penal de emoţii măcar doi ani?
6. Cum de timp de cinci ani absolut nimeni nu a pomenit o vorbă despre ACEST gest oribil, atâta timp cât s-a turuit la nesfârşit despre beţii, orgii, trafic de armament, etc.? Cum se poate ca într-o societate atât de plină de bârfe şi de calomnii să nu transpară aceste fapte comise într-un loc atât de public şi într-un moment atât de vizibil, văzute de unii dintre cei mai aprigi duşmani ai preşedintelui?
7. Îi vede cineva pe Lavinia Şandru şi pe Cosmin Guşe tăcând, discret, pudic şi deontologic, timp de 5 ani şi nesuflând niciun cuvânt despre acest incident ştiut şi văzut de centuristă cu ochii ei de căprioară (atît de blândă? nu, atât de păroasă), după câte sute de alte minciuni nedovedite au mai spus cei doi în această perioadă???
8. În sfârşit, îl vede cineva pe Băsescu enervându-se, sau măcar supărîndu-se, dacă un copil (sau chiar oricine altcineva) striga atunci “Votaţi Iliescu!” (când de fapt candida Nastase, care încerca, tocmai, să-şi detaşeze imaginea de cea a lui Iliescu )?

Răspunsurile la toate aceste întrebări nu le dau imaginile, ci inteligenţa, buna credinţă şi onestitatea logicii fiecăruia dintre noi.

Aşa să ne ajute Dumnezeu?

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Chestiunea filmului şi problema lui Patriciu şi a lui Băsescu nu o rezolvă decât o expertiză făcută de o autoritate internaţională competentă.

Subiectiv fiind, aş spune că o asemenea expertiză ar fi bună pentru liniştea lui Traian Băsescu şi pentru neliniştea lui Dinu Patriciu.

***

© Alexandru Dan Mitache • 2009

How does your company roll out its annual business plans?  Do you get a huge spreadsheet with every cost possible, including toilet paper usage, broken down by accountants after weeks of calculations?  Is there a 95 page Powerpoint presentation that rivals any insomnia methods that exist today?  I really despise those techniques, mostly because of all the waste our leadership and accountants put into a plan that was usually irrelevant by the time the starting month began.  But that was only after I was enlightened by  the lean 7 wastes.  However, even before that I was generally uninspired by this method.

If you lead a group of people and share the same view of uninspiring business plans, I encourage you to try playing “catchball” with your group. Catchball, as described by Pascal Dennis here, is the best method I’ve have found to truly engage your team and achieve astonishing business results.  It’s a crucial part of Policy Deployment that Bruce has been blogging about.  (here, here, and here.)

The name catchball comes from the concept of taking ideas and playing catch with your team, unearthing solutions to a problem.  Within policy deployment, this problem is the large business goal and the outcome is a series of activities intended to achieve that goal. 

The key is that the team members at the lowest levels are the ones developing the solutions.  This creates intensely motivated teams with unbelievable buy in to the business plan.  It increases morale because people are working on what they determined to be the important items.  It all rolls up into outstanding business results and a high level of personal satisfaction for the team.

The best way I’ve achieved catchball success is to start with an A3 with the background information that describes the business problem, like increase sales by 15%, and the gap analysis portion completed.  Then turn it over to the team involved to analyze  problem cause(s).  Let them work on it for a couple days then get back together to scrub the information.  I’ve used 5 why’s, stand in the circle, data mining, and other methods here to capture the causes of the problem.  Once a consensus is achieved on the cause, then send the team back to develop the corrective actions.  Give them a couple days and meet again to review.  Once again achieve consensus.  Complete the A3 with the chosen actions. 

A crucial point here is to make sure that both the leadership and the team agree upon the path chosen and both take equal accountability for the outcome.  Now go to work!  This may entail creating additional A3’s and additional catchballs as you progress towards the goal.  Remember to get together and monitor progress on the A3 at frequent intervals once they are in place. 

A little warning is required here.  It all sounds great but it requires a huge amount of work and patience achieving consensus and playing catchball, but it is worth it.  You must fight the urge to just delegate the tasks to your team when you get impatient and the pressures are mounting.  You must “give up control” and fight the Amercian mentality of “I’m the boss and I’m the smartest person!”  You’ll also encounter team members that don’t want the accountability of developing solutions!  Don’t be discouraged by these things as you play ball.

If your business plans are uninspiring and you are looking for a better way, go through the LEI webinar with Pascal and give catchball a try.  You’ll be truly amazed at the results for the business and the personal satisfaction of your people!

If you decide to give catchball a try be sure to let me know how it works out!  zleanone@gmail.com

Bryan