Don’t Chase the Latest Management
Fads. The Situation Usually Dictates Which Approach Dictates Which Approach
Best Accomplishes the Team’s Mission
By Dr. Tom DePaoli
I was hired
as a lean six sigma consultant for a large transportation organization. The
organization had a history of trying the latest management fads, business book
of the month and other short-term trends. I met with many company employees and
it was obvious that they were very skeptical and had seen many management vogues
or initiatives tried and dropped quickly. The culture was such that they did
not have much patience with projects that did not get relatively quick results.
I soon realized that I had to change my approach and assume a more situational
leadership style. I knew that a typical full-blown lean six sigma project normally
took six months and was very tedious. I decided to adjust my approach and start
with kaizens which were a quicker form of lean six sigma projects and only
lasted two weeks or less. The first kaizen only lasted three days. I had front
loaded much of the work to myself ahead of time which significantly shortened
the project sessions. We kept to kaizens only for over a year and then tried a
six month lean six sigma projects after our string of kaizen success. Don’t chase
the latest management fads. The situation usually dictates which approach dictates
which approach best accomplishes the team’s mission.
Dr. Tom DePaoli, (Dr. Tom) is currently an independent
management consultant, the Principal of Apollo Solutions, which does general
business consulting in the human resources, supply chain and lean six sigma
areas. His organization was self-founded in 1995. He retired as a Captain from
the Navy Reserve. In other civilian careers, he was a supply chain and human
resources executive with corporate purchasing turnaround experience and lean
six sigma deployments. He has worked for over ten major companies and consulted
for over fifty organizations throughout his career. Some of his consulting
projects include: information systems projects, re-engineering organizations,
transformation, e-procurement, e-commerce, change management, global sourcing
and negotiating. His industry experience is in the chemical, paper,
pharmaceutical, IT, automotive, government, consumer, equipment, services and
consulting industries. He has been published extensively in journals, magazines
and books. He is the author of eleven books all available on
Amazon. He has instructed at six
education facilities in numerous roles. He is active in supporting the YMCA, Wounded Warrior, and the prevention of the
bullying of children.
https://www.amazon.com/author/tomdepaoli = Dr. Tom’s Amazon author’s page
http://www.apollosolutions.us = website of Apollo Solutions his business
drtombooks.com = more information on Dr. Tom’s books
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