Seeing The World Through Another's Eyes

TOC promises a lot of benefits to those who embrace it, be they individuals or organizations. Yet those promises can materialize only if change occurs. And we all know change is hard. We've seen and remember that people don't resist change just because it is change. If the change is right for them they embrace it. Yet, the fact still remains that changing is hard and considering 'no man is an island' (John Donne), this change is most likely going to require the cooperation of others. To get this cooperation 'they' will need to see how this change fits them, and it is 'our' job to show them, as this is 'our' change. Only after we have proven that this change truly fits, will there be a chance of 'them' taking ownership.

In order to get others to buy in to the change, clearly we need to see things from their point of view. We must look at the current reality and the proposed reality through their eyes. Understand what constitutes a valuable pot of gold for them not for me (or us). Understand what are their risks, not ours.  Find their mermaid and crocodile and understand the impact these have on them.  Not an easy thing to do. No sir.

Now, I know it is not easy to see the move to TOC through your team members eyes. These are people you know, people who have many similarities to you, people who communicate with you. So, if that's hard, how hard will it be to see things through your customer(s) eyes? Horrible, isn't it? Horrible, but essential if you want to develop an Un Refuse-able Offer (URO), if you want to create your Decisive Competitive Edge (DCE), even if you just want to improve sales.

Well, I'll admit it is not easy in any way, but I will also remind you that that's what the TP tools are for and that to make it a bit easier you can always start by deliberately analyzing your view point and then, once you've gotten that out of the way, you can concentrate on the more important 'THEM'.

Anyways , a few years ago Best Buy put out a campaign just before Christmas that, for me, epitomizes seeing the world through another's eyes. It seems clear to me that the ad agency behind this campaign truly understood Best Buy's customers and the people they buy gifts for. I hope you find this as inspirational as I do.

Using S-DBR for Rapid Response Manufacturing

In this 2006 article,

 Eli Schragenheim, explains how to use S-DBS to support a competitive advantage of accepting requests for faster delivery dates in return for a premium.

S-DBR is short for simplified DBR and Schragenheim claims it has now totally replaced DBR in the GG consulting work. This is due to the fact that the classic DBR has too much protection in it and was overly rigid - the schedule was set at such a level of detail that each time a change was needed it impacted the entire system. This means that local variance is amplified to the entire system. S-DBR, on the other hand, uses only one layer of protection, meant to protect the system as a whole and leaves the micro-management to the people who can do it the best - the floor operators and foremen. The explanation of S-DBR and its mechanism is very detailed and clear.

While S-DBR can be used in any manufacturing system (made to order, to stock, to availability and so on) the focus of this article is made to order. In this kind of environment there may be customers willing to pay more for expedited treatment. Adding the ability to respond rapidly without negatively impacting the standard operations can allow the company to gain those premiums, establishing a decisive competitive edge. The article shows how to reserve capacity for the expedited orders and how to manage them.