Today’s post is by Dr. Giovanni Siepe. The Theory of Constraints is a management methodology developed by the physicist Dr. Eliyahu Goldratt in the late 1970s. There is little doubt about how radically effective TOC is and that remarkable results have been achieved with it in all kinds of sectors, from healthcare to steel foundries […]
A Digital Tool for Human Interaction with a Common Goal: Ess3ntial
We’ve been getting ready to release something exciting and the time has now come. This week, our friend at NASA, David Meza, an early reader of Domenico Lepore’s book ‘Deming and Goldratt: The Decalogue’, and a brave advocate of systems thinking in a highly siloed organization, mentions in an article that he “wants to tackle questions […]
Managing Change Effectively with a Systemic Framework and Method
Whenever we think about managing change, it can’t just be abstract. We need some kind of framework and method. It is highly useful to consider three phases that happen when we introduce change, as identified in the Theory of Constraints (TOC): what to change what to change to how to make the change happen For […]
Effective Decision-Making? Understand Your Driver Needs First
When it comes to change, we find ourselves in a fundamental conflict. On the one hand, we don’t want to change because we want to protect a deep need for “control”. On the other hand, we want to change because we want to protect a deep need connected with “vision” or growth. Both needs are […]
Why Is Managing Change So Hard and How Can We Make it Easier?
Nothing in our world today is quite the same as it was just a year ago. Many people have had to change completely the way they work and live and many will never “return to normal”. Managing change is something that all of us must become familiar with and it has become a fundamental element […]
What’s Driving Profitability in Your Business and What Isn’t – How to Find Out
If you knew accurately what is actually making money in your company wouldn’t that then influence all your decisions regarding cost and investment? Well, isn’t that what accounting is for? The problem is, traditional accounting fails to give a complete and correct picture of what is happening dynamically and what is really driving profitability. Every company is […]
How to Prevent Chaos in Any Project or Initiative
Projects, or any initiative we embark on, can easily get out of hand. They are subject to the chaos that can arise when human interactions are not governed by precise guidelines. Entropy exists and it affects behaviours as well everything else. When we use the Transition Tree Tool to break projects down into actions we […]
The Words We Use Can Change Our Reality – Shifting to a Systems View
This morning I spoke to a highly accomplished, bi-lingual woman who works in software. We agreed that the words we use when we work can have an enormous impact. For example, in her environment, the word “project” has acquired a stigma because of the pain associated with it so now she talks about “initiatives”. This […]
The Human Constraint – Going Beyond What We Think Is Possible
Our lives today are filled with unprecedented levels of rapid change and complexity. Unintended consequences can quickly emerge from inadequate leadership thinking, so we must urgently learn to think not just in a “joined-up” way but in a systemic way. This means developing the skills to: understand and analyze our current reality, as individuals and organizations; […]
Transforming to an End-to-End Operating Model with a Whole System Technology
As Dr. Goldratt has pointed out, a technology is only of use when it removes a limitation. Here in Part 7 of this series, Dr. Domenico Lepore introduces the journey that led to a new technology for transformation. Our Journey: Ess3ntial My partners and I were not born digital; let’s say we all have vivid […]