Stop believing your own dashboards โ๐พ
Especially if they are made for YOU... To truly see the problem, you must physically break your cognitive filters and go talk to the people on the ground.
It is not a coincidence that dysfunctional organizations have "leadership dashboards" that are separate from the dashboards that people on the ground see. There'd be an army of people just for building those dashboards and the data on them gets "massaged", "rounded up", "scope limited", "exception approved", through various layers before the top executive sees it sitting in an air conditioned board roam.
What there are seeing is an abstraction of an abstraction of an abstraction... (you get the idea).
Taiichi Ohno's Genchi Genbutsu ("Go to the actual place and see the actual thing") demands that leaders stop relying on abstraction. But, you can't go there with your "board room" attitude. Ohno deeply understood that our brains filter reality, making it impossible to see problems when looking "right-side up."
This is proven outside the factory floor by art teachers. Here is an excerpt from Harish Jose and Venkatesh Krishnamurthy's latest book, 'Connecting the Dots...' (
leanpub.com/connecting-the-dโฆ) :
โ... when we go to the gemba with preconceived notions, we miss what is right in front of us. If we arrive already armed with the wrong answer, we will not ask the right questions. We must approach the gemba with a fresh mind and limited preconceptions.
Betty Edwards demonstrates this powerfully in her work on drawing education. When she gave students the assignment to copy a Picasso work, the results disappointed her. In a flash of insight, she hung the painting upside down and asked the students to copy it again. ๐๐๐ ๐ช๐ฅ๐จ๐๐๐-๐๐ค๐ฌ๐ฃ ๐๐ค๐ฅ๐๐๐จ ๐ฌ๐๐ง๐ ๐๐ง๐๐ข๐๐ฉ๐๐๐๐ก๐ก๐ฎ ๐๐๐ฉ๐ฉ๐๐ง ๐ฉ๐๐๐ฃ ๐ฉ๐๐ ๐ง๐๐๐๐ฉ-๐จ๐๐๐-๐ช๐ฅ ๐ซ๐๐ง๐จ๐๐ค๐ฃ๐จ. Turning the painting upside down changed how the students โsawโโtheir brains stopped interfering with their perception, allowing them to draw what was actually there rather than what they thought should be there.
As Edwards explains, the efficient left brain says, โIt is a chair, I tell you. That is enough to know. Here is a ready-made symbol for you.โ ๐ฝ๐ช๐ฉ ๐ฉ๐ค ๐ฉ๐ง๐ช๐ก๐ฎ ๐จ๐๐, ๐ฌ๐ ๐ข๐ช๐จ๐ฉ ๐จ๐๐ฉ ๐๐จ๐๐๐ ๐ค๐ช๐ง ๐ช๐จ๐ช๐๐ก ๐ซ๐๐ง๐๐๐ก ๐๐๐ฉ๐๐๐ค๐ง๐๐ฏ๐๐ฃ๐ ๐๐ฃ๐ ๐ฉ๐ช๐ง๐ฃ ๐ค๐ช๐ง ๐๐ช๐ก๐ก ๐ซ๐๐จ๐ช๐๐ก ๐๐ฉ๐ฉ๐๐ฃ๐ฉ๐๐ค๐ฃ ๐ฉ๐ค ๐ฌ๐๐๐ฉ ๐ฌ๐ ๐๐ง๐ ๐ฅ๐๐ง๐๐๐๐ซ๐๐ฃ๐...โ
Your weekly reports, aggregated metrics, and beautifully crafted dashboards are the "right-side-up" version. They show you what your "efficient left brain" thinks should be there, not the raw reality of the Gemba (where value is created).
When a project is stuck, leaders must practice the art of turning the Picasso upside down. Go beyond the fancy dashboard and powerpoint presentations. This is how you discover the waste (Muda) that data hides.
#GenchiGenbutsu #DataDriven #Leadership #GoSee #ShowRespect