Blog posts on respect for people

Posts selected fromManagement Blog - Engineering Blog - Investing Blog and other blogs

• What Motivates Programmers?

  ...I will repeat my statement for all managers for all employees: your job is to eliminate de-motivation not to motivate.

  If you really want to manage programmers well, read these blogs and take action to prevent yourself from becoming a pointy haired boss: Signal vs. Noise – Joel on Software – Paul Graham – Coding Horror – Scripting News – xkcd

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• Giving and Accepting Advice and Feedback

  If the core issue the person raises with feedback is something you should address, do so. Don't have how your respond determined by how successfully they gave feedback.

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• Early "Lean" Thinking

  Here are some early reports (so early it preceded the lean terms widespread use). It also means the focus hasn't already been set by the Machine that Changed the World but it is the same stuff that those that studied in 1980, 1990, 2000 or 2013 saw - it is more about respect for people and using everyone's brain than any specific tool. And these articles have a bit more focus on using statistics and data than much of lean literature today (partially because George Box and Dad were statisticians and partially, in my opinion, because current lean literature is light on using data).

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• Debate Should be Encouraged – Calling Judgement “Extremely Paternalistic” is Normally Unwise

  I also think it is sensible to object to payday loans in the USA. You could make the same argument that such an attitude is paternalistic...

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• Peter Drucker Discussing The Work of Juran, Deming and Himself

  Drucker talked about the shared importance he, Deming and Juran put on the importance of valuing all employees and creating management systems that capture all the value they can offer. He spoke of all 3 of them tilted against those that believed in command and control business organizations. Sadly the lack of respect for all workers is still common today; but it is much better than is was due to the work of these 3 management experts.

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• Take Advantage of the Strengths Each Person Brings to Work

  Managers should be setting up the organization to take maximum advantage of the strengths of the people in the organization while minimizing the impact of weaknesses.

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• Stupid Bureaucratic Requirement

  Is it really unquestioningly doing whatever you are told that is the value that is what is being aimed for? Seems pretty clear to me from even this short article this teacher understands the constitution much better than most people and cares enough to take the values that constitution endorses seriously. While the government looks like they only care about getting their form on file and don’t care at all what the purpose of that form is (the purpose can’t really be just to coerce everyone to sign it, can it?).

  ...

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• Alternative Career Paths Attract Many Women in Science Fields

  The challenge of how to maximize the opportunities for those interested in careers in science, technology, engineering and math is important to all economies. There are difficulties in doing this and so continued focus on this area is good. My personal belief is we focus too much on the gender issue. Yes, we should reduce discrimination. I think we have done well but still have further to go.

  Most of the suggested changes in how things should be done help women and also plenty of men that are turned off by the old way of doing things.

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• Helping Others

  I have long used TrickleUp, Kiva and Global Giving to help (and they each do a good job of engaging donors (tugging on their heartstrings and making them happy to give).

  I try to give back to the places I visit. So I integrate this into my digital nomad life. As with many digital nomads I have an affinity for entrepreneurs and my charity often focuses on helping them (Global Giving does other things too – such as providing clean water, electricity, education and training…).

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• Patient Centered Doesn't Mean Patient Directed

  We need to have systems that are patient focused but that doesn’t mean patients dictate treatment. And we need to see a much wider system than we normally do. We need to be focused on healthy living not just disease treatment. And given the mess that is the USA health care system we need to focus on reducing the burden of coping with the horrible USA health system bureaucracy - that system does great damage to those having to deal with it (and it is nearly all waste that shouldn't be creating such hardship).

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• Influential Women in the Field of Quality Management

  Joyce Orsini and Gipsie Ranney have done lots of good stuff. So has Clare Crawford Mason.
  
  Gertrude Mary Cox isn't known so much for "quality" as statistics but she was an impressive person and a generation or two ahead of others (and it really is related to quality).
  
  Mary Poppendieck has really good stuff at the intersection of quality and software development.
  
  Meg Wheatley...

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• If Japan Can... Why Cant We? – 1980 NBC Special Report

  When this was broadcast 35 years ago there was an immediate demand by business to learn and apply Deming’s ideas. It is hard to understand how great an impact it had, from our current position.

  ...

  Throughout “If Japan Can, Why Cant We?” executives and front line workers talk about how important it is to involve workers in improvement efforts.

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• Using The Building of Robots to Engage Students in Learning

  Fundi bots has a mission to use robotics training in African schools to create and inspire a new generation of problem solvers, innovators and change-makers. I believe strongly in this type of effort. We waste so much human potential by killing students design to learn. Instead we need to create systems that not only don’t kill that desire but allow it to flourish.

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• Exploitation or Economic Support as a Tourist?

  People can still argue about the benefits and costs of chasing tourist money but when there are significant economic benefits that the people actually get (that are not taken by others) it is very hard for me to say it is wrong.
  
  I do get a bit annoyed at people from rich countries that downplay the importance of money. It is easy to say other things are more important when you have lots of cash.
  
  And that brings me back to a specific point about the quote "must be a very exhausting existence for them." While this may be true it doesn't mean that they would be better off without being bothered. It may well be without the botheration of tourists things would be even worse.

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• Challenging Conventional Thinking

  RA Fisher was an outspoken person and not easy to get along with. Being difficult to get along with isn't uncommon for people that do great things - I suspect those that are willing to subsume their opinion to make those around them more comfortable are less likely to find incredible breakthroughs.
  
  Of course you can free your mind from the constraints of conventional thinking while being very friendly and sociable and likeable, it just seems to me not uncommon for people willing to challenge intellectual orthodoxy are also willing to challenge the thinking that social niceties are of utmost importance. They would be more able to win over more people more quickly with behavior based on "you catch more bees honey..." but that seems less common.

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