Guest post by John Hunter, author of Management Matters: Building Enterprise Capability. Data can provide insight or be used to mislead. When looking at data, you need to critically think about how you could be misled. One of the things you learn as a scientist is the ability to look at a plot and think, […]

Guest post by John Hunter, founder of CuriousCat.com. It is wonderful to listen to Ackoff discuss how to tackle challenging problems. We could create so much value by following the guidance of Dr. Ackoff and Dr. Deming in our organizations and by applying that thinking to the larger problems our societies face. We need to […]

Guest post by John Hunter, author of the Curious Cat Management Improvement Blog (since 2004). In order to build strong companies that are resilient and able to prosper even in challenging times, it is best to create reliable and robust systems. It is easy to be misled by what is flashy if we don’t think […]

Guest Post by Dr. Doug Stilwell, Assistant Professor, Educational Leadership, Drake University. Over the past couple of years, I have been informally researching the relationship between the food we eat and our health. Over the course of my learning, I have made a connection with  organizational effectiveness. At first blush, this may seem like quite […]

Guest post by John Hunter, author of Management Matters: Building Enterprise Capability. The Plan Do Study Act improvement cycle is a valuable method to maximize learning and catalyze improvement. See our Deming on Management: PDSA cycle resource page for many more details than are covered here. Here I will just provide four ideas to keep […]

Guest post by John Hunter, founder of CuriousCat.com. Dr. Deming called for the elimination of the annual performance appraisal. This post, part of our Deming on Management series, provides some resources to help those getting started in transforming their management system to one based on Deming’s management ideas. This topic is one that is difficult […]

Guest post by John Hunter, author of the Curious Cat Management Improvement Blog (since 2004). Over time, I have learned that one of the challenges in implementing Deming and Ackoff’s ideas are the underlying expectations for the organizations that are missing. What happens is, people take ideas from Ackoff and Deming and decide that using […]

Guest Post by Liz Schupp, German Teacher, Waukee High School and Educational Leadership Graduate Student of Dr. Doug Stilwell, Drake University. Best efforts are essential when they are guided by principles backed in research and focused on continual improvement. When we simply do our best without what Deming refers to as a system of profound knowledge, we aren’t going to make meaningful improvements.

Guest post by John Hunter, founder of CuriousCat.com. Many lessons have been learned during the last year as the pandemic caused havoc with our lives and economy. During this time, we found new ways of operating our business that would have likely been deemed impossible before. As we return to more normal lives, as vaccines […]

Guest post by John Hunter, author of the Curious Cat Management Improvement Blog (since 2004). Dr. Walter Shewhart developed the control chart in the 1920s while working for Bell Telephone. The text of the memo that including the image of the control chart: A few days ago, you mentioned some of the problems connected with […]