Guest post by John Hunter, author of the Curious Cat Management Improvement Blog (since 2004).
This is the fourth post in our Deming on Management series. This series provides resources for those interested in learning more about particular topics related to W. Edwards Deming’s ideas on management. Previous series posts provided resources on the PDSA cycle, psychology and the red bead experiment.
Appreciation for a system is one of the four aspects of Deming’s System of Profound Knowledge (SoPK). In an earlier short post on this blog, I provided a short introduction to appreciation for a system within the Deming context.
Over the that last seven years we have added many blog posts and videos related to this topic. The links here share thoughts that will help provide a deeper appreciation for systems in the Deming context.
Blog posts
- 94% Belongs to the System – “the system that people work in and the interaction with people may account for 90 or 95 percent of performance.” W. Edwards Deming
- Drawing Lines
- Distorting the System, Distorting the Data or Improving the System
- Optimize the Overall System Not the Individual Components
- Standardization With a Systems View Allows Creativity to Flourish
- Are you a systems thinker?
- Systems Thinking: Feedback Loops
- Circle of Influence
- Eliminate Sales Commissions: Reject Theory X Management and Embrace Systems Thinking
- The Trouble with Incentives is that They Work
- The Degree of Interdependence
- What to think when things do not add up…
- Educate New Managers on Their New Responsibilities
- How to Transform the Management System of an Organization
Articles
- Systems Thinking and the Three Musketeers by Eric Christiansen
- A Lifetime of Systems Thinking by Russell L. Ackoff
- So What’s System[s] Thinking by Ian Bradbury
- All models are wrong: reflections on becoming a systems scientist by John Sterman
- From Mechanistic to Social Systemic Thinking by Russell L. Ackoff and Kellie Wardman
- The Learning Organization: From Vision to Reality by Margaret Wheatley and Peter Senge
Webcasts
- Deming 101: Understanding Systems
- Ackoff on Systems Thinking and Management
- Applying Quality as a Business Strategy at Hallmark Building Supplies
- Dr. Russell Ackoff Webcast on Systems Thinking
- The System of Profound Knowledge Applied to Sales and Marketing
- Peter Senge on Systems Thinking
- Transforming Jet-Hot by Viewing the Organization as a System
Books
- The Fifth Discipline by Peter Senge
- The Symphony of Profound Knowledge by Ed Baker
- Systems Thinking for Curious Managers by Russell Ackoff
- The New Economics by W. Edwards Deming
- Leadership and the New Science by Margaret Wheatley
- Thinking in Systems: A Primer by Donella H. Meadows
- The Essential Deming
- Beating the System: Using Creativity to Outsmart Bureaucracies by Russell L. Ackoff and Sheldon Rovin
Want more?
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