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My guest for Episode #529 of the Lean Blog Interviews Podcast is Scott Gauvin, CEO of Macresco and co-creator of the Respect for People Roadmap.
With 30 years of experience leading operational transformations across sectors including biotech, pharma, agriculture, and manufacturing, Scott brings both a systems mindset and a people-first philosophy to his work. His journey into Lean began with frustration over leadership that blamed people rather than fixing systems–sparking a personal quest to better integrate continuous improvement with what he calls the “practice” of respect for people.
In this episode, Scott shares the evolution of his thinking and how it culminated in the Respect for People Roadmap, a structured learning experience designed to operationalize cultural change through nine actionable behaviors. We explore the difference between “respecting people” as an individual action and “respect for people” as a system-level design principle. Scott also challenges the common notion that respect must be earned, arguing instead that every human being is inherently worthy of it–an idea rooted in his research on Confucian influences within Toyota's founding culture.
This conversation is a must-listen for anyone struggling to move beyond Lean tools and truly build a culture of continuous improvement grounded in human dignity. We also touch on how these ideas align with the Shingo Model, why so many transformations fail to stick, and how organizations can design systems that scale respect–without waiting for permission from the top. Check the links below to learn more and access Scott's free “test drive” version of the Roadmap.
Questions, Notes, and Highlights:
- What's your origin story with Lean and operational excellence?
- What drew you to explore the “respect for people” pillar more deeply?
- How do you distinguish between “respect for people” and “respecting people”?
- Why do so many interpretations of “respect” default to hierarchy or politeness?
- How should leaders approach differences in how individuals define respect?
- Is it a mistake to assume respect must be earned rather than given?
- What are your thoughts on the phrase “better to be respected than liked”?
- How do challenge, kaizen, and respect interrelate in Toyota thinking?
- What did your research uncover about Confucianism's influence on Lean?
- How does the concept of “respect for people” show up in system design?
- What inspired the creation of the Respect for People Roadmap?
- What are the three key behavioral principles embedded in the Roadmap?
- What makes this program scalable and sustainable across organizations?
- Why was it important that the nine behaviors require no leader permission?
- How do you respond to the idea that “respect for people” should be translated as “respect for humanity”?
- Are you looking to pilot the Roadmap in healthcare settings?
- What would transformation look like if it were truly resilient–not dependent on a single leader
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Full Video of the Episode:
Recent Webinar by Scott (via KaiNexus):
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Key Quotes:
“Respect for people is very different from respecting people–it's not a reaction, it's a design.”
“If I believe you have potential and I don't challenge you to grow, that's actually a form of disrespect.”
“Culture is just how we behave consistently. When people show up differently, culture changes.”
“Real respect shouldn't require permission–it should be built into how we work together every day.”
“At Toyota, they don't stop when a solution works for the customer. They keep going until it works for everyone.”
3 Actionable Takeaways from the Episode
Strive for Mutual Benefit Across All Stakeholders
One of Scott's insights from Toyota was their focus on creating solutions that mutually benefit customers, employees, the company, and other stakeholders. Listeners can adopt this mindset by ensuring that solutions cater to the interests of all parties involved, rather than optimizing for one at the expense of others. This can be implemented by rigorously evaluating the impact of business decisions on all stakeholders before moving forward.
Foster a Culture of Curiosity and Support
Scott Gauvin emphasized the importance of seeing behaviors objectively and supporting individuals to address issues rather than making assumptions. As he observed from his experiences at Toyota, a culture that gets curious about behaviors and supports individuals in addressing them is more effective. Listeners can implement this by encouraging open dialogue and curiosity in their teams, as opposed to jumping to conclusions.
Value the Entirety of the Individual's Experience
Scott highlights how at Toyota, the entirety of a person's experience, such as personal life achievements or diverse travel, contributes to the organization's effectiveness. To apply this, team leaders should explore ways to incorporate and value their team members' diverse backgrounds and experiences into the decision-making and problem-solving processes.
Automated Transcript (Not Guaranteed to be Defect Free)
Mark Graban: Hi, welcome to Lean Blog Interviews. I'm your host, Mark Graban. Our guest today is Scott Gauvin. He's the CEO of Macresco, a firm that helps organizations unlock their full potential through strategic operations and organizational alignment. Scott has more than 20 years of experience leading performance transformations in a wide range of industries: pharma, biotech, consumer goods, medical devices, agriculture, industrial manufacturing, and more. Before founding Macresco, Scott started his career in technology focusing on systems design and architecture, and later worked as a business management consultant. He has a BA from the University of Massachusetts, an MBA from Boston University, and is a certified Six Sigma Black Belt. He's also the creator of what he calls the Respect for People Roadmap, which will be a big part of our topic for this episode. Scott, welcome to the podcast. How are you?
Scott Gauvin: I'm great. Thanks, Mark, for having me here.
Scott's Background and Macresco's Origins
Mark Graban: A lot of Boston in your bio. Boston area, born and raised. Is that right?
Scott Gauvin: Yeah. Originally from Boston, actually, for some people who live in the Boston area might know Lowell. I grew up in Lowell, kind of the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution in many ways. But I moved out to LA about 10 years ago, so I now reside in LA, even though I still root for the Red Sox.
Mark Graban: And you still sound like a Red Sox fan.
Scott Gauvin: I think that's good.
Mark Graban: I was going to ask about the name of your company, Macresco.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah, Macresco. More than 20 years ago, we started that. My background is in operations management. As I was doing more and more of that and decided to hang my own shingle, I said, “Okay, I want to do lean, but didn't want to have this very generic-sounding business name.” So I did a search and found out that Macresco is actually a Latin word that means ‘to become lean.' So I said that's the name of the company, Macresco.
Mark Graban: So we're not saying the history of lean management goes back that far, but it sounds like a pretty direct translation: “to become lean.”
Scott Gauvin: Exactly. I think the direct translation is probably more about becoming thin, but we extrapolated from that.
The Genesis of Scott's Lean Journey
Mark Graban: Yeah, no, it makes sense. And I think we're on the same page about what lean management means. So, the opportunity to learn a little bit more about your background with all of this. As I tend to ask everyone on the show, what's your origin story when it comes to Lean or operational excellence? That usually points to a little bit of the terminology that you first got introduced to. But what's your story?
Scott Gauvin: I worked for a guy who wasn't a great boss, and we'd do a lot of work for clients. He'd say, “You know, we do great work, we build great processes, but it's these really dumb people that keep screwing it up.” I was young at the time, in my early 20s, so I didn't know any better. But it just never quite resonated with me.
Mark Graban: Sure.
Scott Gauvin: Then, through the course of just having different mentors, I got involved with an organization where I really got to experiment a lot more. In that experimenting, I started to realize that a lot of these people we're trying to help actually have some really great ideas, and they're just constrained. And so that really got me more interested in what this Lean thing was.
I voraciously started reading books and talking to anybody who knew anything about Lean, just asking them about it. Through a little bit of osmosis, a little bit of self-learning, then I took whatever class I could take, got involved with AME, and met a lot of people through AME. So I had a lot of people who helped shape and craft my understanding of what Lean was. I will say, though, I didn't completely understand it as well as I do today. I think I was doing the typical continuous improvement work, and it was a project, actually, that I did where I was in China, France, Germany, Mexico, and then all over the US and several other countries. I started bumping into the culture thing, and I started realizing, “Oh, the way we're approaching things isn't quite working.” And that's what really sparked my interest in understanding, going back to Lean and saying, “Okay, what was this thing again?” And realizing the model really had two pillars: Continuous Improvement and Respect for People.
Mark Graban: Right.
Scott Gauvin: I started poking at the Respect for People pillar, but everything I read was hierarchical. It was what leaders should do for employees: how you give them autonomy, how you resource them, how you train them, how you develop them–what leaders should do for employees. And that didn't quite resonate with me. Is Respect for People just a pillar? Is it just a leadership thing? So I started to really try to understand that. I started doing a lot more research, and 12 years later, I've come to understand that Respect for People is very different than Respecting People. So what I was trying to do over the last several years is integrate the practice of continuous improvement with the practice of respect for people. And that's kind of where I'm at today. My evolution of my Lean practice was very continuous improvement, process-focused. Now I'm trying to find the holistic element of continuous improvement and respect for people together.
The Nuance of Disrespectful Behavior
Mark Graban: Yeah, yeah. And we'll certainly unpack a lot of that here in the episode today. I think it's interesting that, going back to the part of the story you shared about that one mindset not resonating with you, I think of methods and mindsets as intertwined. It's possible somebody could be teaching Lean methods while missing some of those mindsets of blaming or belittling people, or not understanding one aspect of our human nature: we get distracted, we get fatigued. Instead of just punishing or blaming people for that, we can design systems to protect not just the customers, but to protect the people working in the process.
Scott Gauvin: Right, right, right. Yeah. And, you know, I had a lot of experiences where it's not even just we get fatigued, but we can have things that happen in our lives that activate us, mentally or emotionally. I remember working with some managers who, by and large, were good people, but every once in a while, they'd do things or say things that make you cock your head sideways a little bit. I remember several times thinking, “You know, I know they're a good person because I've played golf with them, I've gone to dinner with them, and I know they really care for people, but when they show up at work, man, they're really mean.” Trying to unpack that and really understand what was going on behind that. That really started to help me think about, well, there's the process side, the method side, but then there's the mindset side. How are they thinking about the people they're interacting with? And is the Lean work I'm supposed to be doing here helping them with that, or is it just fixing the process? And that's where things started to bump into each other and meld together in some ways.
Mark Graban: Yeah, you raise a point that makes me think and reflect. Nowadays people talk a lot about bringing your authentic self to work, being able to be your authentic self. And, you know, I've written and talked a little bit about one of the fairly senior leaders, probably the number two guy at the plant I worked at almost 30 years ago now, General Motors. This guy seemed like a jerk. He yelled and screamed and belittled people and chastised people. He didn't do a lot to help; he just liked to yell, it seemed. And I had my mind made up. I'm thinking, “Oh, this is a bad guy.” But, at one point during that two-year stint there, I was out with some friends and I was mortified that here was this guy in the same restaurant. He was old enough, I think there were probably three generations of his family there at a big table. And I'm like, it seems like everyone loves this guy, like out-of-work Bob is maybe somebody that I might have actually liked. And he sent a couple drinks over to the table for us, the nicest gesture I had ever seen from him. But I got a chance to talk to him at one point where the yelling and the screaming, that might not have been his authentic self as I had originally thought, that it was almost an expectation of like, “Well, it all rolls downhill. I get yelled at and I'm expected to pass it on.” We didn't get to dive too deeply into all of that, but that was a bit of a wake-up call of like, maybe he wasn't his authentic self.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah. And, you know, that experience you had of him, you had one experience, that experience of him at work, but then now all of a sudden you have an experience with him outside of work and you're seeing a different person. So now you're seeing more of the full person. Maybe that allows you to then maybe engage with him a little differently. And I've seen so many times where, whether it's just an employee or it's a leader in an organization, they've got some persona that has been created either by themselves or by someone else. And that is how people engage with that person. There's no consideration outside of that persona that has been given to them as to that they might be something different or that they might even want to be something different. And I remember working with a supervisor once and a very similar story where he was told, “Well, you know, I'm expected to make sure that everyone is doing what they're supposed to do.” And he had no training in being a supervisor, so he just thought, “Well, my supervisor used to just berate us. So I guess that's what supervisors are supposed to do.” And it wasn't until we had some time to spend with him and say, “You know, there's another way you can do this.” And he's like, “Oh, this way is much better.” And he actually appreciated learning that there is a better way to do it.
Mark Graban: Yeah.
Scott Gauvin: But all he knew was how he was treated. And so he just carried that forward. And I think that happens so often in so many organizations, unfortunately.
Defining Respect: Shared Understanding
Mark Graban: Yeah. And, you know, the other part of your story that reminded me of my younger self was that I kind of rejected what was being modeled in terms of behavior. And I had other people in the organization coaching me about how leaders. Because GM at that point had hired people in from other companies, like out of Toyota's supply chain. And, I had people I could talk to, and they're like, “Yeah, that's not optimal. The way he's acting. Don't take that in as something that you should be emulating because it's ineffective.” And, boy, our results at the time certainly showed that. But, you know, I want to ask you about. We're going to talk a lot about words here and like respect as a noun, respecting as a verb. How do you compare, like, first off, the word respect and, I guess the opposite is disrespect or how do you define those words?
Scott Gauvin: Yeah, well, you know, respect is often thought of as the way that you engage with someone, which is polite, kind, and generous, whereas disrespect is just the opposite: not being kind, not being considerate, not being careful with how you're engaging with someone. So when you think about when someone is respectful, you have almost an expectation that they're going to be kind and generous with you. The problem, I think, with the word respect is we use it for a lot of different things. Like, “I respect that,” you know, “I respect you,” and we mean it to mean, “I appreciate you.” Or, “I respect what you've done there,” means that I have an appreciation of the work that you've done. So we often use the word respect to mean a lot of different things. And so there's some conflating that I think sometimes happens with that word. Depending on the person, just about everybody's going to have a slightly different version of what they think respect is. And not only that, but then when we think about respect in our environments, we all think that we show up more respectfully than most people experience us. So, what I think is respectful, maybe you don't think is respectful. For example, in a meeting, if I pull up my phone and you're giving a presentation, and I start looking at my phone, you might feel that that's disrespectful. Whereas there might be others in the organization who are like, “Well, no, that's what needs to happen. He needs to make sure that he's staying in touch.” So we don't always have a shared understanding of what respect is. And so it can mean something different for everybody.
Mark Graban: So is it incumbent on a leader then to try to understand within their team different people's definitions of respect, whether that's based on generational, cultural aspects, or other factors? I mean, it sounds like it would be a mistake to assume everyone would look at the same behaviors with the same, I guess, judgment around the level of respect that's involved. What can leaders, or even individuals within a team, do? Is it a matter of just trying to take feedback or talk to people and have conversations about how we categorize respectful behaviors?
Scott Gauvin: Yeah, well, I think there needs to be a shared understanding, especially in a work environment or in a team environment, a shared understanding of what we mean by respect. Part of that is having those conversations. Part of that is sharing different stories. One of the exercises I like to do with teams is, “Can you share some experiences of when you felt disrespected?”
Mark Graban: Ah, right.
Scott Gauvin: And so, as a team, as we're developing as a team, we share those stories and someone says, “Really? You feel that's disrespectful?” And then also there's an insight or an understanding of, “Oh, yeah, they think about it differently than I think about it.” And so then we start to coalesce around a more common shared understanding of what respect is. And then we actually talk about, “Okay, is showing up late disrespectful?” Some people say no, some people say no, you can show up late to my meetings. I don't mind.
Mark Graban: Yeah.
Scott Gauvin: So, as a group, how are we going to respect each other? Okay, we agree that we're not going to show up late, or that if you're showing up more than five minutes late, then that's disrespectful. But you've got to come to that kind of shared understanding. And because there is such a range of expectations and understanding around what respect is.
Mark Graban: And I think it would be a mistake for, let's say if somebody gave feedback and they did the whole, “When you come late to the meeting, I feel disrespected.” It would be a mistake to say, “Well, you shouldn't,” or “You shouldn't feel like that's disrespectful.” I mean, I think there's a life lesson of trying to tell people how they should feel just isn't helpful or effective.
Scott Gauvin: Right. Because again, what is okay for me might not be okay for you. So a behavior that we exchange, we're going to have different interpretations, different understandings, and because of our life experiences and our orientations and our value systems, we're going to come to a different understanding or expectation around those things. So as a group, as a team, as an organization, having that shared understanding is valuable to do.
Mark Graban: Yeah. And, you know, it's probably a better response if somebody were to say that they think certain words or behavior are disrespectful. I think you raised a good point a couple of minutes ago that may identify a gap between how we think we're coming across versus the actual perception, at least for that individual. And probably better to lean in and to be inquisitive instead of attacking that person for reacting or feeling the way they did.
Scott Gauvin: Right. Yeah. And so, you know, if you come to my meeting late and I don't like that, I might classify that as being disrespectful. But that's really, I'm judging your behavior in that moment. And so, okay, how do I step back from that judgment and just share my experience of that and say, “Hey, Mark, when you come to my meeting late, it makes me feel like what I have to say isn't important.” And so that's my experience of that behavior.
Mark Graban: Yeah.
Scott Gauvin: And I don't think that you mean to do that, but I want to have this conversation so that we can make sure that I'm not having that experience and you understand how I'm experiencing your behavior.
Mark Graban: Yeah.
Scott Gauvin: And that's a more fruitful conversation. But if I say, “Well, you're being disrespectful,” now I'm putting that on you. And now you have to react to that and you're feeling judged, so you're going to get defensive. That conversation isn't going to go really in a positive direction.
Mark Graban: Yeah. And that's where I think that framing, and I think it comes from counseling and other settings of “when you do this, I feel this way.” Because saying “I feel this way” is a statement of fact.
Scott Gauvin: Right.
Mark Graban: As opposed to, yeah, like you said, that argumentative, “Scott, you're being disrespectful.” Was it going to be a natural reaction to say, “Well, no, I'm not,” and then how much progress are we really going to make?
Scott Gauvin: Right. And then also, you don't have to own how I feel. I'm sharing how I feel. And it's not your fault that I feel that way. There's a whole pile of things that go on inside me. That is why I'm coming to this. But I want to share with you, “Okay, hey, this behavior or this activity, this activates me in this way.”
Mark Graban: Yeah.
Scott Gauvin: And I don't want to be activated. I'm asking for help. That's essentially what the outreach is: asking for help. “Hey, can you help me here?”
Respect, Likeability, and Challenge
Mark Graban: Yeah, yeah. There are some other phrases that come to mind. It might be worth hearing your reactions to or digging into a little bit. People often say, “Oh, as a leader, it's better to be respected than to be liked.” What are your thoughts on that one?
Scott Gauvin: “Better to be respected than to be liked.” Well, I think that being liked is an ego element. Being respected is shared values.
Mark Graban: Al.
Scott Gauvin: And so you may not like the things that I say or maybe the decisions that I've made. And that's okay. You don't necessarily need to like those things. But respect means that there's a mutuality of how we're going to engage with each other. We've got almost a contract of how we've agreed to communicate, collaborate, and work with each other. And so I don't know that people maybe think about it that way, that, you know, hey, I want to respect the contract that we've got and if that means that you don't like something I've said or done, I'm okay with that, as long as we honor the contract that we've got on how we're going to engage with each other.
Mark Graban: Yeah. And I mean, I think, one more positive framing of that difference of, you know, respected versus liked, the word challenge comes to mind. Right. So, from what I've read from Toyota people, when they talk about words that seem to be very interconnected, you know, respect, Kaizen, and challenge in the name of wanting to improve and needing to improve for the customers, the business, for the employees, because I respect you as a team and I believe that you can contribute to improvement, that you can be excellent, I'm going to challenge you or even push you to do better. And some people, in a way, might not like that.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah.
Mark Graban: In a way, unless it's a culture where, like, yes, that is normal. I know the boss is challenging me not because they disrespect me, but because they respect me. How do you see those concepts connecting?
Scott Gauvin: Yeah. So I've come to understand this in a little bit deeper way. In my research of looking at Respect for People, it led me down a very deep hole of looking at Toyota and Ohno and trying to understand where they were coming from. One area that I explored was that they were both students of Confucianism. So when I started to understand a little bit more about what that was, there are a couple elements that stand out. One is that students of Confucianism believe that people are inherently good and inherently want to do good. So you can see that, well, if people want to do good, if they're not doing good, then, well, what got in the way? So now it strikes an automatic curiosity, like, “Okay, what's going on here?” The second is that they believe that people are infinitely improvable and upgradable. And so if that's true, if there's infinite opportunity for you to become better and I am not challenging you, then that's almost a sign of disrespect because I'm not helping you to achieve your highest potential. Right. And if I'm not doing that, then I'm derelict almost in my responsibilities as a leader or as a mentor. So it's incumbent on me to continue to challenge you, to continue to grow, to continue and to evolve to your highest potential as opposed to “I'm challenging you.” It's not a disrespect. It's actually a high respect that you have such potential that it's my responsibility to help you to achieve that potential.
Mark Graban: Yeah, yeah. Because if someone thought you were hopeless, they would stop trying to help you improve.
Scott Gauvin: Right. Well, and in fact, we see this often where someone may have a group of people: “Oh, well, they're just fill-in-the-blank,” give them whatever their title is, as if that's all that they could be. And this idea that people are infinite in their ability to grow and improve debunks that just because that's where they are today doesn't mean that's where they have to be or where they will be tomorrow or a year from now. Yeah. So.
Mark Graban: Yeah, yeah. And, you know, I'm having flashbacks now to disrespectful things I heard or things I viewed as disrespectful in a General Motors environment of, you know, someone like, “Oh, well, they're just an operator.” Like, that's a really disrespectful thing to say. Or, somebody sadly might throw language like that around in a hospital. It tends to be really hierarchical. And unfortunately, sometimes that translates into things that I observe as being disrespectful, that you don't have the right letters after your name, you don't have the right education, so you're just such and such. Whereas I think the Kaizen mindset would have us embrace that everybody in their role in their job has this, I think, innate human ability to improve their work.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah, right. Yeah. Not only improve their work, but improve themselves and their capabilities and their understanding and knowledge, and their contributions. I think that's one of the beautiful things that the Toyota culture has cultivated is that there's no limit for anybody in the organization. It is just a matter of practice and time as opposed to your station in life, wherever you start, that doesn't limit you.
Mark Graban: Yeah. And there's one that I've reacted to a couple times recently, talking with people about the application of process behavior charts or SPC concepts into metrics, even down at the shop floor level. I heard people say, “We can't do that. We've got to keep it simple. The operators are never going to understand SPC.” I'm like, “Oh, come on!” Again, like a 30-year flashback to the General Motors story. The people working on the shop floor might not have known the formulas, but they understood SPC charts and they were updating the charts. They knew even more intuitively what it meant for something to be out of control process-wise. We were looking at manufacturing measures, not the hour-by-hour production numbers. You can apply SPC to any of those systems and their outputs. But I'm like, that just sounds disrespectful when someone says, “Oh, they'll never, we can't, they won't understand.” I don't share that hypothesis.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah, no, I completely agree with you. I'm always surprised at the concepts I'm sharing with people and the depth that people can go, because we've got these frameworks in our head of, “Oh, well, they work in this department or they work in that area or they are whatever their title is.” So we artificially put these constraints around people. I can share with you a story. I remember working for this agriculture company, and there was a tractor driver who would come to our stand-ups, always had these really great insights. I mean, just like, “Wow, where did that come from?” We had this program, it was part of a leadership development program. And I said, “Hey, I think you should put him in the program.” And they were like, “Well, he's just a tractor driver. He just sprays chemicals at night.” I was like, “I'm telling you, can you just appease me here? And can you put him in? It's my mulligan if it doesn't go well.” And they put him in. Let me tell you, that guy today…
Mark Graban: Yeah.
Scott Gauvin: Is running the farm operation side of that business. Wow. I mean, just, yeah. A really insightful guy, a thinker about things, would really think through problems and had really creative solutions. All he needed was just a little bit of formal training. He came from a really hard knock life, didn't finish high school, so he just got a job driving a tractor, but had such potential. When we were able to put him in an environment where he could start to build on that potential, not even five years later, he was managing the whole farm side of that organization. The guy who was running that part of the organization wanted to retire, and there was no one who could take his place. And this guy came in and was able to do that. Just remarkable.
Respect: Earned or Given?
Mark Graban: That, that's great. So, yeah, I'd invite anyone. We'll move on from this point. But I'm thinking of the unfortunately disrespectful things that people might say in the context of doing continuous improvement work or Lean work. “They're just a so-and-so.” That would be regrettable and cringeworthy. I'll invite people if they want to comment on the blog post to this episode, if they have an example of something that was said or done during Lean Work that was unfortunately disrespectful in your view, add it as a comment. You can do so anonymously without leaving your name. Or you can email me at mark@markgraban.org, that might merit a follow-up post. And I'll go out of my way if you say don't use my name or company. I won't. But one other thing I wanted to ask you before moving on. Talk a little more about the Respect for People Roadmap and approaches. One thing I've disagreed with people on, I've heard some people that are in a camp who say quite directly, “Nobody deserves my respect. It has to be earned.” I'm more in the camp of, “Well, respect is something to be given to show respect.” And you made me think of this when you talked about this view of: do you view people as being inherently good and therefore by being human, deserving respect? Or, “Oh, you have to prove yourself to me.”
Scott Gauvin: Yeah, I would very much be in the camp of because you are human, you are deserving of respect. In fact, there's a great little TEDx video that I sometimes use in our training, and it was a student who gave this, and she makes this point, and she says, “So, okay, so someone has to earn your respect? So your newborn baby has to earn your respect?” And that's so ridiculous, right?
Mark Graban: No, baby might be a little jerk, right?
Scott Gauvin: I mean, so yes, your newborn baby is deserving because of its humanity, deserves your respect. And I think when we come to this, “Oh, well, someone deserves, you know, they have to earn my respect.” That's putting conditions on it. And those conditions are often unfair conditions. Now, do you have to earn my loyalty? Do you have to earn my appreciation? There are a lot of things that you have to earn, but respect is not one of them. Respect is one of those things that we should give each person because of our shared humanity, we should be giving them that respect. And when you do that, that actually opens up the opportunity for more appreciation, for more loyalty, for more trust. And this goes back to earlier in the conversation when I said, sometimes we use respect to mean a lot of things. We use it to mean appreciation, loyalty, trust. When you use it synonymously with those words, you get this conflating of, “Well, you have to earn my fill in the blank.” And we're using the word respect in one of those ways.
Mark Graban: I think you're making me think that one way people use that word, respect, is to suggest agreement. So somebody does something and someone says, “I respect that decision,” it means, “Okay, I agree with that decision,” at least begrudgingly. But I've unfortunately seen leaders who frame disrespect to say, you know, it's like the opposite of a psychologically safe environment where, let's say, an employee disagrees with the leader, and the leader gets upset, saying, “Oh, you're being so disrespectful by disagreeing with me.” And I don't view it that way, but I mean, it seems like there are enough people out there who do see it that way. Well, problem, control, leadership model.
Scott Gauvin: That's exactly the problem. The problem is when we use respect to mean so many different things that in one moment you can say, “Well, you should respect me,” but if you disagree with me, “Well, that's disrespectful.” Well, are we saying that agreement and respect are the same things? Yeah. Is challenge and respect the same thing? Yeah. Is loyalty or trust? Are those the same things as respect? No, they're very different things.
Mark Graban: Yeah.
Scott Gauvin: And then. So when we conflate those things, then that's when we start to have these problems. Because. Yeah. Then the leader will say, “Well, that's, you know, you're being disrespectful.” No, I'm trying to get more clarity around what you mean here, because I see it differently than you see it. And that's, this is the start of that conversation.
Respecting People vs. Respect for People
Mark Graban: I had something else. You triggered another thought and it exited stage left and I lost it. So let me just move on to one of the other things I think you brought up earlier that's worth digging into a little bit is the language that I know you've researched and been thinking about and teaching about respecting people versus respect for people. Can you tell us more about the differences there?
Scott Gauvin: Yeah. So what I came to understand as I was doing more research on what Respect for People was and trying to understand what that was really about, I started to see the nuance between Respecting People and Respect for People. Respecting people is an individual action. It's based on my personal values, my orientation, my experience. So how I react to you or engage with you is going to be very individualized. It's often reactive in the moment. So it's very variable because, depending on my state of mind or my emotional state that day, it might look different. So it's very variable and very reactive. Respect for People, on the other hand, what I've come to appreciate is that it's about how we design the practice of respect into the systems, into the policies, into the processes, into the cultural fabric of the organization. It is not reactive to someone, but how are we being proactive about that? So it's about the intention and the shared experience. It is a universal practice. So it doesn't matter your title, your role, your position in the organization, it's irrelevant. It is a universal practice. It is a practice that we all come to. It is how we are going to engage with each other, communicate with each other, collaborate with each other, solve problems with each other. So there's this commonality, this universality of the practice that we come together so that allows us to hold each other accountable to how we're communicating and showing up and engaging with each other. And so as opposed to if it's an individual thing, “Well, then that's just the way I am.” How many times have you heard that? Well, that doesn't fly when you have a universal practice of respect for people. So I see those two things very differently now. I didn't have that distinction maybe 10 years ago, but as I've come to appreciate and learn that there is a distinction. And the reason there's an important distinction is because how I show up as a person, as an individual, is different than how I show up as a member of this community. Whether it's in an organization or in my family or in my community group, there is a universal practice that we engage in that is this. Again, we talked about respect as a contract on how we're going to engage with each other. There's this universal contract as opposed to individually creating my own contract and then you just have to get what you get when you experience me. That's kind of the difference that I see between respecting people and respect for people.
Respect in Organizational Excellence
Mark Graban: Yeah, there's a couple different directions. We keep talking about words and language and difference in these words. I saw you most recently in person at the annual Shingo conference, and we both really appreciate the Shingo model and the elements of that and what they do. They use language that says “respect every individual.” What are your thoughts on that phrase and how it lines up with the difference between respecting and having respect for people?
Scott Gauvin: Yeah, so I think that. And I can't speak for the Shingo organization, but if I'm translating that, I'm…
Mark Graban: Asking your thoughts on it.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So my translation for that is that they're saying “respect every individual.” And so they're kind of nodding at that. It's a universal practice again, that everyone deserves respect and that we should practice universally this respect. So they're not saying, you know, go out and make your own idea of what respect is. They're saying that, hey, as an organization, we respect every individual. So universally, what does that look like? So it feels like it's closer to Respect for People, how we are universally defining that as opposed to you making an individual choice of how you're going to show up. And I know that they couple that with humility, interestingly. And that's important because it's only in my humility that I can say, “You know what, I have to put my personal preference aside for this universal practice that we're all going to engage in.”
Mark Graban: And it makes me think of the question around respect, makes me think of the late Paul O'Neill, who had been CEO at Alcoa for about 13 or 14 years. I'm just going to pull up some of the wording here because he always talked about organizational excellence and he said for an organization to have the potential to be excellent, you want everyone to be able to say, “Yes,” to these three questions every day. I'm just going to read the first. “Am I treated with dignity and respect by everyone I encounter?” And then there are times where he would say a longer version. I'm going to read this too. “Are you treated with dignity and respect every day by everyone you encounter without regard to race, gender, nationality, pay level, rank, or any other qualifying characteristic?” It's powerful things he was talking about 30 years ago.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah, I mean, it's unfortunate that he has to even qualify it, but, I mean, it would be nice if we could just stop at “are you treated with dignity and respect by everyone?”
Mark Graban: Right.
Scott Gauvin: Period. Regardless of all those qualifiers. And, I think that again goes to this idea of the practice of Respect for People. Is that, that more universal practice as opposed to that individual. So when you walk into that organization, is it a universal experience that you're going to have or are you going to get it from some and not from others? Yeah, you know, is it a choice that some people make and some don't?
Mark Graban: Yeah. And I think, you know, the shorter version of his question, it just says, “Are you,” meaning each individual, “treated with dignity and respect?” Like you said, it means everyone. I had a chance to ask Paul O'Neill Jr. after his dad's passing, we had a follow-up conversation. We kind of touched on this and he had this broad category of “any other defining characteristic.” He didn't list all of them and his son was very clear. He meant everybody. You can't list. It would be a long list of defining characteristics and that kind of evolves over time based on, you know, discrimination or mistreatment that society becomes more aware of or more willing to talk about. But yeah, I mean, he meant, he meant everyone. But I think he was kind of at the forefront of, you know, as a CEO talking that way in the late 80s even.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah, yeah. And I mean, it's becoming more of a central topic for leaders these days. But yeah, I mean, certainly, 20, 30, 40 years ago it would have been. People just weren't thinking that way, weren't talking that way. It wasn't as important. I guess part of it is, I think, the work contract has changed as well. You know, 30, 40, 50 years ago, the work contract was that you had loyalty to a company, the company gave you a good pension, gave you, and today that contract is very different. Now it's about an exchange of value. Like I'm going to continue to give you value if you're continuing to invest in me and give me value. That contract is very different today.
Mark Graban: Look, because, I mean, I think maybe it's not just value, it's values as well. We want to have alignment on.
Scott Gauvin: Right, right. Yeah. I want to know that the organization that I'm contributing to aligns with who I am and who I want to be as much as whatever it is that we deliver to our customers. That's become more relevant and important than, I mean, 50 years ago. Sometimes people didn't even know. Yeah, I put this together. I don't even know what this ends up going into. I don't even know what the products are that we sell. And today, that's much more of a consideration. What does this company stand for? What is this company about? How do they engage? That's more of a consideration for people these days.
People vs. Humanity: The Deeper Meaning of Respect
Mark Graban: Yeah. So I think the last word, the last question about words and terminology before we talk about the Respect for People Roadmap, there are some. Sometimes there's this discussion of we're translating Toyota concepts from Japanese to English. When I've been at their sites in Japan, things are quite literally translated into the language. “Respect for people” into English, “respect for people.” There are some who say, “Well, maybe respect for humanity is a better translation.” What did you find in researching this topic? Or even just your own views about saying respect for people versus respect for humanity?
Scott Gauvin: Yeah, so from what I've understood, the more literal translation is respect for humanity. I think.
Mark Graban: More literal doesn't necessarily mean it's a better translation, does it?
Scott Gauvin: Well, it doesn't necessarily mean it's a better translation. Personally, I like that one better.
Mark Graban: Okay.
Scott Gauvin: But I think it's more palatable. When we say respect for people, it feels more, almost personal. When you say respect for humanity, it feels more broad, and I…
Mark Graban: More conceptual. As real as the people in front of you, the people you're interacting with. People. As opposed to…
Scott Gauvin: Exactly.
Mark Graban: Humanity is kind of the big fuzzy concept, right?
Scott Gauvin: Exactly. Yeah. So when we say humanity, we are talking about all of the people. But when you say respect for people, that feels more localized, I think, because I am a person. So, okay, that's me. When I say humanity, I'm thinking about this broader concept. And, who knows what the founders intended? But if I go back to Confucianism, it probably was more humanity that they were thinking about. Just because of the practices that would have thought about the betterment of humanity and how you're contributing to the betterment of humanity. So they probably were thinking about humanity, not people individualizing it.
Mark Graban: Yeah, well, I think there's an element, you know, Toyota and other companies that I've visited in Japan, they do talk very broadly about, you know, “the company must provide benefits to society.” And, you know, Toyota talks about responsibility not just to employees and customers, but to suppliers, to the communities, to the environment. That seems like that's taking that broader view.
Scott Gauvin: Right, right. Yeah. And I, and I do think that they generally probably take a broader view. They think about the extended stakeholders. And, we're not trying to generalize, but in the West, we tend to be more centralized and individualized. And I think, in more Eastern cultures, it's more community-focused than individualized-focused. And that makes translating some of these concepts a little challenging because there's a cultural element that enables it a little easier in one environment and makes it a lot more challenging in another environment. Doesn't mean that it's any less valuable, but the natural inclination because of our cultural orientation makes it more challenging in some cases.
Mark Graban: Yeah, yeah. I don't personally have a strong opinion either way. You know, respect for people, respect for humanity. I think one nuance, maybe one thing that's beneficial, maybe that comes from the phrase respect for humanity, is to me, it kind of ties it back to human nature and recognizing and understanding human nature. Back to things I touched on earlier, that part of human nature is we're infallible. And that's part of the reason we're driven to do mistake-proofing as part of our systems instead of just telling people, “Be careful and don't make that mistake again,” you know.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah.
Mark Graban: I think there are certain elements of, like, we have to appreciate design systems that take human nature into account.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah. And I do think that that's part of the central thinking, is that we have respect for the human condition. The human condition is imperfect, so if we can appreciate that we are imperfect, then can we come to that with less judgment? Can we come to that with more curiosity? Can we come to that to understand what was the reasoning behind that or what was the unmet need that caused that to manifest the way it did? And we can, and it allows us. It kind of opens a door that if we didn't appreciate that human condition and the imperfectness of that human condition. Because, you know, you just, at the outset, you're expecting that things are going to go wrong. You're expecting that things are going to break, that mistakes are going to happen.
Mark Graban: Yeah.
Scott Gauvin: And that's okay because, hey, you're human. And we expect that humans are going to make mistakes. So what can we do to then create the conditions around the human so that we can maybe prevent that more often? Right.
The Respect for People Roadmap
Mark Graban: And I love that question you asked, “What can we do?” Because I've heard some people say, “Well, you know, a mistake was made and it comes down to human error. And, well, humans are imperfect. What can you do?” And it's kind of a dismissive. They're kind of giving up, like, “What can we do?” And like,
Scott Gauvin: Well, no, no, no, no, no.
Mark Graban: Like, let's answer the question. What could we do?
Scott Gauvin: Yeah. I think that's the whole point. It's like, what can we do? Because we know that there's a lot we can do. I mean, we've just seen the evolution of how we've improved our working conditions.
Mark Graban: Yeah.
Scott Gauvin: So there's a lot that we can do. It's just, we just haven't thought of it yet. We just haven't gotten creative enough around it yet. But for any condition, there is an opportunity to look at what we can do differently or what we can do better. How can we create a different condition or a different environment around that person or group of people so that it supports them and helps them?
Mark Graban: Yeah. So tell us about the Respect for People Roadmap. I know enough to be dangerous, so I'm going to let you answer the question. But I'll say to the listener, it's not a book. It's not just online training. It's a lot more. So, yeah. What is the Respect for People Roadmap?
Scott Gauvin: So let me tell you where it came from. I'll give you the origin story of this. This goes back to my earlier years when I was working more globally and started to bump into some of these different cultures and realizing, “Oh, what worked for me in the US is not working for me here in China. What worked for me in the US is not working here in Germany.” There's a different cultural condition that I need to take into consideration. That really started me down this journey of investigating and looking at what Respect for People was. As I started to study it more, I reached out to as many people at Toyota as I could find and just asked them, “What is working at Toyota? Can you explain?” And we would have these extended conversations. There were three things that started to bubble up for me. The first thing was that, unlike a lot of the organizations that I worked with, especially in the US, they saw behaviors more objectively. So when someone would do something or would not do something, they didn't necessarily judge that. They got curious about it. And not only did they get curious about it, but then they moved to support that person, to address it. So that was the first thing that I saw that was different. What I saw in the US was that we just made a lot of assumptions. We assumed things like, “Oh, it's because that guy's lazy. Oh, because that guy doesn't care. Oh, because she doesn't really want to be here.” Yeah. And we'd make these assumptions and these judgments.
Mark Graban: Right.
Scott Gauvin: So that was the first thing: they saw behavior objectively. The second thing was that they really valued the entirety of the person's experience. And that came out when I would say, “Well, I don't understand. Why did you include Maria on this?” “Well, Maria has traveled to 30 different countries.” “Okay.” “Well, she has seen things that we haven't seen. She must know things that we don't know.”
Mark Graban: Yeah.
Scott Gauvin: Even though she had nothing to do with that area, knows nothing about that product, knows nothing about that process, but she's traveled to 30 different countries. Or, “Well, how about Mike?” “Well, we included Mike because he's raised five boys.” “Okay. What does that have to do?” “Well, he has experiences in raising five boys and challenges that he's had to overcome that may play a role in thinking through this problem.” And I realized that they don't just value the title or the role or the specific skill set that that person might have that they were maybe hired for. They really think about the whole entire person. They value the entirety of that person. The third thing that I observed or kind of it was an insight that I had was that they then take those people and they bring them together, not just because there are differences there, but for mutual benefit. So they bring together this collective wisdom for this mutual benefit. They're bringing people together because there's a benefit not just for the customer, not a benefit just for the company, not a benefit just for the employees, not a benefit just for the suppliers. But this mutual. This mutuality that they were really focused on, like, “How is solving this going to be better?” “Oh, we see that that solution is better for the customer, but that's worse for the employee. Okay, keep working it.” “Okay, now it's better for the customer and it's better for the employee, but it's not really better for the company. Okay, keep working it.” They would keep working it until there was this mutual benefit for all the stakeholders. I thought that was really different. That was because we might stop at, “Oh, it fixed the customer problem. Okay, move on.”
Mark Graban: Right. No, I think a vast majority of companies would absolutely do that. Yeah.
Scott Gauvin: And so I took benefit for the company.
Mark Graban: So. Okay, moving on.
Scott Gauvin: Right, right. And so I took those three things and I said, “Oh, well, wouldn't it be great if I could teach my client organizations those three things to behave in those three ways?” So I started thinking about it more, and we took seeing behaviors more objectively. We started calling that engaging with compassion. We took valuing the entirety of a person's experience, and we started calling that treating people like they matter. We took bringing together this collective wisdom for mutual benefit, and we started calling that partnering for mutual benefit.
Mark Graban: Yeah.
Scott Gauvin: And so those three things, and those were great theories, but I had to be able to then teach it. It had to be more concrete. So then we started to look at, well, what would be the behaviors behind each of those principles? And as we kind of started to develop that, that's what started to become the framework for, “Oh, this is what we can teach an organization.” So we started teaching organizations those things, and that was great. It just wasn't scalable. So then we started saying, “Well, what would this look like if we scaled it?” And so then we started saying, “Okay, it would look like there would be some online component, there would be some facilitative component, there's some peer learning that would happen.” And we started pulling together all of these different pieces, and that is what has become the Respect for People Roadmap, which is a learning experience, not just training. It's really a learning experience. And when people go through this program, it is really an experience that they're having because they're not only learning the education, but there's a mentor who's part of the program. So as they go through the micro-lessons, they then share their insights with their mentor. Their mentor then goes back and forth with them about those insights. And the goal is to help really create these insights that move people to action. One of the things that we learned as we were developing this is that an insight is really when you just take a bit of information data and you connect it with your lived experience that gives you that “aha moment,” which is really just a moment of clarity. So there are two things that happen with an insight. You have that moment of clarity, like, “Oh, that makes sense. Why fill in the blank?” But then there's also an intrinsic motivation that happens, “Well, that means I probably should fill in the blank.” So we wanted to tap into that. The reason we designed it the way we did is, “Hey, how can we create the best conditions to create more insights?” So we take people through this learning, feedback, doing feedback loop. So it's a constant. It's a loop that you go through multiple times through the course of the program. And the goal is so that you're walking away with lots of insights that we motivate you to then embrace some of these new behaviors. As you embrace those behaviors, that starts to create, you show up differently, you communicate differently, you partner differently, you collaborate differently, you solve problems differently, you engage in conflict differently. And as a result of showing up differently, you're really starting to create a new environment. And when you do this more broadly in an organization, so when you start taking multiple teams through this, that just inevitably starts to create a different culture. You just have now lots of different people who are showing up and engaging in different ways. And so what we're seeing is what would often take maybe a two or three-year window to change culture or a five-year window. We're seeing it in six to ten months. It's really, it's, it's beyond our, even our expectations. But we're really seeing transformation. We talk about transformation, that word transformation, right? We're talking about words. Transformation is when it's different than change. Change is, “Oh, we did something different, but we can go back.” A transformation is, “Oh, we're doing something different. And because we have really changed our environment, we cannot go back to the previous way.” It's like a caterpillar to a butterfly. That butterfly is never going to become a caterpillar again.
Mark Graban: But see, that's where I like the word metamorphosis comes into play. Because, I mean, yeah, this is the thought I had earlier. I'm going to say I respectfully disagree. And that's possible. Right. I'm saying that with a smile. But there are organizations that have really gone through transformations with Lean that did go back to their old way under new leadership.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah.
Mark Graban: So maybe I'm going to suggest maybe we want metamorphosis right, where the butterfly truly can't go back to becoming a caterpillar again.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah. And I would say in those organizations that when they got new leadership and they went back, it's because what was holding it together were those few people. It was that leader that was holding it together. What we're trying to create is that if the majority of the people have changed and like this new way and want to engage in this new way, the leader could leave and that culture is going to continue forward. It's not going to matter whether the leader leaves or not. In fact, if anything, what you're hoping for is if a new leader comes in that doesn't align, then he gets put in check or she gets put in check. Because that's just not how we do things. We engage this way, we talk this way, we share this way, we solve problems this way, we deal with conflict this way.
Mark Graban: Yeah.
Scott Gauvin: And that has become the new norm for that organization. And that's what we're trying to get to. Not, you know, hey, yeah, it's great to change something and then you get this short-term benefit that, “Oh, we've got 30% improvement in productivity,” or whatever it is. But then two years later it's regressed back again. How useful was that effort, the short-lived improvement?
Piloting the Roadmap in Healthcare
Mark Graban: Yeah. And I think if it's only, you know, if the Lean transformation was only exhibited through the mechanics of Lean activities as opposed to mindsets and, you know, you can't take the mindset away from people. But a leader can come in and say, “Okay, no more of the Lean mechanics,” because that leader doesn't share some of the same mindsets as the previous leaders had tried ingraining. But gosh, it would be great to have more success stories as we wrap up here. I know from a conversation the other day, correct me if I'm not stating this properly, but you're looking for healthcare organizations or at least a healthcare organization that wants to pilot some of this approach.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah, we would love to have. We haven't done this in healthcare yet, and we've done it a lot in manufacturing, service industries, biotech, and a lot of different industries, but we haven't done it in healthcare yet. So that was part of the conversation we were having: it would be great to find an organization that wants to pilot this and maybe run an experiment with us to say, “Okay, hey, we.” I'm 99.9% sure this is going to work in healthcare as well, but it would be nice to prove it. And an organization that would be interested in stepping forward to maybe do that pilot with us. And, you know, I just want to make one more point about that leader coming in and changing things. We very intentionally designed this program so that the nine behaviors that we're teaching do not rely on permission from any leader to allow people to engage in them. And it's an important thing because we were very careful because, like a lot of the Lean tools, you have to have permission to engage in those tools. We wanted to eliminate that. So all nine behaviors are things that you have agency to do regardless if your leader believes it or not. So even if your leader doesn't believe in it. I'll just run through a couple of the behaviors. So one of them is checking your perspective. Are you judging? Can you get better at not judging the situation and just seeing things more objectively? Can you seek to understand? Can you act to support people? Can you prioritize? Well, being. The next one is valuing individuality. Can you really value those people around you more? We have one called spotlighting others, and that's really about. We do a lot of recognizing people, but this is around appreciating and recognizing people. So can you appreciate the people around you? I don't need my leader to give me permission to appreciate you and to say, “Hey, I really appreciate what you did. I want to thank you for stepping up and taking that load off of me.” Or, “Hey, I really want to thank you. Your due diligence and how you think about things really made a difference here. And I just want to let you know I appreciate that.” I don't need anyone's permission to do that.
Mark Graban: Sure.
Scott Gauvin: And so, when we designed these nine behaviors that we're teaching, we very intentionally wanted them to be things that no one needed permission to do. They could do them independent of anyone else in the organization. And that's really a very powerful element of this program: no matter where you start in the organization, these can take a foothold because they don't require anyone else to give you permission to do.
Mark Graban: Well, it seems really powerful. Give me an opportunity to dig deeper and learn more. I invite the audience to do the same. So you can go to respectforpeopleroadmap.com. There's a contact form there if you want to get in touch with Scott about healthcare or any other setting. What you're saying there at the end seems powerful because you were talking about designing the system of respect. You have a background in system design, system architecture. It sounds like you're trying to design a resilient system.
Scott Gauvin: Exactly, yeah. And we thought about it not only from designing it to be resilient, but also to be scalable, because that's the other challenge. You may have one continuous improvement person in the company, well, he can't be everywhere or she can't be everywhere in the organization. And so then it limits what the organization can do. So we wanted to make this so that it could be scalable, so that organizations can scale it at the rate that makes sense for them.
Mark Graban: Yeah, that's great. I'm going to wrap up with one final quick story. I was talking to someone the other day who is not healthcare, a different industry. I'm not going to say where. They were saying that the organization was struggling with trying to take respect for people beyond the superficial level, as he put it, beyond not being a jerk. He used a word that rhymes with “jerk” that's a little less family-friendly. But it sounds like I should point him in the direction of the Respect for People Roadmap.
Scott Gauvin: Well, send them on over and I'd be happy to. We have a demo version of the program that anyone can do, and he can kind of, we call it the “test drive,” so he can go kick tires. The program itself is about 72 micro-lessons, so it's pretty robust. The demo is just eight of those, but they're eight of the actual lessons. So there's actually some value just in doing the demo. There's actually some value that people will get out of just the demo.
Mark Graban: Yeah, it's a good intro. And from what I've demoed the demo, maybe I'll go through the rest of the demo. But I want to thank you again, Scott. Our guest has been Scott Gauvin, CEO of Macresco. There'll be links in the show notes, Scott's website, his LinkedIn profile, the Respect for People Roadmap page. So, Scott, thank you so much for being a guest here today. I really, really appreciate it.
Scott Gauvin: Yeah. Thank you for having me on. I appreciate it.
Mark Graban: Thanks.
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