Headlines say Bourbon is in crisis: Yeah, this looks bad. Look at that decline! This chart supports headlines like: And it’s not just Bourbon, it’s wine and alcohol in general. There were plenty more like this. These headlines are written…
Nearly 30 years ago, I had my first real encounter with what not to do as a leader. I was working in a General Motors factory where the culture was one of daily disrespect. Leaders–if you could call them that–were…
Professors Robert H. Hayes and William J. Abernathy have harsh words about a common, if not typical style of American management: “…an overdependence on analytical detachment – what they call ”managerial remote control.” They say it is an approach that…
The Oscars may report a “four-year high” (or now, in 2026, a “four-year low”), but the long-term data tells a very different story. Year-to-year viewership and ratings changes are mostly noise. Using Process Behavior Charts reveals the real trend: decades…
I loved a recent New York Times article about Chef Gordon Ramsay, including this part: “Ramsay said that when he makes a mistake, he owns up to it. He has been candid about the misjudgments that led to the closure…
The average NFL score is around 44-46 total points per game — but that number hasn’t always been stable. Has scoring truly surged, or are fans reacting to short-term noise? TL;DR: NFL scoring trends reveal a real system shift–not just…
TL;DR: When leaders prioritize speed and output over quality, employees stop speaking up–and safety suffers. From GM to Boeing to hospitals, production pressure creates fear, hidden defects, and misleading public narratives that no amount of PR can fix. Yesterday’s blog…
So many of our business metrics are reported in terms of two-data point comparisons. How much did the metric change from last week? Web site traffic is up 14% from last month. So that’s good? Maybe. Two data points…
I am always happy to see something even vaguely related to the practice of Kaizen in mainstream publications. Here’s a recent essay from the New York Times: The Best Path to Long-Term Change Is Slow, Simple and Boring The author,…
This article caught my eye recently:
Skip the Fancy Towels, and Hire More Nurses
(via the NY Times)
A few weeks back, a number of you sent me this article from the New York Times: “Doctors Unionize to Resist the Medical Machine“ The article describes a physician who is trying to take the amount of time – the…
To close out the year 2013, I once again need to close some browser tabs that are full of things that I was maybe going to write about, but don’t merit a full post. So, the latest in my occasional…
