Organizational Leadership – Don’t Mess with the Gemba

I first read about Gemba while reading Peter Scholtes’ “The Leader’s Handbook” while in grad school learning Systems Thinking and trying to build upon my understanding of Deming’s “System of Profound Knowledge”. Gemba is a Japanese term that relates to “where the important and truly valued work gets done” in organizations.  At the time I had a professor with whom I had formed a close friendship who himself decided to move into academia after he burned out in the corporate world while working as a rising executive at Ford/New Holland.  

When I asked my professor about this notion of Gemba he shared that part of a pervasive problem plaguing corporate America and businesses and organizations in general is that all too often, large organizations and their prevailing management/leadership styles permit the stifling of their Gemba.  They mistakenly promote a culture that values bureaucracy over getting the real work done.  They do damage by permiting the Gemba to either be unnecessarily tampered with or they burden it (the Gemba) with activity that gets in the way of the important tasks at hand that move the business or organization forward.  It is important that leaders not permit the Gemba in their organizations to be weighed down or held back.

Dwight D. Eisenhower said “Farming looks mighty easy when your plow is a pencil and you’re a thousand miles from the corn field.”  Top leaders would do well to keep that notion in mind the next time they are tempted to promote non-value activity within their organizations above that which is done by the Gemba.  If leaders aren’t aware of where the Gemba resides in their organizations, then it’s time they do a pulse check to learn where it is.

Sovereign Citizens, the Watchful Eye of the FBI, and the Founding Fathers

Recent news accounts like this of the FBI’s announcement that it has concerns with people who claim themselves to be Sovereign Citizens evokes thoughts of our country’s founding.  The patriots who were associated with country’s founding fathers had to consider the threat of apprehension by the authorities when they were contemplating whether or not to break free from the rule of King George and Great Britain.  It is no small thing to break free from an established government.  That is why the American Revolution was so historic in the annals of human history.

Sovereign Citizens have taken a different interpretation of current prevailing viewpoints of what it means to be an American and living in the United States. In essence, they seem to want to separate themselves from the current laws of the land and live by a different set of rules from the mainstream citizens.  They appear to describe the current laws as illegitimate when pitted against the rights American are described as having as written in the Constitution.  In the video that runs on their website, the woman makes a reference to the USA as a corporation to which the Sovereign Citizens do not want to participate.  I have come across other references about this Corporation over the years and have been interested in learning more about it but then abandoning the issue altogether due to time constraints and thoughts about what does it really matter any way?  Maybe the Sovereign Citizens just had more time and interest in seeing what it is all about.  I am not sure.

Today in the year 2012, the vast majority of citizens are law abiding taxpayers of which many have serious concerns and objections about how our elected / appointed representatives are managing our national, state, and local governments.  It would be members of this segment of American society who organized the Tea Party and /or might be active in the Libertarian political party.  Many people who follow the current rules of the  electoral and political system have expended a good many years of their lives and personal resources to try and get more Constitutionally compliant leaders into government at all levels.

Anybody who has followed American political events over the past 70 years knows that the Republicans and Democrats backed by highly financed special interest groups have claimed wins in most if not all major political campaigns for public office.  It would be very frustrating for any normal person to begin to think that there has to be a better way to push back the problem of the wrong people being elected to run the government because they have what appears to be an inappropriate ability to wield greater influence than a majority of most individual citizens in the election.

Maybe that is what led to this group that calls themselves Sovereign Citizens.  When I think of them and why they do what they do, there is a part of me that can sort of relate and understand and maybe even agree with the rationale as to why they would want to “not play by the rules” of the prevailing form of government.

Let me be clear, I do not condone violence and aggression against other people including the lawful authorities.  That noted, for purposes of trying to understand their behavior and actions so as to learn and maybe improve the situation that is causing the FBI to escalate their surveillance of this group, perhaps Sovereign Citizens simply have more courage to push back and defend themselves from the government in a fashion that based on their political beliefs, can lead to what looks like violence and aggression against the State.

Obviously there is a stigma that mainstream society attaches to people who are members of such fringe groups.  But I get a sense that the fringe is growing.  Maybe the Sovereign Citizens are just an early version, a way-out in-front organized group ahead of the game.  Sooner or later it seems inevitable that more and more supposedly Free People who have become frustrated with their government run amok would form in this coalesced fashion if unable to realize the changes they see as being needed to save their way of life because of a corrupted and unconstitutional electoral and political system and government.

What I wrote above does not seem to differ much with what Thomas Jefferson and the Founders had to wrestle with when they decided to break free from Great Britain.  On the outset of the Revolutionary War, they wrote and affirmed with sacred honor the Declaration of Independence.  The words below from that historic document tied to our country’s founding seem to mimic in some part at least, to what might be compelling the Sovereign Citizens to opt out of the current rule of law.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Framed in this light, are the Sovereign Citizens really that bad or just that misunderstood by the current authorities?

Capitalism Magazine – “Francisco’s Money Speech” from Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged

We all tend to have unfinished or uninitiated activities or tasks or things that we would like to get around to doing some day.  If we had the luxury of all the time in the world, we could continually keep from doing today what we would hope could be put off until tomorrow.  Unfortunately, we know all too well that none of us is promised tomorrow.  During the year 2010, one particular as yet to be completed task on my list was beginning to gnaw at me.  I had yet to read Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged.

Someone carrying not yet completed desired to-do tasks around in their mind was popularized as a person having a”Bucket List”.  This came about several years ago after actors Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson teamed up on the big screen to make a movie about two aging men and the stories behind them acting out some of the activities on their list of things to do.

As a liberty minded individualist who first learned about Atlas Shrugged years ago from my good friend Gerry back when I was just starting high school,  I grew into adulthood simply thinking that I did not have the time to read it.  How silly of me.

Once I finally got a copy and started reading it just 2 years ago, what I once thought was going to be a labored read turned into a labor of love with the book. The labor was simply the time needed to read it.  Once started, I found I could not put the book down.  It was both a philosophical work and an adventure story all rolled into one.  Like most other things we procrastinate from doing, I found and made time to read it once I realized I enjoyed it.  How silly of me to put it off in favor of what I thought was my busy schedule.

My reading sessions turned into an escape of sorts.  I completed it in about 2-3 weeks, taking about an hour or so daily.  Looking back at the time, Atlas Shrugged served as a balm of sorts for what ailed me insofar as my complete sullied attitude and morale relating to the bad economy, our federal debt, President Obama’s and Harry Reid’s and Nancy Pelosi’s individual health care mandate in the Affordable Healthcare Act, the wars and our country’s overall malaise.  Reading this book helped me see that these problems that are in part based on collectivism and statism are not new.  Ayn Rand wrote of them in the 1950’s.  It helped me refocus my mind as to how I might better cope with what seems the the degradation of our free society.  In many respects, it had me rethink about dedicating some time to writing this blog.

One of my favorite parts of the book was Francisco’s money speech.  Not coincidentally, other readers must also have enjoyed it, as it was very easy to find numerous references to it with a simple google search.  I have provided the link to it below so that it might serve as a primer of sorts for you.  After reading it, maybe reading Atlas Shrugged will be something that you will add to your bucket list.     This topic of sound money is very appropriate for our times.  Many mainstream economists are proclaiming that the recession is ending and that our economy is headed in the right direction. Those of us who look at the economy through the lens of the Austrian school of thought think otherwise.  The threat of a third round of quantitative easing looms and with it, our beloved freedoms take even more of a beating.  Candidate Ron Paul holds the issue of sound monetary policy as a main component of his platform for restoring America.

Please take a moment and read Ayn Rand’s views on money, as told by one of her amazing characters, Francisco D’Anconia.  And as usual, thanks for reading my thoughts here at Wake Up America!

Capitalism Magazine – “Francisco’s Money Speech”