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Hosted by tom johnson
Hosted by tom johnson
Hosted by tom johnson
Hosted by tom johnson
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Stan's guest this week is Georgia native and journalist Tom Johnson, whose remarkable career took him from Macon, where he worked for legendary newspaperman Peyton Anderson, to UGA's Grady College of Journalism, to White House Fellow during President Lyndon Johnson's administration, to publisher of the Los Angeles Times, and finally as president of CNN during ...Continue Reading »
From abroad, the chaos in Washington resonates far and wide, as the U.S. government shuts down, with Democrats going to the mat for American's healthcare. Just as the shutdown took place, Christiane spoke with Democratic Senator Jeanne Shaheen who has worked towards bipartisan consensus for more than thirty years but also believes it's time to mount an effective opposition to some of Trump's policies. Then, director Benny Safdie talks to Christiane about making his new film, "The Smashing Machine," dealing with loss and transforming Dwayne Johnson, aka "The Rock," into a mixed martial artist. Plus, another blow for Afghanistan's women after the internet was shut down in the country for days. Amanda Davies has a special report on the exiled girls fighting for freedom through football. And, defying bombs and presidential warnings to break the news, former CNN chief, Tom Johnson speaks to Christian about his new book, "Driven," dealing with depression and how he led CNN through a golden age despite a nightmarish job interview with Ted Turner and Jane Fonda. Then, after a total and sudden internet blackout by the Taliban in Afghanistan this week, from her archives, shortly after 9/11, when the U.S. and its allies sent the Taliban and Al-Qaeda packing, Christiane's 2001 report about what it was like when TV and satellite were finally brought back. And finally, remembering the remarkable life of primatologist Jane Goodall, Christiane revisits her conversation with the woman who changed our understanding of the world. Air date: October 4th, 2025 Guests: Jeanne Shaheen Benny Safdie Tom Johnson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
In President Trump's second term, federal agencies are navigating uncharted territory. Two Supreme Court cases from June 2024 fundamentally changed how agencies can operate: Loper Bright ended Chevron deference—meaning courts no longer automatically defer to agencies' interpretations of ambiguous laws—and Jarkesy limited agencies' ability to impose civil penalties without jury trials.At the same time, President Trump is consolidating control over agencies that were traditionally seen as independent from the executive branch. He's fired commissioners from the FTC, NLRB, and other agencies as part of his push for a "unitary executive." Former FTC Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter is fighting her dismissal, and the Supreme Court recently allowed the firing to stand while it reviews the case.The fundamental tension? Courts are stripping power from agencies just as Trump is trying to bring those agencies under tighter presidential control. Will Loper Bright and Jarkesy make these agencies less useful tools for implementing Trump's agenda, even if he wins the fight to end their independence? And how will these cases impact the FCC's authority looks to reform its broadband subsidy programs while fighting illegal robocalls?Evan is joined by Tom Johnson, former general counsel of the FCC under Chairman Pai and now a partner at Wiley Rein. He is the author of a new paper for Digital Progress Institute on ways to reform the Universal Service Fund.
Even after Jimmy Kimmel returned to air, President Trump spoke of launching new legal action against ABC. Former CNN President Tom Johnson helped shape the legacy media landscape and had a front-row seat to many defining moments of the late twentieth century. He speaks to Christiane about his new book "Driven: A Life in Public Service and Journalism from LBJ to CNN" and the state of media today. Also on today's show: painter Adam Cvijanovic; author Fara Dabhoiwala ("What Is Free Speech?") Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
This week we're joined by Tom Johnson – a name that's been making big waves in the BMX scene! From his passion for racing to the impact he's making in the BMX community, Tom brings a ton of knowledge, stories, and straight-up love for the sport. You know it's going to be a fun night when Tom's in the house!You can join us for the most part each and every week at 8:00 PM EST on the All Things BMX Show Facebook, YouTube, and Twitch pages. If you miss us live you can find us on all your favorite podcast sites and watch the replays on our YouTube Channel. The ATB Krew coming to you live from "The Ethan Clark" studios that are brought to you by the good people at Motor City Harley-Davidson in Farmington Hills Michigan. Chris and I are at the Get-O Wear News Desk. For the coolest lifestyle apparel out there check out Get-O Wear. Melissa is at her producer's perch that is brought that is brought to from the good people at Gatenine Custom Number Plateswww.gateninedesign.comDie Job Apparel brings you our guest this week.“Elevate Your Look. Empower Your Brand Die Job Apparel ”www.facebook.com/diejobapparelThe show's chat is sponsored by BMX-Rox Photographywww.roxandcoco.comTonight's Trivia is brought to you by Krupp & Carterhttps://www.kruppandcarterco.store Our show doesn't happen with the support of the following companies. So when you are shopping for your BMX wants and needs please shop the companies that support All Things BMX Show. Krupp and Carterhttps://www.kruppandcarterco.store/shopOn 2 Wheels BMXhttps://on2wheelsbmx.company.siteThe Hack Shackhttps://www.facebook.com/p/The-Hack-Shack-100057675570612/dB Sports Worldhttps://www.facebook.com/dbsportsworldWrenchman Wheel Builds www.wrenchmanwheelbuilds.comMega Design Group https://www.megadesigngroup.comGuest Contact Infohttps://www.facebook.com/tommygun.cycleshttps://www.instagram.com/tsjohnson_99/Support the show
From War to Museum: Welcome to the USS Silversides.In this episode of Total Michigan, host Cliff DuVernois explores the fascinating history of the USS Silversides, a World War II submarine located at the museum in Muskegon, Michigan. With guest Tom Johnson, a tour guide at the museum, the discussion covers the submarine's service during the war, its remarkable preservation and transformation into a museum, and the unique stories and memories shared by visitors. Listeners will learn:The construction and missions of the Silversides, Its journey to becoming a training and museum vessel, The personal histories of those who served.Links:USS Silversides (Website)USS Silversides (Facebook)Address:1346 Bluff StMuskegon, MI 49441For Total Michigan:Subscribe to our Email Newsletter: https://totalmichigan.com/join/Find us on Facebook: https://facebook.com/totalmichiganWatch on YouTube: https://youtube.com/@totalmichigan
In this Mission Matters episode, Adam Torres interviews Tom Johnson, Chairman of Texas Ducks Unlimited Youth, live at the Texas FFA Convention. Tom shares how he helped Ducks Unlimited evolve from having no youth programs to launching the #1 wildlife certification in the U.S.—all while empowering students, supporting teachers, and advancing wetland conservation nationwide. Big thank you to Texas FFA Foundation! Follow Adam on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/askadamtorres/ for up to date information on book releases and tour schedule. Apply to be a guest on our podcast: https://missionmatters.lpages.co/podcastguest/ Visit our website: https://missionmatters.com/ More FREE content from Mission Matters here: https://linktr.ee/missionmattersmedia Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Guest Preacher, Tom Johnson, walks us through John 6:22-71
Harbour Bazaar sweeps open with a theme of live performance with Steven & Davey joined by Justin Jarrett choosing live favs and with us in the studio Tom Johnson, star of the fabulous comedy musical 'Verbal Diary' at the Palace Theatre Dixons Studio on 18th July, choosing tracks and all things John Otway! We have a hoot and hope you enjoy! PLAYLIST You Don't Love Me - The Starlets So Long It's Been Good to Know Yuh - Woody Guthrie Cinnamon Girl - Neil Young Whatever Gets You Through The Night - Elton John & John Lennon Headbutts - John Otway & Wild Willy Barrett I Shouldn't Be Doing This - John Otway & The Big Band Geneve - John Otway If I Did - John Otway & Wild Willy Barrett My Pink Half of the Drainpipe - The Bonzo Dog Band Masquerade - I Am Kloot From Your Favourite Sky - I Am Kloot 86 TVs - I Am Kloot Endlessly - Mercury Rev Belief -Antelope Phoenix - Paul Weller Same - Wreckless Eric Everhands Demise Southwest - HKippers LINKS VERBAL DIARY by A Comedy Musical by John Otway, Paul Bradley & Tom Johnson Details, tickets and tour dates: www.verbaldiaryshow.co.uk Tickets for the Palace Dixons Studio, Westcliff On Sea performance on 18th July at: https://trafalgartickets.com/palace-theatre-southend/en-GB/event/play/verbal-diary-tickets Support Ship Full Of Bombs Thames Delta Independent Radio If you would like to support the station and are able to do so then please pledge only what you can genuinely afford at www.patreon.com/sfob Please like and subscribe from wherever you stream your music and podcasts. Thank you from The Harbour Bazaar
Yacht rock? ...eh, Tom doesn't really care. In depth conversation with Tom Johnson about The Doobie Brothers illustrious career and recording new music together for the first time in 40 years. The Doobie Brothers new studio album “Walk This Road” is available now. Catch them this summer at the Freedom Mortgage Pavilion in Camden, NJ on August 13th.
This interview was recorded for GOTO Unscripted.https://gotopia.techRead the full transcription of this interview hereThomas Johnson - Co-Founder & CTO at MultiplayerJulian Wood - Serverless Developer Advocate at AWSRESOURCESTomhttps://x.com/tomjohnson3https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomjohnson3https://github.com/tomjohnson3Julianhttps://bsky.app/profile/julianwood.comhttps://twitter.com/julian_woodhttp://www.wooditwork.comhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/julianrwoodLinkshttps://www.multiplayer.appDESCRIPTIONJulian Wood and Tom Johnson explore the complexities of modern software development, with Tom sharing his journey from machine learning and distributed systems to founding Multiplayer, a company focused on simplifying development by automating documentation, debugging, and system design.They discuss the challenges of building and managing complex software architectures, especially with microservices and cloud platforms, and the need for better tooling to address these issues. Tom emphasizes the importance of simplicity, collaboration, and transparency in development, especially when it comes to API design and managing system dependencies. They also explore best practices for team communication, the evolving role of platform engineering, and the shift toward a future where infrastructure is abstracted away, allowing developers to focus on software creation.Together, they envision a world where better tools and AI lower the barrier to entry for developers, driving innovation and enabling more people to bring their ideas to life.RECOMMENDED BOOKSSimon Brown • Software Architecture for Developers Vol. 2David Farley • Modern Software EngineeringKim, Humble, Debois, Willis & Forsgren • The DevOps HandbookSimon Wardley • Wardley MapsSimon Wardley • Wardley Mapping, The KnowledgeDavid Anderson, Marck McCann & Michael O'Reilly • The Value Flywheel EffectMike Amundsen • Restful Web API Patterns & Practices CookbookBlueskyTwitterInstagramLinkedInFacebookCHANNEL MEMBERSHIP BONUSJoin this channel to get early access to videos & other perks:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs_tLP3AiwYKwdUHpltJPuA/joinLooking for a unique learning experience?Attend the next GOTO conference near you! Get your ticket: gotopia.techSUBSCRIBE TO OUR YOUTUBE CHANNEL - new videos posted daily!
In 1976, Barbara and Tom Johnson moved from California to Missouri. In the past nearly 50 years, they built a home and had a family. As the Johnson kids grew up they realized there really was something to this homesteading thing. This episode of the Mo’ Curious podcast happens in two-parts. This first half of […]
The Oilers and the Panthers made quick work of their Conference Finals opponents as they both advanced after 5 games. What does the Stanley Cup Final have in store? Lane Lambert to coach the Kraken. Meanwhile the Minnesota Frost repeat as PWHL champions. Listen Here: Apple Podcasts Direct MP3 iHeart Radio News Check out ScuttlePuck's online Merch store at www.scuttlepuck.dashery.com Playoffs Oilers 4 Stars 1 McDavid - leading NHL in points 26 Panthers 4 Hurricanes 1 Final repeat - game 1 Wednesday June 4 PWHL - Minnesota Frost Expansion - Seattle / Vancouver Treliving - changes, including between the ears Guess the 5th Connections - Last week - Boom Boom Geoffrion, Doug Harvey, Tom Johnson, Bert Olmstead This week - Matt Cooke, Marc Crawford, Nick Cousins, Andrew Shaw
Tom Johnson, Better Business Bureau VP of Board and Public Relations, joins Wendy Snyder, in for Bob Sirott, to discuss several scams targeting people about REAL ID. Tom also details the car wrap scam and talks about fake Amazon accounts that are pretending to be customer and tech support.
The conference finals have started and the Panthers look set to eliminate the Hurricanes quickly. The Oilers are up 2-1 in a series that has been a bit back and forth. The USA won the World's and the PWHL heads into its final week with the Frost up 2-1 on the Charge. Listen Here: Apple Podcasts Direct MP3 iHeart Radio Title Player - Pelle Eklund Feedback - thanks for congrats from Nora, David Hyuben, Mark Cannons, Adam Cairns Playoffs! Oilers 2 v Stars 1 DAL 6 EDM 3 - Stars 3 PP goals in 3rd EDM 3 DAL 0 - Nurse slash injures Hintz EDM 6 DAL 1 - McDavid 2 goals - Skinner kept them in it in 2nd - Blown calls both ways Skinner answering critics Panthers 3 v Hurricanes 0 FLA 5 CAR 2 FLA 5 CAR 0 FLA 6 CAR 2 What's to say? CF% 54 SF% 49.6 GF% 7.69 xGF%45.58 Led league in reg season with xGF% 55.99 15 straight Conf Final losses 2023 - Panthers 2019 - Bruins 2009 - Penguins What next, assuming loss? Brind'amour, Tulsky? Guess the 5th News Shanahan out in Toronto Pelley will not hire President - Treliving will report to him. No Grit. No Grind. No Greatness. PWHL - Minnesota Frost 2 v Ottawa Charge 1 - all 3 games in OT Best of 5. Game 4 in Minnesota on Monday. Game 5 Wed World Championships USA wins in OT on goal by Tage Thompson - 1-0 over Switzerland Sweden bronze with win over Denmark Denmark beat Canada 2-1 in quarter final. Hall of Fame Inductions - Henrik Lundqvist Zdeno Chara Vicky Sunohara - Canadian Women's Kai Hietarinta - Pres Finnish Ice Hockey 1984-1997 Kim Martin-Hasson - Swedish Women' Goalie Frans Nielsen - Danish David Vyborny - Czech Connections Last episode - reverse sweep This week - Boom Boom Geoffrion, Doug Harvey, Tom Johnson, Bert Olmstead I have a concept for fans of teams that continue to disappoint them. Fan bankruptcy DOPeS - are they working?
Firstly an apology. As the name suggests this podcast is adult content heavy! Sorry Gill... Anyway...The Slick Boyz are joined by actor, comedian and writer Tom Johnson. His wacky form of comedy is on the road summer 2025 so grab a ticket to see him live.They talk about meeting somebody who might have been Noddy Holders daughter in law on a 'telly thing' (Beth Fox not Bett Riddler), if a potato is better than an onion, why his microwave stinks of eels and other nice things Tom Johnson has been up to (despite how much he hates compliments).Catch Tom Johnson @ Bath Fringe from 4th June 2025 or The Rik Mayall Comedy Festival 7th June OR his show "Verbal Diary" whenever you can!As ever, if you've enjoyed this podcast please give @tomjohnsonactor a follow!#DTYNSupport the showFollow us on Social Media, join our Patreon and more here.
On October 24th, 1992, 22-year-old Heather Uffelman and her fiancé, Jeremy Rolfs, traveled to Marietta, Georgia, to sell computer equipment to a man who identified himself as Tom Johnson. They met Tom at a motel where he attacked them - Jeremy survived the attack, but Heather succumbed to the injuries. The killer fled and remains unidentified. Instagram Email: keytothecase@gmail.com Sources: https://www.newspapers.com/image/422133974/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/467607556/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/402798563/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/112607991/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/977678866/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/814661813/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/422354603/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/467362719/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/814663311/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/675105349/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/814672957/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/112781201/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/422363325/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/113137202/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/422350092/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/422355961/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/422102560/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/423833574/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSJPP7Zgbsc&list=PLvOTJuUUgID_3C5gdIFkGCLObCqfnHVPb&index=20 https://fpcv.org/hains-point-alma/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/111871203/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/113454274/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/113169249/?match=1&terms=thomas%20steeples https://play.discoveryplus.com/video/watch/a811768c-f1a4-43d2-a4d8-2916f8f82b76/7bb4bf84-ee4e-45cd-a488-d41a2a98d24a
durée : 00:09:23 - Combination : Tom Johnson - Quatuor Bozzini - Tom Johnson utilise les nombres comme matériau de base en transformant les formules, les combinaisons et autres phénomènes mathématiques en musique.
Ben Sherwood '81 is the publisher, CEO, and co-owner of the digital news platform The Daily Beast, a position Ben assumed in 2024 after a long and illustrious career as a media executive. For example, Ben has served as Executive Producer of Good Morning America, President of ABC News, and most recently led the entire Disney ABC Television Group globally. If that isn't enough, Ben is also an accomplished novelist, entrepreneur, and Rhodes Scholar. In this episode, Ben speaks about the principles behind covering the news with integrity and diligence during a time of rapid political change. Ben references journalist Tom Johnson, broadcasters Bill Moyers and Dan Rather, media executive Bob Iger, and various Harvard School teachers as profound influences on his life and career.
What happens when you cold email Lord Sugar asking for investment? Tom Johnson did exactly that…and it worked!On this week's show, I am joined by Tom Johnson, founder of Hernshead Group, a recruitment business he launched six years ago with backing from Lord Alan Sugar after watching The Apprentice.In this episode, Tom shares the full story – from that bold email to building and scaling Hernshead Group, launching (and closing) multiple brands, and recently completing a management buyout to take full ownership of the company.In this episode, we discuss:How Tom secured investment from Lord Sugar and built the business from scratchThe reality of launching new brands and learning from failureThe highs and lows of building a team, navigating COVID-19, and scaling with clarityHow and why he bought back 100 percent of the sharesIf you're looking for investment, currently working with a business partner, or planning for long-term ownership and growth, this is an episode you need to hear.Chapters00:00 The journey begins: Tom Johnson's entrepreneurial path03:08 Investment and growth: Partnering with Sir Alan Sugar06:14 Navigating challenges: The impact of COVID-1908:56 Expanding horizons: The launch of multiple brands11:56 Learning from failure: The downfall of new ventures15:03 Refocusing on core strengths: The future of Hearnshead Group30:06 Scaling the team and business growth31:03 Implementing effective processes and training33:14 Leveraging AI and technology in recruitment34:21 Balancing AI assistance with human touch36:33 Data-driven management and performance tracking39:05 Overcoming fear and building confidence in sales44:04 Strategic business decisions and future planning49:09 Equity and incentives for team growth52:50 Vision for the future and sustainable growth__________________________________________Episode Sponsor: AtlasYour memory isn't perfect. So Atlas remembers everything for you. Atlas is an end-to-end recruitment platform built for the AI generation. It automates your admin so you can focus on the business tasks that matter. How many conversations do you have every day? With clients. Candidates. Your team. Service providers.Now how many of those conversations can you recall with 100% accuracy? How many hours a week do you spend making notes to try and retain as much as possible? And how much is still getting lost along the way? Traditional CRM systems weren't built for the type of recruitment business you're running right now. They were built to rely on the structured, tagged, categorised, and formal data you could feed it. Manual processes that needed you to input specific information, based on specific questions and answers. But what about all the other conversations you're having every single day? Atlas isn't an ATS or a CRM. It's an Intelligent Business Platform that helps you perform 10X better than you could on your own. How? By removing all your low value tasks, acting as your perfect memory, and providing highly relevant recommendations to impact your performance. Learn more about the power of Atlas – and take advantage of the exclusive offer for The RAG listeners – by visiting https://recruitwithatlas.com/therag/ __________________________________________Episode Sponsor: HoxoReady to find 25+ warm leads within seven days on LinkedIn?As a recruiter, most of the working day is spent chasing people via cold outreach on LinkedIn.This method is super time-consuming, and most people don't reply...
St. Patrick's Day at a bar is amateur night. Blazers snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. Bengals lock up Ja'Marr Chase & Tee Higgins. Congrats to the Barlow Bruins & head coach Tom Johnson. Did the NCAA committee get the bracket right? Rick Pitino wants to drink a quart of Jameson. Worst Day on the Web: Dallas Mavericks' super-cringey AI hype video. Dusty's tourney darlings. Bengals investing in Joe Burrow's weapons. Oregon State going to the postseason... no, not that one. Blazers vs Wizards in a battle of tanking teams.
It's St. Patrick's Day, which means it's once again time to dispel the myths about Guinness! Raptors understood the assignment the Blazers haven't grasped all season. Bengals lock up their wide receiver tandem. Shout out to the Barlow Bruins & head coach Tom Johnson!
We talk MACT*Fest 2025 with Tom Johnson. mn-act.net/index.php/about-us/mact-events/mactfest-2025 facebook.com/badmouthtc instagram.com/badmouthtc twitter.com/badmouthtc Music credit: MusicbyAden - Mythology by MusicbyAden is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0CC Download: Musicbyaden – Mythology @musicbyaden
In this episode of Misunderstanding Quality, host Andrew Stotz and Bill Bellows discuss what not to measure when it comes to quality. Bill offers some great examples to show how organizations get it wrong, and how to get it right. TRANSCRIPT 0:00:02.4 Andrew Stotz: My name is Andrew Stotz, and I'll be your host as we dive deeper into the teachings of Dr. W. Edwards Deming. Today I'm continuing my discussion with Bill Bellows, we're gonna have a lot of fun, who has spent 31 plus years now that it's 2025, helping people apply Dr. Deming's ideas to become aware of how their thinking is holding them back from their biggest opportunities in the episode, today is episode 11, and the title is "To Improve Quality, Don't Measure Quality". Bill, take it away. 0:00:35.6 Bill Bellows: Thank you, Andrew. And, so the title of episode 10, came from chapter 10... Chapter 1 of The New Economics, and I used a quote from Dr. Deming, which was, "Are you in favor of the improvement of quality?" Which Dr. Deming says, "Are you in favor of the improvement of quality? We can have a national referendum, yes or no?" Everyone says yes. Then he says... Then he say, "We could have a secret ballot." And... But I... At the beginning of the podcast, I had said, "Are you in favor of quality?" And it's... No, it's, "Are you in favor of the improvement of quality?" And so today I wanna, in episode 11, share it with our listeners and viewers, more of the profound insights from Genichi Taguchi. But I think, what I was just thinking is saying, "Are you in favor of quality?" And I've used that quote, which now I now realize it's a misquote. It's not, "Are you in favor of quality?" It's "Are you in favor of improvement of quality?" But in seminars, what I've done is used the quote, the misquote, I would say Dr. Deming would ask, "Are you in favor of quality?" And he would say, "We're gonna have a secret ballot. Is everyone in favor of ballot?" In quality, everyone says yes. So I would go through that. 0:02:16.3 Bill Bellows: And then I would go to the next question, and I would say to the audience, I'd say, "Okay. Dr. Deming made reference to secret ballot. So I wanna do a secret ballot. I want you to close your eyes, and I'm gonna ask you a question, and if your answer is yes, raise your hand. But I want you to close your eyes when you raise your hand, 'cause I don't want you to raise your hand 'cause everybody else does. Okay, so close your eyes." And I say, "Are you in favor of teamwork?" And all the hands go up. [laughter] And it's not so much "Are you in favor of improvement of teamwork?" But it's the idea that, acceptability saying this part is acceptable, as we've shared in prior episodes, is the essence of looking at that part, my task, my effort in isolation. And what that has to do with teamwork, I question. Now, with a few of us at Rocketdyne years ago used to talk about, we would say, you give out a term paper assignment, the term paper must be between 10 and 20 pages long. And what happens? They're close to 10 pages. Then I would share, we'd tell Allison, our daughter, I'd say when she was in high school, "Be home by between 8:00 and 10 o'clock," and she shows up around 10 o'clock. 0:03:51.6 Bill Bellows: And I would show a distribution over there. Then I would say, "What about a machinist? The machinist is given a hole to machine. And what does machinist do is machine the hole on the low side, and then a machinist is machining the outer diameter of a shaft or a tube. And what does machinist do? Machines to the high side." And so I would show those four distributions either on the low side or the high side, and say, "What do they all have in common?" And people would say, "Each of those people's looking out for themself. They're focusing on their work in isolation." Then I would say, "So what do you call that in a non-Deming company or in a... " In the first podcast there is a, called it a Red Pen Company or a ME organization, or a Last Straw companies... What do you call that behavior where people look at the requirements and say, "What's best for me?" What do you call that? What do you call, people scratch their head? We say... You ready? "Teamwork." [laughter] 0:05:00.6 Bill Bellows: And everybody laughs. And then I turn to somebody in class and I say, "So Andrew, are you a team player?" And Andrew says, "Yes." And I say, "Andrew, if you machine the holes to the low side, are you a team player?" And you might say, "I'm not sure." And I would say, "Say yes." And you'd say, "Okay. I say yes." And I say, "Okay, Andrew, who's on your team?" And you say, "Me." "So, oh, you are a team player, man." 0:05:24.2 Andrew Stotz: I'm a team player. Team Andrew always wins. 0:05:28.2 Bill Bellows: Yeah. And I would say, so I say, "In a non-Deming company, everyone's a team player. All right. But who's on the team?" So I would say to people, "You'd be a fool not to be on your own team. The only question is, who else is on your team?" All right. Back to Dr. Taguchi to improve quality, don't measure quality. And I was, got into this in an explanation with some others recently, and somebody was showing me a bunch of defect rate data involving some process. And the question was, how to apply this occurrence of defect rate data to Dr. Taguchi's loss function. And so, again, reminder to our listeners, acceptability is everything that meets requirements is okay. Either I am unaware of differences or the differences don't matter, any parking spot, any professor any Thermo 2, any doctor and desirability is "I want this doctor, this parking spot, this, this, this, this, this." And so not just anything that meets requirements. 0:06:50.3 Bill Bellows: And Dr. Taguchi's work has a lot to do with that thinking. And Andrew, yeah, I'm on a month, on a regular basis, meeting more and more people that are listening to the podcast and reaching out to me on LinkedIn. And one shared with me recently then, and he started to listen to this series, and he said, he never thought about desirability. He says everything he knows, everything he sees every day, is acceptability. And he's like, "You mean, there's more than that?" And it's like, "Hello. That's what our series is trying to do." So... 0:07:26.6 Andrew Stotz: And let me introduce you to door number three, which opens you up into this whole 'nother world of... 0:07:35.6 Bill Bellows: Yes. 0:07:35.7 Andrew Stotz: The interconnectedness and understanding quality from the impact on all the different parts of the organization, not just the one thing and the one area. Yep. 0:07:46.6 Bill Bellows: Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. 0:07:48.9 Andrew Stotz: But that's door number three. Now, we don't wanna go through that right off the bat, but when you go through it, unfortunately door number three disappears as you walk through it, and it's a wall... [laughter] 0:08:00.4 Andrew Stotz: And you can't go back because now you understand that what is a system, what is the interconnectedness of everything, and once you see that, you can't unsee it. 0:08:09.6 Bill Bellows: That's right. Now, it's like, it's a holistic view in which... And a from a holistic perspective, parts don't exist, parts of exist, but everything is connected. 0:08:27.4 Andrew Stotz: Right. 0:08:28.2 Bill Bellows: And what does that mean? So anyway... 0:08:30.1 Andrew Stotz: And just to put that into context, let's just take a car. A customer never buys a part. And they don't buy a jumble of parts, they buy the car. So to the customer's perspective, it's even more meaningless, the independent parts of that. 0:08:50.3 Bill Bellows: When I would go to Seattle and do training when Rocketdyne was owned by Boeing, and I'd be doing training for people working on commercial airplanes or 737s, 47s and whatnot. And one of the jokes I would use is that, "Hey, 747... " People went, "What's a 747?" How about 787? If I was today, I'd say "a 787 is not a bunch of parts that fly in close formation." But that is, the mindset is that... But anyway, so acceptability is looking at the parts in isolation, looking at things in isolation, it's assigning a grade to a student, it's performance appraisals, that's all about isolation, it's thinking, "I won the game, I get an award. I lost the game." All of that thinking, from engineering to, how we look at human resources, the idea that the savings add additional only works when the activities are independent. So that's all acceptability, looking at things in isolation. Desirability in this idea of a preferred value, I don't know that anyone contributed to that, besides Dr. Taguchi. In fact, this morning, I was talking with some friends overseas about Joseph Juran's work. And, do you remember last time you and I worked, I was sharing with them that our last podcast followed the last meeting I had with these friends in Europe. And I said that conversation led to our podcast conversation about Quality 4.0, and it's all acceptability, acceptability, acceptability, meet, meet, meet requirements. 0:10:35.6 Bill Bellows: This very conversation. And I said, I went back and did some research on what Joseph Juran... How Juran defined quality. 'Cause I looked at the ASQs definition of quality and it gave two definitions of quality, one attributed to Juran talking about quality as fitness for use, and then Philip Crosby's definition is, meeting requirements. But you may recall, I said, there is no explanation of how Dr. Deming defined quality. Yeah, maybe that will come. But, so I was sharing that with them, and also shared with them a model I've used. And it might have come up in our first series, but I think the classic model within organizations is, I work, I follow a bunch of steps to make a part, a thing, a module, something. And if all the requirements are met, I hand off to you, you're downstream. And then likewise, there's others in parallel with me that hand off good parts, good things to you. Because they're good, we can hand off to you. And then the model is you take the parts that are good and put them together, and because they are good, they fit. And then you pass that integrated component downstream where other integrated components come together. And we progressively go from, it could be that we're putting together the fuselage, somebody else is putting together the wings, and it's all coming together. And at the other end, it's an airplane. 0:12:22.5 Bill Bellows: And on every handoff we hand off what is, so the parts that are good fit, the components that are good fit together with other, then we turn the whole thing on, it works. And I show this flow to people and I say, "So what do you see going on in there?" And what eventually they start to see is that all the thinking is black and white, because they're good, they fit, because they fit, they fit, and when you turn it on, it works. There's nothing relative about that. And so I was sharing that with these folks this morning, and I said, after you and I spoke last time, went back and looked, and Juran talks about fitness for use, and the question was, is Juran's definition of fitness, absolute fitness or relative fitness? Meaning that there's a degree of good in the parts associated with desirability thinking, and if we've got degrees of good in the parts, then there's degrees of fit. And, well, it turns out there's plenty of reason to believe that Juran had a model of acceptability that the parts are good, then they fit. All to come back to what Dr. Taguchi is talking about in terms of improving quality, is improving quality from a variable perspective that there's degrees of good. And so now we go back to, to improve quality, don't measure quality. And I remember when he said that and we were dumbfounded, "Well, what do you mean by that?" 0:13:52.5 Bill Bellows: And then he would go on to explain, that traditionally, we look at the quality... The lack of quality of something. An inspector says, "There's a scratch on the door. There's a ding here. There's a crack there. There's a, the weld has a drop in it. The weld has porosity." You know what that means is that's not a... The quality inspector is looking for the absence of a crack, the absence of porosity and things like that. And it also parallels with what I learned from Ackoff, Russ would say, [chuckle] "Getting less of what you want doesn't get you what you want." So you could say, "I want less waste, less defects." Well, what is it you want? Again, the clarification is, Russ would say, "Getting less of what you don't want doesn't get you what you want." And likewise, Dr. Taguchi talked about, what is the function of the process? So if you're talking about, imagine on a washing machine, when you have a... Or a dryer, and you have a motor that's spinning, and around the motor is a belt that's spinning the drum. Well, the quality problem, classic quality problem could be that the belt slips, or the belt cracks, or the belt is vibrating. 0:15:28.3 Bill Bellows: Well, then you say, "Well, okay, what's the function of the belt?" Well, it's not about cracking. The function of the belt is to transmit energy from the motor to the drum. And if it does that really well over sustained periods of time, then that suggests there's probably less cracking going on and less slipping going on. But if you don't look at it from a function perspective and ask, "What's the function of the belt?" And move away from, "Well, I don't want it to crack and I don't want it to slip." Well, then tell me what you want it to do. What is it you want it to do? Now, let's get into more of what we do want. And then, and this is what's neat listening to Dr. Taguchi as an engineer, you say, "Well, okay, so what is the belt trying to do? It's trying to transmit energy." So if I can design the belt, and by changing the materials of the belt to transmit energy, under wide-ranging temperatures, wide-ranging usage conditions, if I do a good job of that, then I should see less cracking problems. Absent that, if I try to reduce the number of cracks, I may end up with a belt slipping more often. So then what happens is you end up trading one problem for another, which is not uncommon. 0:16:57.7 Bill Bellows: You go from, the cookies being undercooked to overcooked as opposed to saying, "What's the role of the baking process?" And he would say, "To transmit energy to the cookie in the precise amount. And if we have the precise amount and distribution, then that should work out." Now, relative to welding. Welding, there is, there may be a dozen different weld anomalies that inspectors are looking for, with X-rays, they see porosity, they see, what's called drop-through with the material and the weld, drops a little bit, which could result in a fatigue problem leading to cracking. Well, here Dr. Taguchi would say, "Well, what's the function of a weld?" Say, well, to join two pieces of material together with a given strength. And so you join them together. And then once they're joined together, now you run tests and you say, "I wanna... " It could be, "I wanna heat and cool the weld to see how it does with that. I wanna introduce vibration to the weld." And if you can show that under vibration, under wide-ranging changes in the environment, that the strength holds up, then by focusing on the strength, which is what you want, you end up with fewer quality problems. But it's turning things around and saying, "Not what I don't want, what do I want?" 0:18:35.3 Andrew Stotz: And... 0:18:36.4 Bill Bellows: And that's what... Go ahead. Go ahead. Andrew. 0:18:37.6 Andrew Stotz: There's two things. The more I think about this quote that you're talking about, to improve quality, don't measure quality, sometimes I think I got it, but sometimes I don't. I just wanna think about a couple of parallels. One of them is sometimes we say in the field of sales and marketing, we may say, "Fill your pipeline and your sales will happen." So focus on the beginning of the process. If you don't have a pipeline of people coming in to your company, into your sales team, there's nobody to sell. So that's an example. We also say sometimes, focus on the inputs and the outputs will take care of themselves. That's another way that we would use something similar. But I'm just curious, what does it mean by "Don't measure quality"? 0:19:25.0 Bill Bellows: Yeah. And that's a good question. I'd say, Taguchi's used to quality being the absence of defects. And quality is what the customer's complaining about. So he's saying, quality problems in terms of don't measure quality, he's saying, "So what are the quality problems?" "Oh, let me tell you, we've got porosity, we've got cracks, we've got drop-through, we've got cracking, cracking of the belt and slipping and the... " This is what people are complaining about. And what he's saying is, the customer's not articulating, "Hey, Andrew, improve the function." They're complaining about the... You just have to interpret that what they're saying is, you have to take where they are. They don't want it to crack. They want it to last longer. They want all these things and say... And the idea is, don't get sucked into what they don't want. Turn it around to, well then, I'm the engineer, and this is what Dr. Taguchi would say, "As an engineer, don't be dumbed down into the complaint world. Turn it around and say, what could you improve? What is the function of that thing you're selling?" And if you improve the function, because again, the beauty of talking about function, if you focus on problems, you eliminate one problem, create another problem, then another problem. Now you're just... And what... 0:21:00.8 Andrew Stotz: So it's whack-a-mole... 0:21:02.3 Bill Bellows: Exactly. 0:21:03.6 Andrew Stotz: It's whack-a-mole in the back end of the process without the awareness of, "What are the customer's needs and how do we understand whether we're hitting the mark?" And... 0:21:12.7 Bill Bellows: Oh, and this is what Dr. Taguchi used to call as whack-a-mole engineering. It's what Ackoff would say, "Today's problems come from yesterday's solutions." 0:21:24.6 Andrew Stotz: So just just to visualize that, can imagine going into a factory and saying, "Look at all these charts and how we reduce the defects of this and that. And this is... " We've reduced all these defects, but in fact, that could be out of touch with what the customer really needs at the end of that production. 0:21:44.1 Bill Bellows: Yes, it is... The beauty is, it is saying... And he would get really angry with people who got sucked into the rabbit hole of eliminating defects, scrap and rework and things like that. And just say... What he's trying to say is, "I want you to be smarter than that. I want you to start to think about what is the function of the machining process? What is the function of the welding process? What is the... " And what was neat was, I spent... On three different occasions, I spent a week with him, watching him engage every day with four teams. A team would come in for two hours, and he would discuss with them whatever the hardware was. I'm not at liberty to say what company it was. [laughter] But it was a really cool company. 0:22:56.9 Bill Bellows: And the people there invited me in because I learned at Dr. Deming's... I attended Dr. Deming's very last four-day seminar, and there met some people that were very close to him. And one of them shared that, there were people for many years, traveled with Dr. Deming. They found out where he was gonna be a given week, maybe called up his secretary Ceilia Kilian and, once he became, bonded when... And somehow Dr. Deming liked you. And then you would say, "Dr. Deming, I'm gonna take a week's vacation next summer. Where are you gonna be in June?" And he'd say, "Well, I'm gonna be at GM corporate headquarters." And what these people told me is that, they would be with him that week, whether he is doing a four-day seminar in Ohio. Now, I don't know who paid for it. 0:23:50.8 Andrew Stotz: No. 0:23:50.9 Bill Bellows: But he gave them access to be with him wherever he was. And one guy told me he was at some high-level GM meetings that week, and he said, "Dr. Deming is there and he and some others." And I think they may have been called "Deming Scholars". I know that term was used. But anyway, this guy was telling me they were there, and this GM executive comes over to him and it says to him, "So, who are you again?" And you say, "Andrew Stotz." And he says something like, "So what might I ask are your qualifications for being here?" And he says, "If Deming overheard that, Deming would turn to the executive, snap at him and say, 'These are my people. What are your qualifications?'" So anyway, inspired by that, I walked out of Dr. Deming's four-day seminar, called up a friend of mine who worked for Dr. Taguchi's company and said, "Deming had people travel with him. I wanna travel with Dr. Taguchi. I don't wanna go to a seminar. I wanna see him in action." 0:24:56.1 Andrew Stotz: Yep. 0:24:56.4 Bill Bellows: And I said, "Can we make that happen?" And it happened, and I got to go inside a company. The lawyers didn't know I was there. And I asked him, I said, to the lawyer, "Do I have to sign anything?" He said, "No. If we let the lawyers know you were here, you wouldn't be here. So, here are the rules. You can't tell anybody what happened, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah." So I get to be a fly on the wall watching him. So, a team would come in and say, "Here's this stuff we're working on." And he would... And they had an approach, which would be, reducing defects or scrap rework. And then he would turn it around for the next hour and a half and get them thinking about function. And after the first week of doing this four times a day for five days, I walked out of there thinking, "There's five basic functions." I started to notice the patterns. And then the second time I did this, a team would come in and I'm thinking, "I know what he's gonna do. He's gonna... He has in mind a function model. And all these things relative to how things come together." And so I did that three times. But, it was neat to get my brain adapted to, "Okay, what's the function? Where's he gonna come? Where's he gonna come?" 0:26:16.0 Bill Bellows: And then I would... The people would present it, and I'm thinking, "I think it's gonna go for function five. Yep. Bingo." So that's what I just wanted to share with the audience tonight. Again, there's a lot of depth. I taught two 40-hour courses at Rocketdyne in Taguchi Methods. So, a 40-hour intro and a 40-hour more advanced. So all I wanted to cover tonight, is that wisdom of not being defect-focused, but for our audience to start thinking about, start to think about the function. In fact, when I was having this conversation with a colleague recently and, 'cause he's talking about turning defect rate, he was thinking turning defect rate data into a loss function. I said, "No, defect rate thinking is acceptability thinking, the loss function is desirability thinking. They don't go together." I said, "What I wanna know is what's causing the defects." And we start diving into what's causing the defects, we can turn it into a variable data as opposed to a discontinuous data. Anyway. And I just wanted to throw out... Go ahead, Andrew. 0:27:34.4 Andrew Stotz: To wrap this up, I'm thinking about, I like what you just said, "Stop being defect-focused." Replace that with... 0:27:44.5 Bill Bellows: What is it we're trying to accomplish? 0:27:47.8 Andrew Stotz: Yeah. 0:27:48.2 Bill Bellows: If you say, "Well, we don't want defects." I know we don't want defects. But what do we want? 0:27:52.9 Andrew Stotz: Do we say replace it with outcome focus, customer focus? What would you say? 0:27:58.1 Bill Bellows: Yeah, well, absolutely it's customer focus. The idea is that, now you start to think in terms of, is what is the greater system in which this is used. 0:28:11.0 Andrew Stotz: Okay. So... 0:28:11.1 Bill Bellows: The defect thinking is just saying it doesn't fit, it doesn't meet requirements. But that doesn't tell me what you're trying to do. 0:28:17.0 Andrew Stotz: Okay. So I think I know what you're saying. Stop being defect-focused, and please walk through door number three. 0:28:25.3 Bill Bellows: Yes! Stop... 0:28:27.7 Andrew Stotz: And in door number three, you're gonna be aware of the customer, the next process, the next flow, the customer of your area and the ultimate customer, and start focusing on the needs and the desires of them, and bring that back in the chain of your process. And you'll be improving, you'll stop being focused on "Fix this, stop this. Don't do that." Let's not have any more of that, and you'll be more into, "Let's do this because this is going to drive a much better outcome, or the exact outcome that our customer wants." 0:29:05.2 Bill Bellows: Yeah, it is, which changes the hat. That may not be the purview of people in the quality organization. So, they're out there counting defects. This is not to say it's their job. Not that they're not in the loop, but it's turning to the people that are more aware... That are more in tune with functionality, which is likely gonna be that people designing the thing, thinking about what's the role of the windshield wiper? Is it to skip across the windshield? Is it to, which is, that chatter. No, we don't want the chatter. So what is it we do want? We want the windshield wiper to move smoothly. And what does that mean? It means at a given second, we want it to be... And this is where the smoothness functionality comes in that I saw Dr. Taguchi many times is, is saying at a given interval of seconds, it should be here, here, here, here, here. And if it does match those positions, then what have we done? We have improved the smoothness of the flow of the wiper blade, or whatever it is that thing. 0:30:21.5 Bill Bellows: And that's the type of thing I'm trying to introduce, in this short episode, people thinking about function, not the lack of quality, but what is it we're trying to achieve? Now, otherwise, we can also say, Ackoff would say, and Dr. Deming would agree with him, is that organizations aren't in business to make a profit. They're in business to do something really well. That's the function of the organization. And then profit is the result of that. As opposed to being profit focus, in which case you start to... You run it as a finance company and misunderstand the focus and you start believing in addition and you end up with a mess. 0:31:04.2 Andrew Stotz: So, let's end it with a cartoon that I saw in The Wall Street Journal. And in that cartoon, it was a couple of guys, young guys wearing suits, and they were talking to each other, and they were either, it was either in an MBA class or they were in a factory or something, and it said, "Things? I don't wanna make things. I wanna make money." [laughter] And the whole point is, money is the result of making great things. 0:31:38.3 Bill Bellows: Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. And that's why... And this is why I so enjoyed about listening to Ackoff, conversations with Russ... Conversations with Dr. Taguchi. And then reading Deming. I don't have any conversation with Dr. Deming and thinking of that there. They, each were astute enough to see the process, the means leading to the result. Tom Johnson would say, "The means are the ends in the making." So you have organizations that are either means-focused, which is process focus, versus, "Did you deliver the report? Did you deliver the thing?" And Dr. Deming's big thing is, by what method? Tom would say, "By what means?" So... 0:32:25.2 Andrew Stotz: All right. Well... 0:32:25.2 Bill Bellows: Anyway, that's what I wanted to expose our audience to tonight. 0:32:29.4 Andrew Stotz: There it is. They've been exposed. Ladies and gentlemen, the exposure has happened. Bill, on behalf of everyone at The Deming Institute, I wanna thank you again for this discussion. And for listeners, remember to go to deming.org to continue your journey. And if you wanna keep in touch with Bill, just find him on LinkedIn. And this is your host, Andrew Stotz. And I'll leave you with one of my favorite quotes from Dr. Deming. And you know this one, you can say it along with me 'cause I say it all the time. People are entitled to joy in work.
In the five years since the COVID pandemic began, trust in public health institutions and vaccines has plummeted. According to a new opinion poll, just over half of the public now says they trust the Food and Drug Administration to make the right recommendations on health issues at least “a fair amount,” down from nearly two-thirds (65%) in June 2023. About 1 in 4 Republicans parents now say they've akipped or delayed some children's vaccines."Why Should I Trust You?" is a new podcast about why so many Americans have lost trust in science and public health. We hear from two of the show's co-hosts, journalists Brinda Adhikari and Tom Johnson. They speak about what they've learned from a remarkably broad range of skeptics, scientists and doctors who have different opinions about vaccines and public policy on healthcare. "How Do We Fix It?" reports on the people, projects and ideas of Braver Angels, America's volunteer-led cross-partisan movement working to bring people together across rigid lines of partisan division. Braver Angels' Truth and Trust Project was featured on episode 414 of "How Do We Fix It?". This work aims to bridge divides among people with different views on official responses to the pandemic. Braver Angels helped Brinda and Tom as they launched their podcast.Tom Johnson is an award winning producer with experience in documentary series, digital, cable and network news. Brinda Adhikari is the former executive producer of The Problem with John Stewart.This episode also looks at the changing public comments from Robert F Kennedy Jr., who may be the most powerful voice in US public health today. As we release this episode he's set to become President Trump's Health and Human Services Secretary. Kennedy's Senate nomination hearings have been highly contentious. To critics he's a destructive vaccine skeptic and spreader of conspiracy theories. Many Trump supporters see Kennedy as a hero and a fighter, willing to take on a broken healthcare system. We also learn more about the remarkable contrast between the high level of distrust over the introduction of vaccines against COVID, and what happened during the 1950's after the polio vaccine was introduced. Then there was a huge amount of acceptance. Some thought the vaccine was almost a gift from God. The vaccine reduced fear and increased trust of doctors and public health officials. Thank you to Braver Angels for help with making this episode. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Host Seth Boustead features a variety of pieces by composers who ask the performers to vocalize in some way while also playing their instrument. Music by Frederick Rzewski, George Crumb, Daniel Bernard Roumain and Tom Johnson.
Tom Johnson is our guide in this showcase of Mi'kmaq language, culture and community goings-on in Eskasoni and the rest of Unama'ki.
Today we'll be deep diving into one of five of the big themes in the Marketer's Toolkit 2025 for marketers in the EMEA region. Discussing the theme of the age of atomisation are Mark Anderson, customer and commercial consultant, and Tom Johnson, managing director at Trajectory. The Marketer's Toolkit 2025 is here: the fourteenth edition of the report draws out five major trends that will define strategic planning, based on an extensive global survey of practitioners. WARC members can read the full report here. If you're not yet a member, you can find a sample of the report here.
Nick is joined by broadcaster Matt Chapman to discuss the latest news and goings on from around the racing world. Joining the show today, guests include trainer Harry Fry, whose In Excelsis Deo looks to have a big chance in Cheltenham's December Gold Cup. Harry also has news of Gidleigh Park, plus has some strong feelings about racing at Sandown going ahead last weekend in spite of the weather warnings. Also today, Kim Bailey ponders tomorrow's Plan B with Chianti Classico, while Ascot's marketing supremo Tom Johnson enjoys the racecourses latest offering being awarded 'ad of the day in Campaign magazine and discusses the success of "The Ascot You." Michael Guerin drops in to discuss the banning of Greyhound Racing in New Zealand, while Ben and Molly are along with our Pointing Pointers which includes news of two new sponsorships from the NLD Podcast.
Nick is joined by broadcaster Matt Chapman to discuss the latest news and goings on from around the racing world. Joining the show today, guests include trainer Harry Fry, whose In Excelsis Deo looks to have a big chance in Cheltenham's December Gold Cup. Harry also has news of Gidleigh Park, plus has some strong feelings about racing at Sandown going ahead last weekend in spite of the weather warnings. Also today, Kim Bailey ponders tomorrow's Plan B with Chianti Classico, while Ascot's marketing supremo Tom Johnson enjoys the racecourses latest offering being awarded 'ad of the day in Campaign magazine and discusses the success of "The Ascot You." Michael Guerin drops in to discuss the banning of Greyhound Racing in New Zealand, while Ben and Molly are along with our Pointing Pointers which includes news of two new sponsorships from the NLD Podcast.
The Penney Hornets advances to their 6th state championship game in program history. On this show we have:History 2024 Season In Review Stat Leaders Player Interviews Coach Alex Lloyd Interview Adrian Preview and more * Radio Calls are courtesy of Tom Johnson and KTTN Sports * This episode is sponsored by Tolly & Associates, Little Caesars of St. Joseph, John Anderson Insurance, Meierhofer Funeral Home & Crematory, Musser Construction, HiHo Bar & Grill, Jayson & Mary Watkins, Matt & Jenni Busby, Michelle Cook Group, Russell Book & Bookball 365, The St. Joseph Mustangs, B's Tees, KT Logistics LLC., Hixson-Klein Funeral Home, James L. Griffith Law Firm of Maysville, Toby Prussman of Premier Land & Auction Group, Barnes Roofing, The St. Joseph School District, HK Quality Sheet Metal, Redman Farms of Maysville, Melissa Winn, Amber & Anthony Henke, Adams Bar & Grill, Green Hills Insurance LLC., Cintas, Thrive Family Chiropractic, IV Nutrition of St. Joseph, J.C's Hardwood Floors, Roth Kid Nation, Serve Link Home Care out of Trenton, Barnett's Floor Renewal LLC., Balloons D'Lux, B3 Renovations and Gabe Edgar *also want to thank the following Hamilton area businesses for their contributions as well that includes KC Flooring and Drywall , C&H Handyman Plumming of Hamilton, Robinson Welding & Repair LLC, Hamilton Bowl, The Hamilton Bank Member FDIC, Hamilton Nutrition, TOPsBBQ and the Caldwell County Abstract & Title Company LLC. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/cliffnotespod/support
In this episode of Maintainable, Robby speaks with Tom Johnson, Co-Founder and CEO of Multiplayer. Tom shares his perspectives on the evolving landscape of distributed systems, the challenges of maintaining legacy software, and how innovative tools are transforming the way teams collaborate.Topics DiscussedCharacteristics of well-maintained software, from system-level documentation to effective workflows.The importance of debugging tools tailored for distributed systems.Anecdotes about managing technical debt, including cutting off a CEO's database access.How auto-documentation and design branches in Multiplayer streamline team collaboration.Practical strategies for tackling technical debt and fostering developer morale.Key Takeaways[00:01:16] Defining Well-Maintained Software: Tom explains why documentation, tests, and collaborative workflows are essential.[00:06:14] The Case for Locking Down Production: Lessons learned from a humorous but cautionary tale.[00:18:11] Debugging Distributed Systems: How Multiplayer's tools simplify the debugging process.[00:25:00] Design Branches and Team Collaboration: Enhancing communication through shared documentation.[00:31:39] Prioritizing Technical Debt: Identifying customer and developer pain points.Resources MentionedMultiplayerTom Johnson on LinkedInTom Johnson on TwitterBook Recommendation: Making Comics by Scott McCloudThanks to Our Sponsor!Turn hours of debugging into just minutes! AppSignal is a performance monitoring and error-tracking tool designed for Ruby, Elixir, Python, Node.js, Javascript, and other frameworks.It offers six powerful features with one simple interface, providing developers with real-time insights into the performance and health of web applications.Keep your coding cool and error-free, one line at a time! Use the code maintainable to get a 10% discount for your first year. Check them out! Subscribe to Maintainable on:Apple PodcastsSpotifyOr search "Maintainable" wherever you stream your podcasts.Keep up to date with the Maintainable Podcast by joining the newsletter.
If system design is a team sport, then you need to make sure that your team has the tools they need to work together. In this episode, entrepreneur, CTO, and co-founder Tom Johnson joins us to discuss Multiplayer, a collaborative tool streamlining system design and documentation for developers. Multiplayer is often likened to “Figma for developers,” as it allows teams to map, document, and debug distributed systems visually and collaboratively. Tom shares his experience building this tool, drawing on years of backend development challenges, from debugging to coordinating across teams. We also discuss the business side of startups before learning about the AI features that they have planned for Multiplayer and how it will benefit users, including eliminating time-consuming “grunt work”. Join us to learn how Multiplayer is revolutionizing system design and get a sneak peek into the exciting AI-powered features on the horizon! Key Points From This Episode: Introducing Tom Johnson, co-founder of Multiplayer. An overview of Multiplayer and how it helps developers work on distributed systems. The teams and developers that will get the most use out of Multiplayer. Details on Multiplayer's debugging and auto-documentation tools. A breakdown of what distributed systems are in modern software development. Why Tom sees contemporary systems design as a team sport. Multiplier's whiteboard-type space and how it allows teams to collaborate. Tom's back-end developer experience and how it helped him create Multiplayer. How Tom co-founded Multiplayer with his wife, Steph Johnson, and her role as CEO. Why solving a problem you've personally experienced is a good starting point for startups. What you need to have before fundraising: a minimum viable product (MVP). How they used the open-source software, YJS, for virtual, real-time collaboration. Insights into Multiplayer's upcoming AI-powered features. Links Mentioned in Today's Episode: Thomas Johnson on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomjohnson3/) Thomas Johnson on X (https://x.com/tomjohnson3) Thomas Johnson on Threads (https://www.threads.net/@tomjohnson3?hl=en) Steph Johnson on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/steph-johnson-14355b3/) Multiplayer (https://www.multiplayer.app/) YJS (https://github.com/yjs/yjs) Figma (https://www.figma.com/) Chad Pytel on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/cpytel/) Chad Pytel on X (https://x.com/cpytel) thoughtbot (https://thoughtbot.com) thoughtbot on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/150727/) thoughtbot on X (https://twitter.com/thoughtbot) Giant Robots Smashing Into Other Giant Robots Podcast (https://podcast.thoughtbot.com/) Giant Robots Smashing Into Other Giant Robots Email (hosts@giantrobots.fm) Support Giant Robots Smashing Into Other Giant Robots (https://github.com/sponsors/thoughtbot)
In this episode of Now That's Significant, a market research podcast, host Michael Howard interviews Tom Johnson, Senior Director of Consumer Insight and Analytics at Jack in the Box and Del Taco, about his journey in market research and the importance of aligning insights with business goals. Tom, with 25 years of experience on both the agency and client side, shares valuable lessons learned from building the consumer insights function at Del Taco from the ground up and navigating the complexities of a merger with Jack in the Box. Here are five key takeaways from the episode: Passion for insights can stem from inspiring mentors: Tom's journey began with a college professor who ignited his interest in market research, highlighting the impact mentors can have on shaping careers. Understanding the full impact of insights requires client-side experience: Tom transitioned to the client side to gain a deeper understanding of how insights are used to drive business decisions. Cross-functional collaboration is essential for maximizing impact: Building relationships with stakeholders across different departments allows consumer insights to influence a wider range of decisions. Strategic prioritization is crucial for managing research budgets: A "barbell strategy," balancing high-impact strategic research with efficient, tactical research, helps optimize resource allocation. Adapting to evolving consumer behavior is key for success: Understanding the nuances of consumer behavior in a changing economic and social landscape is crucial for developing effective strategies. Tune in to this episode to learn more about Tom Johnson's insights on building a successful consumer insights function and navigating the challenges of the fast-food industry. *** Infotools Harmoni is a fit-for-purpose market research analysis, visualization, and reporting platform that gives the world's leading brands the tools they need to better understand their consumers, customers, organization, and market. www.infotools.com Established in 1990, we work with some of the world's top brands around the world, including Coca-Cola, Orange, Samsung, and Mondelēz. Our powerful cloud-based platform, Harmoni, is purpose-built for market research. From data processing to investigation, dashboards to collaboration, Harmoni is a true "data-to-decision-making" solution for in-house corporate insights teams and agencies. While we don't facilitate market research surveys, provide sample, or collect data, we make it easy for market researchers to find and share compelling insights that go over-and-above what stakeholders want, inspiring them to act decisively. One of the most powerful features of Harmoni is Discover, a time-tested, time-saving, and investigative approach to data analysis. Using automated analyses to reveal patterns and trends, Discover minimizes potential research bias by removing the need for requesting and manually analyzing scores of cumbersome crosstabs – often seeing what you can't. Discover helps you easily find what differentiates groups that matter to you, uncover what makes them unique, and deliver data points that are interesting, relevant, and statistically significant, plus see things others can't. Add to all this an impending GenAI feature, and you have an extremely powerful, future-proofed tool.
Send us a textSo, I've decided to start a series that will hopefully cover the country. I'm interested in how the state series for each state in the union is doing. Now what I mean is how have they been running, how many races they have, how many racers participate, how well is the series doing, what are some of the challenges they face and what does the future look for their particular state series. Since I live in Florida it would only be right to start right here. Thanks to Drew Motley, Tom Johnson and Domingos Lammoglia I was able to contact head official Bill Robins. Here's what I will tell you, Bill took me to school on how the series runs, how the tracks work together, ridership and the partnership between the Florida state series and USA BMX. Fit, Healthy & Happy Podcast Welcome to the Fit, Healthy and Happy Podcast hosted by Josh and Kyle from Colossus...Listen on: Apple Podcasts Spotify
“Dude, you know you can donate plasm…” Because of the obvious “Halloween tingle” wafting through the Bunkerpoon, we decided to finish out “the month of Halloween” with a rrrrrevisitation of the grrrrreen tinted, goth infused, Sabbath inspired doom metal druids hailing from Brooklyn, New York known as TYPE-O-NEGATIVE. To be fair, “technically” we have already done an INSIDE THE METAL featuring TYPE-O, but that's been (approximately) 3 years and 10 days ago, and A LOT has changed since then, not only with regard to the world at large but also with the quality of this podcast as well. Having said that, we felt that discussing more TYPE-O-NEGATIVE made perfect sense, as their catalog (and our podcast) is all about “thickness and girth.” HAPPY HALLOWEEN TO ALL!!! It's time to put on your “platfoam shoes” and get ready to r-r-r-r-r-roll your R's while trick or treating with “Tom Johnson” during our “pre-Chronicles Chronicles” Halloween event in the Bunkerpoon Dungeon. Remember that “Summer's Eve” is not the same as “Summer Breeze”, discover the proper way to prepare “a handheld” and JOIN US via the “Interdimensional Bunkerpoon Portal” as we go (BACK) INSIDE THE METAL (AGAIN) with TYPE-O-NEGATIVE. Visit www.metalnerdery.com/podcast for more on this episode Help Support Metal Nerdery https://www.patreon.com/metalnerderypodcast Leave us a Voicemail to be played on a future episode: 980-666-8182 Metal Nerdery Tees and Hoodies – metalnerdery.com/merch and kindly leave us a review and/or rating on the iTunes/Apple Podcasts - Spotify or your favorite Podcast app Listen on iTunes, Spotify, Podbean, or wherever you get your Podcasts. Follow us on the Socials: Facebook - Instagram - Twitter Email: metalnerdery@gmail.com Can't be LOUD Enough Playlist on Spotify Metal Nerdery Munchies on YouTube @metalnerderypodcast Show Notes: (00:01): “Only when you let me do #buttstuff …”/ #perfecttiming / “Just a minute…”/ “Why is yours always so sticky?”/ #markthetime / ***WARNING: #listenerdiscretionisadvised *** / “It's a button and it's a tingle…”/ ***WELCOME BACK TO THE METAL NERDERY PODCAST HERE IN THE BUNKERPOON DUNGEON!!!*** / #onmicburpASMR / #HalloweenTingle / “This is a #PreChronicles Chronicles…”/ #BritnyFox / “Bass is one thing but guitar!?”/ #TomJohnson / “Somebody's got the tickles…”/ #HAARP #pollen #ragweed / “I don't know if it's period weed or not…”/ #earbook #RHTS / “Ohh noooo….”/ #bunkerpoonportal / “That is NOT the docket…”/ “It's all the same…”/ “Let's give him a second…he's gotta get it worked out…you good buddy?” / #imacowboy / “He's a tall dude…”/ “Yeah, he had a nine-inch dick…”/ “You don't lead with that!”/ #RussellsReflectionsEarbookEdition / “Does this motherfucker EVER shut up!?” / #STFU / “Sometimes there is such a thing as bad publicity…”/ #Supergroup #VH1/ “If you could have a wife that's a #pornstar who would you pick?”/ #stagenames #personalitydisorders / “If I was gonna be #DickTaintler all the time…”/ #AngryDickTaintlerPodcast / “They both gotta be topless…with their buttholes showin'…”/ #buttholehair #butthairholes / “He had a Spanish name…” (16:45): “So he's halfway there…” / “Sounds more mobsterish…” / #RussellsReflectionsRepeated / “A week later…he was drowning in poon…”/ ***PATREON SHOUTOUTS!!!*** / #PatreonShoutouts / ***WE THANK OUR PATREONS AND IF YOU'D LIKE TO JOIN US ON THE PATREON, YOU CAN DO SO AT patreon.com/metalnerderypodcast *** / “Dude, that's about the gayest thing you've said on this show…”/ “Dude, you know you can donate plasm…”/ #plasma / “I get confused…”/ #gasmplasm or #plasmgasm / ***You can email us at metalnerdery@gmail.com or hit us up on the socials at #metalnerderypodcast OR you can give us a call and leave us a voicemail at 980-666-8182!!!*** / “What's the point?” / “What's weird about it?” / #RussellsReflectionsASMR #HorrorMovieASMR / “It's a little late for that…”/ #whatsitcalled? / “It's low budget, but it's fun…”/ “There's gotta be porn…”/ “I got a food thing to share…”/ #ZaxbysTacoReview / “They're sorta like dicks…”/ #unburdenedbywhathasbeen / “You smear it together…and then you fold and roll…”/ #foodreviewrage / “I don't want a whole #creampie of sour cream…”/ “That's why I've given up on #Chipotle…”/ #handheld / “#HalloweenDay …really?” / “Remember back in April-ish…”/ #ultrahammered #DamageInc #blackout #backscratch / “It was a gash…”/ “I wasn't babysitting you…” (32:24): #TheDocket METAL NERDERY PODCAST PRESENTS: TYPE-O-NEGATIVE – (BACK) INSIDE THE METAL (AGAIN) / “We did an #InsideTheMetal on #TypeONegative 3 years ago…”/ “We missed a bunch of things…” / #InsideTheMetalVolumeTwo / “This is much more #Carnivore than any of their other albums…”/ “What IS the cover on this?” / “What do you wanna hear!?” / Slow, Deep and Hard (1991) / XERO TOLERANCE / “And now, you die!” / #surfmurdermusic / “This is #HalloweenAsFuck right here…”/ “Oh I know what THAT is…”/ “It's kinda touchy racist…”/ “If they weren't lying political whores, they would be homeless…”/ The Origin of the Feces (1992) / “It was their #LiveUndead …” / ARE YOU AFRAID?/GRAVITY / “It sounds like #TheMasquerade to me…”/ “I'm just a fireball…”/ “What's the (guitar) amp on this one?” / “I can see God!” / “It was at #TheInternationalBallroom … the #WREKage benefit…”/ HEY PETE/PARANOID / “This is VERY different than what you're used to…” (50:11): Bloody Kisses (1993) / “Let's pretend your hand's a penis…”/ “I've thought about buying one of those things…” / “When #fuckbots become readily available and affordable…would you get one?” / “It's doing what she should be doing…”/ MACHINE SCREW / “No #cokelines for that one…that's a German girl…”/ CHRISTIAN WOMAN #CorpusChristi / “I love the birds…”/ “If they didn't have keyboards, it'd be a different band…”/ “We do need to play number 5…” / KILL ALL THE WHITE PEOPLE (“Not us, but the rest of ‘em…like 98% of ‘em…”) / “That's fucking #KISS dude…that song should be called KISS!!!” / BLOOD & FIRE / “The first album was basically the end of #Carnivore and the beginning of Type-O-Negative… (1:00:28): October Rust (1996) / BAD GROUND (“I get it…”) & UNTITLED / MY GIRLFRIEND'S GIRLFRIEND / “This organ sounds like Halloween…”/ “Maybe a second of the Neil Young cover on here…”/ “Well, so was Summer's Eve (?)…”/ “They're not cinnamon, dude…they're chocolate…”/ CINNAMON GIRL / “WTF happened to your voice?” / “I gotta tell y'all something real quick…”/ “There's gonna be a #splitter coming out of me later…”/ #ketoflu / “That was a long story to get to ‘this is pollen'…”/ “Well, we've all been going back and forth…”/ World Coming Down (1999) / “You've gotta open with SKIP IT…”/ “That's how you top Bad Ground…”/ ALL HALLOWS EVE / “I can totally do it with mucus…”/ #platfoamshoes / “I do…I look amazing.”/ “Across America, black haired tattooed chicks are dropping their panties…”/ “It's like Halloween Sabbath…”/ “You're saying they created their own #genre?” / “The 2nd time I did #LSD I was listening to this…”/ CREEPY GREEN LIGHT / “This is your favorite band and you're destroying this moment…”/ “That's Halloween all day…”/ “He does it effortlessly…”/ #rollingtheRs / The Least Worst Of (2000) / BLACK SABBATH (FROM THE SATANIC PERSPECTIVE) / “Oh it's thickness alright…girth, THAT is the sound of #TypeONegative…pure girth…”/ “I like the bubbles…”/ “They're singing in Latin now…”/ “Name that song, Billiam…” / #KillingYourselfToLive #FairiesWearBoots / “They throw in Sabbath references all day long…they opened the show with #Cornucopia…” / “When he opened for #Danzig…”/ “So when's the next #Doomsicle song?” (1:23:11): Life Is Killing Me (2003) / “My dick took out the whole centerfold…”/ “Guys are visual…”/ LESS THAN ZERO (
On budget day, Tom Johnson joins Malin Hay to discuss the revolution in numeracy and use of numbers in Early Modern England, from the black and white squares of the ‘reckoning cloth' to logarithmic calculating machines, as described in a new book by Jessica Marie Otis. How did the English go from seeing arithmetic as the province of tradespeople and craftsmen to valuing maths as an educational discipline? Tom and Malin consider the importance of the move from Roman to Arabic numerals in this ‘quantitative transformation' and the uses and abuses of statistics in the period.Find further reading on the episode page: https://lrb.me/earlymodernmathsSponsored links:Use the code 'LRB' to get £100 off Serious Readers lights here: https://www.seriousreaders.com/lrbTo find out about financial support for professional writers visit the Royal Literary Fund here: https://www.rlf.org.uk/Find out more about ACE Cultural Tours: https://aceculturaltours.co.ukDiscover the LRB's subscription podcast, Close Readings, and audiobooks here: https://lrb.me/audio Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
We introduce our new Mi'kmaw language series Na Teliag featuring Eskasoni's Tom Johnson.
Thanks for tuning in, gang! In this episode we're joined by special guest Tom Johnson, a great comedian and friend of the show. Tom performed in our January Meatball show to rave reviews. We sat down to discuss his recent trip to observe the eclipse, his career in teaching, and his thoughts on pre-historic humans. We had a blast sitting down with Tom and we hope you enjoy the episode. Go follow Tom on Instagram & Tik Tok @tomoftoday to see him do stand-up or watch some of his educational science videos! Also follow his educational science YouTube channel "Worlds on Earth"And don't forget to follow us on Instagram @meatballrollout to watch stand-up clips from our shows, get updates on upcoming events, or even DM us questions for our next pod! Thanks for listening! Meatball Messaging (say hi!)
People have a lot of complaints about media in these polarized times. Take your pick: The mainstream press is biased, elitist, sensationalistic, hyper-partisan. If you're on the right, you may believe that it deliberately enables falsehood. Today's guest is very much NOT on the right, but he agrees. Tom Johnson is a professor at the University of Texas at Austin School of Journalism and his book The Press and Democratic Backsliding makes the claim that media have failed democracy by losing control of the information landscape and allowing anti-democratic voices to thrive. In his view, the strength of the MAGA movement is not merely a cultural or political phenomenon. It's a failure of journalism. Those are fightin' words. Tom and I talk about the role of the press in spinelessly empowering authoritarianism, about the media's lopsided obsession with then-candidate Joe Biden's age, its bias towards conflict and negativity, and, finally, lest you entirely despair, what to do about it all. So there's hope.Website - free episode transcriptswww.in-reality.fmProduced by Sound Sapiensoundsapien.comAlliance for Trust in Mediaalliancefortrust.com
Listen to coverage from the 96th Texas FFA State Convention in Houston, Texas. In this episode, Adam Torres and Tom Johnson, Founder of Encino Landscape, Inc., explore the Texas FFA and Ducks Unlimited. Follow Adam on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/askadamtorres/ for up to date information on book releases and tour schedule. Apply to be a guest on our podcast: https://missionmatters.lpages.co/podcastguest/ Visit our website: https://missionmatters.com/ More FREE content from Mission Matters here: https://linktr.ee/missionmattersmedia
Our “Thank You, Stranger” series is about the people who come into our lives and lend a little support, maybe make our days a little brighter. This time, we'll hear about a young group of friends who wanted to take a trip together — and the Minnesotans who made it possible. Tom Johnson told his story to MPR News producer Alanna Elder.
Is reaching A+ quality always the right answer? What happens when you consider factors that are part of the system, and not just the product in isolation? In this episode, Bill Bellows and Andrew Stotz discuss acceptability versus desirability in the quality realm. TRANSCRIPT 0:00:02.5 Andrew Stotz: My name is Andrew Stotz and I'll be your host as we continue our journey into the teachings of Dr. W. Edwards Deming. Today, I'm continuing my discussion with Bill Bellows, who has spent 31 years helping people apply Dr. Deming's ideas to become aware of how their thinking is holding them back from their biggest opportunities. Today's episode, episode three, is Acceptability and Desirability. Bill, take it away. 0:00:28.1 Bill Bellows: Thank you, Andrew, and welcome back to our listeners. 0:00:30.7 AS: Oh, yeah. 0:00:31.4 BB: Hey, do you know how long we've been doing these podcasts? 0:00:36.6 AS: No. 0:00:40.8 BB: We started... Our very first podcast was Valentine's Day 2023. I was gonna say 2013. 2023, so roughly 17 months of podcast, Andrew. 0:00:53.4 AS: That was our first date, huh? 0:00:55.0 BB: Our first date was Valentine's Day 2023. 0:00:58.9 AS: All right. Don't tell your wife. [laughter] 0:01:03.1 BB: All right. And so along the way, I've shared reflections from my first exposures to Dr. Deming, as well as my first exposures to Genichi Taguchi. Talked about Edward de Bono, Tom Johnson, others, mentors, Bill Cooper, Phil Monroe, Gipsie Ranney was a great mentor. Last week, Andrew, while on vacation in New England with my wife, I visited for a day my 85-year-old graduate school advisor who I worked with for ten years, Bob Mayle, who lives in, I would say, the farthest reaches of Maine, a place called Roque Bluffs. Roque Bluffs. How's that for... That could be North Dakota. Roque Bluffs. He's in what they call Down East Maine. He's recently got a flip phone. He's very proud. He's got like a Motorola 1985 vintage flip phone. Anyway, he's cool, he's cool. He's... 0:02:15.9 AS: I'm just looking at that place on the map, and looks incredible. 0:02:19.0 BB: Oh, yeah. He's uh, until he got the phone, he was off the grid. We correspond by letters. He's no internet, no email. And he has electricity, lives in about an 800 square-foot, one-floor bungalow with his wife. This is the third time we've visited him. Every time we go up, we spend one day getting there, one day driving home from where my in-laws live in New York. And then one day with him, and the day ends with going to the nearby fisherman's place. He buys us fresh lobster and we take care of them. [chuckle] 0:03:01.3 AS: Yeah, my sister lives in Kennebunk, so when I go back to the US, I'm... 0:03:08.8 BB: Yeah, Kennebunk is maybe 4 hours away on that same coast. 0:03:15.3 AS: I'm just looking at the guide and map book for Roque Bluffs' State Park, and it says, "a beautiful setting with oceanfront beach, freshwater pond, and hiking trails." 0:03:25.9 BB: Yeah, he's got 10 acres... No, he's got, I think, 20, 25 acres of property. Sadly, he's slowly going blind. He has macular degeneration. But, boy, for a guy who's slowly going blind, he and I went for a walk around his property for a couple hours, and it's around and around... He's holding branches from hitting me, I'm holding branches from hitting him and there's... Let alone the terrain going up and down, you gotta step up and over around the rocks and the pine needles and all. And it was great. It was great. The week before, we were close to Lake George, which is a 32-mile lake in Upstate New York. And what was neat was we went on a three-hour tour, boat ride. And on that lake, there are 30 some islands of various sizes, many of them owned by the state, a number of them owned privately. Within the first hour, we're going by and he points to the island on the left and he says it was purchased in the late '30s by Irving Langmuir. Yeah, so he says, "Irving Langmuir," and I thought, I know that name from Dr. Deming. That name is referenced in The New Economics. 0:04:49.1 BB: In fact, at the opening of Chapter Five of The New Economics, the title is 'Leadership.' Every chapter begins with a quote, right? Chapter Five quote is, "You cannot plan to make a discovery," so says Irving Langmuir. So what is... The guy's describing this island purchased back in the late '30s by Langmuir for like $5,000. I think it's... I don't know if he still owns it, if it's owned by a nonprofit. It's not developed. It's privately held. I'm trying, I wrote to Langmuir's grandson who did a documentary about him. He was a Nobel Prize-winning physicist from GE's R&D center in Schenectady, New York, which is a couple hours south of there. But I'm certain, and I was looking for it earlier, I know I heard of him, of Irving Langmuir through Dr. Deming. And I believe in his lectures, Deming talked about Langmuir's emphasis on having fun at work, having fun. And so I gotta go back and check on that, but I did some research after the day, and sure enough came across some old videos, black and white videos that Langmuir produced for a local television station, talking about his... There's like show and tell with him in the laboratory. And in there, he talks about joy and work and all that. 0:06:33.5 BB: So I'm thinking, that's pretty cool. So I'm waiting to hear from his grandson. And ideally, I can have a conversation with his grandson, introduce him to Kevin and talk about Deming's work and the connection. Who knows what comes out of that? Who knows? Maybe an interview opportunity with you and Irving Langmuir's grandson. So, anyway. 0:06:52.7 AS: Fantastic. 0:06:54.7 BB: But going back to what I mentioned earlier in my background in association with Deming and whatnot, and Taguchi, and I offer these comments to reinforce that while my interests in quality were initially all things Taguchi, and then largely Deming, and it wasn't long before I stopped, stepped back and an old friend from Rocketdyne 20 some years ago started focusing on thinking about thinking, which he later called InThinking. And it's what others would call awareness of our... Well, we called it... Rudy called it, better awareness of our thinking patterns, otherwise known as paradigms, mental models. We just like the way of explaining it in terms of becoming more aware of our thinking patterns. And I say that because... And what I'm presenting relative to quality in this series, a whole lot of what I'm focusing on is thinking about thinking relative to quality. 0:07:58.8 BB: And so last time, we talked about the eight dimensions of quality from David Garvin, and one of them was acceptability. And that is this notion in quality, alive and well today, Phil Crosby has created this focus on achieving zero defects. Everything meets the requirements, that gets us into the realm, everything is good. Dr. Deming and his red bead experiments talked about red beads and white beads. The white beads is what we're striving for. All the beads are good. The red beads represent defects, things we don't want. And that's this... Thinking wise, that's a thinking pattern of "things are good or bad." Well, then we can have high quality, low quality and quality. But at Rocketdyne, when I started referring to that as category thinking, putting things into categories, but in the world of quality, there's only two categories, Andrew: good and bad. This either meets requirements or it doesn't. And if it's good, then we're allowed to pass it on to the next person. If we pass it on and it's not good, then they're going to send it back to us and say, "Uh-uh, you didn't meet all the requirements." And what I used to do in class, I would take something, a pen or something, and I would go to someone in the seminar and I'd say, "If I hand this to you and it doesn't meet requirements, what are you going to say?" You're gonna say, "I'm not going to take it. It hasn't met the requirements." 0:09:36.4 BB: And I would say you're right. All the I's are not dotted, all the T's are not crossed, I'm not taking it. Then I would take it back and I'd say, "Okay, now what if I go off and dot all those I's and cross all those T's?" Then I would hand them the pen or whatever the thing was, and I'd say, "If all those things have been met," now we're talking acceptability. "Now, what do you say?" I said, "Can you reject it?" "No." I say, "So what do you say now that all those things... If you're aware that all those requirements have been met, in the world of quality, it is as good, now what do you say?" And they look at me and they're like, "What do I say?" I say, "Now you say, thank you." But what I also do is one more time... And I would play this out to people, I'd say, "Okay, Andrew, one more time. I hand you the pen, Andrew, all the requirements are met. And what do you say?" And you say, "Thank you." And I say, "What else just happened when you took it?" 0:10:45.4 AS: You accepted it. 0:10:47.3 BB: Yes. And I say, "And what does that mean?" "I don't know. What does that mean?" I said, "It means if you call me the next day and say, I've got a problem with this, you know what I'm going to say, Andrew?" 0:10:58.5 AS: "You accepted it." 0:11:01.5 BB: Right. And so, what acceptability means is don't call me later and complain. [laughter] So, I get a photo of you accepting it, you're smiling. So if you call me back the next day and say, "I've got a problem with this," I'd say, "No, no, no." So acceptability as a mental model is this idea that once you accept it, there's no coming back. If you reveal to me issues with it later, I deny all that. I'd say, I don't know what your problem with Andrew... It must be a problem on your end, because what I delivered to you is good. And if it is good, then there can't be any problems associated with it. So, if there are problems, have to be on your end, because defect-free, everything good, implies, ain't no problems, ain't no issues with it. I'm thinking of that Disney song, trouble-free mentality, Hakuna Matata. [chuckle] 0:12:04.5 BB: But now I go back to the title, Acceptability and Desirability. One of Dr. Deming's Ph.D. students, Kauro [actually, Kosaku] Yoshida, he used to teach at Cal State Dominguez Hills back in the '80s, and I think sometime in the '90s, he went to Japan. I don't know if he was born and raised in Japan, but he was one of Dr. Deming's Ph.D. students, I believe, at NYU. Anyway, I know he's a Ph.D. student of Dr. Deming, he would do guest lectures in Dr. Deming's four-day seminars in and around Los Angeles. And, Yoshida is known for this saying that Americans are all about acceptability meets requirements, and the Japanese are about desirability. And what is that? Well, it's more than meeting requirements. And, I wanna get into more detail on that in future episodes. But for now, we could say acceptability is meeting requirements. In a binary world, it can be really hard to think of, if everything's met requirements, how do I do better than that? How do I continue to improve if everything meets requirements? Well, one clue, and I'll give a clue, is what I shared with the senior most ranking NASA executive responsible for quality. 0:13:46.4 BB: And this goes back to 2002 timeframe. And we had done some amazing things with desirability at Rocketdyne, which. is more than meeting requirements. And the Vice President of Quality at Rocketdyne knew this guy at NASA headquarters, and he says, "You should go show him what we're doing." So I called him up a week in advance of going out there. I had made the date, but I figured if I'm going to go all the way out there, a week in advance, I called him up just to make sure he knew I was coming. And he said something like, "What are we going to talk about?" He said something like, "We're going to talk about that Lean or Six Sigma stuff?" And I said, "No, more than that." And I think I described it as, we're going to challenge the model of interchangeable parts. And he's like, "Okay, so what does that mean?" So the explanation I gave him is I said, "What letter grade is required for everything that NASA purchases from any contractor? What letter grade is ostensibly in the contract? What letter grade? A, B, C, D. What letter grade is in the contract?" And he says, "Well, A+." [laughter] 0:15:01.2 BB: And I said, "A+ is not the requirement." And he's like, "Well, what do you mean?" I said, "It's a pass-fail system." That's what acceptability is, Andrew. Acceptability is something is either good or bad, and if it's bad, you won't accept it. But if it's good, if I dot all the I's and cross all the T's, you will take it. It has met all the requirements. And that gets into what I talked about in the first podcast series of what I used to call the first question of quality management. Does this quality characteristic, does the thrust of this engine, does the roughness of this surface, does the diameter of this hole, does the pH of this bath meet requirements? And there's only two answers to that question, yes or no. And if yes is acceptable, and if no, that's unacceptable. And so I pointed out to him, much to his chagrin, is that the letter grade requirement is not A+, it's D- or better. [chuckle] And so as a preview of we'll get into in a future podcast, acceptability could be, acceptability is passing. And this guy was really shocked. I said, "Procurement at NASA is a pass-fail system." 0:16:21.9 BB: Every element of anything which is in that system purchased by NASA, everything in there today meets a set of requirements, is subject to a set of requirements which are met on a pass-fail basis. They're either, yes, it either meets requirements, acceptable, or not. That's NASA's, the quality system used by every NASA contractor I'm aware of. Boeing's advanced quality system is good parts and bad parts. Balls and strikes. And so again, for our viewers, acceptability is a pass-fail system. And what Yoshida... You can be thinking about what Yoshida's talked about, is Japanese companies. And again, I think it's foolish to think of all Japanese companies, but back in the '80s, that's really the way it came across, is all Japanese companies really have this figured out, and all American companies don't. I think that's naive. But nonetheless, what he's talking about is shifting from a pass-fail system, that's acceptability, to, let's say, letter grades of A's or B's. That would be more like desirability, is that it's not just passing, but an A grade or a B grade or a C grade. So that's, in round terms, a preview of Yoshida... A sense of, for this episode, of what I mean by acceptability and desirability. 0:17:54.7 BB: In the first podcast which was posted the other day, I made reference to, instead of achieving acceptability, now I can use that term, instead of achieving zero defects as the goal, in the world of acceptability, once we continuously improve and achieve acceptability, now everything is passing, not failing. This is in a world of what I refer to as category thinking, putting things in categories. In the world of black and white, black is one category, white is a category. You got two categories, good and bad. If everything meets requirements, how do you continuously improve if everything is good? Well, part of the challenge is realize that everything is good has variation in terms... Now we could talk about the not all letter grade A, and so we could focus on the things that are not A's and ask the question, is an A worthwhile or not? But what I was saying in the first podcast is my admiration for Dr. Deming's work uniquely... And Dr. Deming was inspired towards this end by Dr. Taguchi, and he gave great credit to that in Chapter Ten of The New Economics. And what I don't see in Lean nor Six Sigma, nor Lean/Six Sigma, nor Operational Excellence, what I don't see anywhere outside of Dr. Deming's work or Dr. Taguchi's work is anything in quality which is more than acceptability. 0:19:32.0 BB: It's all black and white. Again, Boeing's Advanced Quality System is good parts and bad parts. Now, again, I'm not suggesting that there's anything wrong with that. And I would also suggest in a Deming-based organization there may be characteristics for which all we need is that they're good. We don't need to know how good they are, we don't need to know the letter grade. And why is that? Because maybe it's not worth the trouble to discern more than that. And this is where I use the analogy of balls and strikes or kicking the ball into the net. If you've got an open net... That's Euro Cup soccer. There's no reason to be precisely placing the ball. All you want to do is get it into the net. And that's an area of zero defects, maybe all that is worthwhile, but there could be other situations where I want the ball in a very particular location in the strike zone. That's more of this desirability sense. So I want to clarify for those who listened to the first podcast, is what I'm inferring is I'm not aware of any quality management system, any management system in which, inspired by Dr. Deming and Taguchi, we have the ability to ask the question, is acceptability all that is required? 0:20:55.7 BB: And it could be for a lot of what we do, acceptability is not a bad place to be. But I'm proposing that as a choice, that we've thought about it and said, "You know what? In this situation, it's not worth, economically, the extra effort. And so let's put the extra effort into the things where it really matters." And if it doesn't... So use desirability where it makes sense, use acceptability elsewhere. Right now, what I see going on in organizations unaware of Dr. Deming's work, again, Dr. Taguchi's work, is that they're really blindly focusing on acceptability. And I think what we're going to get into is, I think there's confusion in desirability. But again, I want to keep that for a later episode. Now, people will say, "Well, Bill, the Six Sigma people are about desirability." No, the Six Sigma people have found a new way to define acceptability. And I'll give you one other fun story. When I taught at Northwestern's Kellogg Business School back in the late '90s, and I would start these seminars off by saying, "We're going to look at quality management practices, past, present, future." And so one year, I said, "So what quality management practices are you aware of?" And again, these are students that have worked in industry for five or six years. 0:22:17.6 BB: They've worked at GM, they worked at General Electric, they worked for Coca Cola, banking. These are sharp, sharp people. But you got into the program having worked somewhere in the world, in industry, so they came in with experience. And so they would say, zero defect quality is a quality management practice. And I'd say, "Okay, so where'd that come from?" And again, this is the late '90s. They were aware of the term, zero defects. They didn't know it was Philip Crosby, who I learned yesterday was... His undergraduate degree is from a school of podiatry. I don't know if he was a podiatrist, but he had an undergraduate... A degree in podiatry, somebody pointed out to me. Okay, fine. But Philip Crosby, his big thing was pushing for zero defects. And you can go to the American Society for Quality website to learn more about him. Philip Crosby is the acceptability paradigm. So, students would bring him up and I'd say, "Okay, so what about present? What about present?" And somebody said, "Six Sigma Quality." So I said, "So what do you know about Six Sigma Quality?" And somebody said," Cpk's of 2.00." And I said, "So what's... " again, in a future episode, we could talk about Cpk's." 0:23:48.5 AS: But I said to the guy, "Well, what's the defect rate for Six Sigma... For Cpk's or Six Sigma Quality or Cpk's of 2?" And very matter of factly, he says, "3.4 defects per million." So I said, "How does that compare to Phil Crosby's quality goal from 1962? Here we are, 1997, and he's talking about Motorola and Six Sigma Quality, a defect goal of 3.4 defects per million. And I said, "How does that compare to Phil Crosby's quality goal of zero defects in 1962?" And the guy says... [chuckle] So cool, he says, "Well, maybe zero is not worth achieving." 'Cause again, zero was the goal in 1962. Six Sigma sets the goal for 3.4 per million. Not zero, 3.4, to which this guy says... And I thought it was so cool, he says, "Well, maybe zero is not worth achieving." So, there. Well, my response was, "Well, what makes 3.4 the magic number for every process in every company around the world? So, what about that?" To which the response was crickets. But what I want to point out is we're still talking about zero... I mean 3.4 is like striving towards zero and admitting some. It is another way of looking at acceptability. It is... And again, and people claim it's really about desirability. I think, well, there's some confusion in desirability and my hope in this episode is to clear up some of that misunderstanding in acceptability as well as in desirability. And they... Let me just throw that out. 0:25:58.1 AS: Yeah, there's two things that I want to say, and the first one is what he should have replied is, for those older people listening or viewing that can remember the movie, Mr. Mom with Michael Keaton, I think it was. And he should have replied, "220, 221, whatever it takes." And he should have said, "Well, yeah, 3.4, 3.5, 3.6. It's could be around there." 0:26:27.5 BB: Well, the other thing is, why we're on that is... And I think this is... I'm really glad you brought that up, is, what I would push back on the Lean and the Six Sigma, those striving for zero defects or Cpk's of 2 or whatever they are is, how much money are we going to spend to achieve a Cpk of 2, a zero defects? And again, what I said and... Well, actually, when I posted on LinkedIn yesterday, "I'm okay with a quality goal of 3.4 defects per million." What I'm proposing is, instead of blindly saying zero defects is the goal and stop, or I want Cpk's of 1.33 or whatever they are everywhere in the organization, in terms of the economics of variation or the new economics, is how much money are we going to spend to achieve zero or 3.4 or whatever it is? And, is it worth the return on the investment? And this is where Dr. Taguchi's loss function comes in. 0:27:49.2 BB: And so what I'm proposing, inspired by Genichi Taguchi and W. Edwards Deming is, let's be thinking more about what is... Let's not blindly stop at zero, but if we choose to stop at zero, it's an economic choice that it's not worth the money at this time in comparison to other things we could be working on to improve this quality characteristic and that we've chosen to be here... Because what I don't want people to think is what Dr. Deming and Taguchi are talking about is we can spend any amount of money to achieve any quality goal without thinking of the consequences, nor thinking about, how does this goal on this thing in isolation, not make things bad elsewhere. So we have to be thinking about a quality goal, whether it's worth achieving and will that achievement be in concert with other goals and what we're doing there? That's what I'd like people thinking about as a result of this podcast tonight. 0:28:56.0 AS: And I think I have a good way of wrapping this up, and that is going back to Dr. Deming's first of his 14 Points, which is, create constancy of purpose towards improvement of product and service with the aim to become competitive, to stay in business, and to provide jobs. And I think that what that... I link that to what you're saying with the idea that we're trying to improve our products and services constantly. We're not trying to improve one process. And also, to become competitive in the market means we're improving the right things because we will become more competitive if we are hitting what the client wants and appreciates. And so... Yeah. 0:29:46.3 BB: But with regard to... Absolutely with regard to our customers, absolutely with regard to how it affects different aspects of our company, that we don't get head over heels in one aspect of our company and lose elsewhere, that we don't deliver A+ products to the customer in a losing way, meaning that the A+ is great for you, but financially, we can't afford currently... Now, again, there may be a moment where it's worthwhile to achieve the A... We know we can achieve the A+, but we may not know how to do it financially. We may have the technology to achieve that number. Now, we have to figure out, is, how can we do it in an economically advantaged way, not just for you, the customer, but for us. Otherwise, we're losing money by delivering desirability. So it's gotta work for us, for you, but it's also understanding how that improvement... That improvement of that product within your overall system might not be worthwhile to your customer, in which case we're providing a... The classic... 0:31:18.8 AS: You're not becoming competitive then. 0:31:21.8 BB: The better buggy whip. But that gets into looking at things as a system. And this is... What's invaluable is, all of this is covered with a grasp of the System of Profound Knowledge. The challenge is not to look at goals in isolation. And even I've seen people at Lean conferences quote Dr. Deming and his constancy of purpose and I thought, well, you can have a... A non-Deming company has a constancy of purpose. [chuckle] The only question is, what is the purpose? [laughter] And that's when I thought, a constancy of purpose on a focus on acceptability is good provided all of your competitors are likewise focusing on acceptability. So I just be... I just am fascinated to find people taking Deming's 14 Points one at a time, out of context, and just saying, "Well, Dr. Deming said this." Well, there we go again. [laughter] 0:32:29.9 AS: Bill, on behalf of everyone at The Deming Institute, I want to thank you again for this discussion. For listeners, remember to go to deming.org to continue your journey. If you want to keep in touch with Bill, just find him on LinkedIn. This is your host, Andrew Stotz. And I'll leave you with one of my favorite quotes from Dr. Deming, "People are entitled to joy in work."
Episode 340 of The VentureFizz Podcast features Steph Johnson, Co-Founder & CEO at Multiplayer. Steph is an inspiration. As discussed in this interview, her background might not be the prototypical tech CEO profile for a few reasons. First, she came up through the agency world and then ran comms in-house for major tech companies like DigitalOcean and MongoDB. Second, she is a female founder of a dev tools platform startup and yes, we need more female founders. And third, she has a neurological condition called Tourette Syndrome. All of these factors have ultimately given her unique skills to thrive in her current role. Multiplayer is a visual collaborative platform that makes it easy for engineering teams to design, develop, and manage distributed software. The company is venture backed and on a mission to create better ways for developers to work. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * Steph's background story and how she got her career started with agencies in NYC. * Her decision to move in-house to run comms at DigitalOcean and MongoDB, plus what she learned at each company like the importance of a developer community. * Advice for making the shift from agency to in-house roles. * Founding Multiplayer with Tom Johnson, her Co-Founder, CTO, and husband… and why being married was a strategic advantage when they raised capital. * The details on the Mutliplayer platform and its beta release. * Advice on the storytelling element for a company building technical products. * And so much more.
In our season finale, we pay tribute to Tom Johnson, a distinguished bird expert and an exceptional human being, who passed away unexpectedly in 2023. Tom was a guiding light in the birding community, known for his profound knowledge, infectious enthusiasm, and unwavering dedication to bird conservation and science. This episode features an interview with Tom, recorded shortly before his passing.Listen to the American Birding Association's podcast tribute to Tom here. Learn more about Tom's impact on the birding community here and here in these two remembrance articles. Imagine yourself birding with Tom with this multimedia trip report he created about his 2023 Field Guides tour to Nome, Alaska. And with that, folks, we're closing out for a short summer break. Thanks for listening to Life List and we'll be back in July with season five!Get more Life list by subscribing to our newsletter and joining our Patreon for bonus content. Talk to us and share your topic ideas at lifelistpodcast.com. Thanks to Kowa Optics for sponsoring our podcast!
How do you know that the learning you and your colleagues are doing is leading to changes in behavior? In this episode, Bill and Andrew discuss little tests you can do to see if the transformation you're working toward is really happening. 0:00:02.0 Andrew Stotz: My name is Andrew Stotz and I'll be your host as we continue our journey into the teachings of Dr. W. Edwards Deming. Today, I'm continuing my discussion with Bill Bellows, who has spent 30 years helping people apply Dr. Deming's ideas to become aware of how their thinking is holding them back from their biggest opportunity. Today is episode 22, and the title is, Test for Understanding Transformation. Bill, take it away. 0:00:30.7 Bill Bellows: Hey, we've been at this podcast for about a year now, right? 0:00:36.6 AS: It's incredible how long it's been. 0:00:39.8 BB: And in the beginning you said, I've been at this for 30 years, right? 0:00:43.7 AS: Yeah. [laughter] 0:00:46.7 BB: Maybe we should change that to 31. 0:00:48.3 AS: Oh, man, there you go. 0:00:51.2 BB: All right. 0:00:53.0 AS: That reminds me of the joke of the janitor at the exhibition of the dinosaurs and the group of kids was being led through the museum and their guide had to run to the bathroom. And so they were looking at this dinosaur and they asked the janitor, "How old is that dinosaur?" And he said, "Well, that dinosaur is 300,032 years old." "Oh, how do they know it so exactly?" He said, "Well, it was 300,000 when I started working here 30 years ago." [laughter] 0:01:28.8 AS: So there we are. 0:01:31.4 BB: That's great. 0:01:33.3 AS: Thirty-one years. 0:01:34.0 BB: All right, all right, all right. So first thing I wanna say is, as you know and our listeners know, I go back and listen to this podcast and I interact with people that are listening too, and I get some feedback. And in episode 19, I said the Germans were developing jet engines in the late 1940s. No, it turns out the Germans were developing jet engines in the late 1930s and they had a fighter plane with a turbine engine, a developmental engine in the late '30s. They didn't get into full-scale development and production. Production didn't start till the tail end of the war. But anyway, but I was off by a decade. In episode 21, I mentioned that checks were awarded within Rocketdyne for improvement suggestions and individuals who submitted this and it could be for an individual, maybe it was done for two people, three people, I don't know, but they got 10% of the annual savings on a suggestion that was implemented in a one-time lump sum payment. 0:02:36.1 BB: So you got 10% of the savings for one year and I thought, imagine going to the president of the company and let's say I walk into the president's office and you're my attorney. And I walk in and I say, "Hey, Mr. President, I've got a suggestion. You know that suggestion program?" He says, "Yeah, yeah, yeah. Come on in, come on in. And who's this guy with you?" "Well that's Andrew Stotz." "And who's Andrew?" "He's my attorney, and he and I have been thinking about what this is worth." "Well, tell me about it." "No, well, before we get into it, we've got this form to sign here." 0:03:10.9 AS: Andrew. 0:03:11.1 BB: "Right? And you wanna see the idea or not? But we don't have to share it." But I thought, imagine people going to great length and really taking advantage of it. Well, a few of us that were involved in our InThinking Roadmap training, what we started to propose is we want a piece of the action, Andrew. So the proposal we had is that, Andrew, if you come to one of our classes, a study session on The New Economics or Managing Variation of a System, we'll have you sign a roster, right? And so if you are ever given a check for big numbers, Andrew, then we're gonna claim that our training contributed to your idea and all we ask is 10%, right? 0:03:58.1 AS: Of your 10%. 0:04:00.9 BB: I mean, I think that's fair, right? But imagine everybody in the organization becoming a profit center. 0:04:08.7 AS: Crazy. 0:04:10.4 BB: That's what you get. All right. 0:04:14.5 AS: And the lesson from that is focus on intrinsic motivation. People wanna make improvements, they wanna contribute. 0:04:23.8 BB: You start... You go down the slippery slope of incentives, which will be part of what we look at later. There's just no end to that. All right? 0:04:31.4 AS: Yeah. 0:04:32.2 BB: So I mentioned in a previous podcast that I had an interaction, met the army's first woman four-star general, and I just wanna give you some more background and interesting things that happened with her relative to this test for understanding transformation. I don't know April, May, 2008, someone on her staff reached out to me and when they first... When the guy got a hold of me, I said... From the Pentagon, he called me, I think it was like 8:00 or 9:00 o'clock at night here. Whatever it was, it was after hours in LA so it was after hours in DC. I remember saying to the guy, "How did you find me?" He says, "There's a lot of stuff on the internet." So he says, "I came across a presentation you did for Goodwill Industries." And he says, "In there you talk about... " He says, "There's some really good stuff in there." 0:05:29.0 BB: And I said, "Like what?" He said, "You have a slide in there about you can minimize loss to society by picking up nails in a parking lot." And that was an example of what I used Dr. Taguchi's work, minimizing loss to society. I said, "Yeah, I remember that slide." He says, "We don't do enough of that in the Army." And he says, "Hey, we've got a conference next week, late notice. The keynote speaker bailed out." And he's calling me on a Monday. The presentation's a week from Wednesday and he says... And also he said that the Army had an initiative called Enterprise Thinking and Enterprise Thinking was part of what we called our effort within Rocketdyne. We used the terms Enterprise Thinking, organizational awareness, and that InThinking personal awareness. We were using those two terms. So he did a search on that, found my name, and he says, "What do you think?" And he says, "We're gonna... " 0:06:24.3 BB: If I agree, we'll have a follow-up vetting call the next day. So he calls me up the next day and it's him and a two-star general. There are three people in the room, all senior officers, and he says, "Okay, so, but tell us what you do." So I shared the last... It sounds funny, is what seems to have been the last straw in their interest was having me speak, was my last straw story. Remember the executive from the European airline and... Right? So I tell that story about my efforts within Rocketdyne and Boeing about this airline executive and how this deeply resonated with this executive of this customer of this company that buys a lot of Boeing airplanes that we focused on the one cause, not the greater system. 0:07:13.2 BB: And within minutes of sharing that story, they started laughing, leading to it a few minutes later to them saying, "you're the one." 0:07:19.2 AS: [laughter] That's very interesting. 0:07:21.3 BB: You're the one. So for our listeners, I'd say, let this be a reminder of how a personal story guided by insights on how Dr. Deming's System of Profound Knowledge can open doors for you. And you can use that story, come up with your own stories, but you just never know when you're gonna be in a situation where you need a really simple story. So as an aside, they contact me, like I mentioned, 10 years later, and I think I shared with you offline that the speaker I was replacing was the great Richard Rumelt, the strategy professor from UCLA, who for whatever reason needed to bail out. And then when this podcast is posted, I'll put a link to the slides of the presentation. 0:08:05.7 BB: It's about 45 minutes long. What was not covered... I went back and looked at it earlier to say, what did I share with them that got them so excited? All I know is it fit into 45 minutes to an hour. What was not covered was the trip reports, whether Red Pen or Blue Pen, Last Straw/All Straw, Me/We organizations. But after it was done, as I'm coming off the stage, General Dunwoody in uniform comes up to me. She was thrilled. Her exact words were, "You hit it." She says, "Bill, you hit it out of the park." And I thought, well, I had help from a lot of people. She then says something to me that I'll never forget. So we're face-to-face, right? Let me just... Right? 0:08:45.1 BB: And she says to me, "Bill, you've got a real challenge on your hands. Bill, you've got a real challenge on your hands." So prompted by that, I held my hand out, my right hand, which is what you do to initiate a handshake, and then she reaches out to shakes my hand and I said, "General Dunwoody, we have a challenge on our hands." [laughter] And she erupted in laughter. And my only regret, even though we went out for drinks for the next couple of hours, but my regret was not having a photo of her and I doing a double high five as she laughed. So then I remained in touch with her for the next six to eight months when she was promoted to four-star and she looked for opportunities to get me to the Pentagon, which she did. And I was trying to get her or somebody on her staff to come to Rocketdyne to learn more about what we're doing. 0:09:38.1 BB: But I say I share this anecdote as an example of a Test for Understanding of a transformation. So what is a TFU, test for understanding? This is something I got exposed to in my Kepner-Tregoe Problem Solving and Decision Making training, which I talked about in one of the first episodes. And in our training to deliver what was then a five-day course, we were coached on how to interact with seminar attendees, including how to answer questions and how to ask questions. And one of the things we got our knuckles wrapped for was saying, are there any questions? Because no one answers that. There is... And if I had said that when I was being certified, I'd have failed. So instead we're coached on how to ask questions or make comments, which serve as a test for someone's understanding of what I presented. 0:10:27.9 BB: For example, for me to reply to General Dunwoody with we have a challenge on our hands was to test her understanding of what I said and her laughter is a response that I could be expecting with something short. As an aside, an appreciation, we've talked about Ackoff's D-I-K-U-W model data, raw data information. You turn that into what, where, when, extent, knowledge. If we convert that to how does something operate looking inside of an automobile, how do the pieces work together? Remember he said understanding is when you look outward 'cause knowledge looking inward, Russ would say, doesn't tell you why the car is designed for four passengers. That comes from looking outward. And then wisdom is what do we do with all this? Well, the Kepner-Tregoe training was Test for Understanding and now that I'm inspired by Ackoff, well in my university classes, I ask "Test for Information" classes. I have them watch videos and say, what company was Russ working for? 0:11:31.1 BB: This anecdote, that's information. Nothing wrong with those questions. I can ask for "Test for Knowledge" questions asking how something operates. So what I don't know is like, why are they called Test for Understanding? They could be Test for Knowledge, Test for Information, Test for Wisdom. And obviously TFI test for information could be true, false, multiple choice and test for knowledge and understanding could be short, but then I want to go deeper. And so what I wanna share is in one of my university courses, I share the following, true, you can't make it up news stories. It says, once upon a time a national airline came in dead last on on-time performance one month even though it had offered its employees everything from cash to pizza to finish first in the US Department of Transportation's monthly rankings. Does that sound like incentives, Andrew? 0:12:33.0 AS: It's all there. 0:12:33.8 BB: If we finish first, pizza parties. Now if they got exposed to Rocketdyne, they'd be handing out checks for $10,000. So in one of the research essays, for a number of the courses, every week, every module, I give them a research essay very similarly, giving them a situation and then what's going on with the questions is having them think about what they've been exposed to so far. And so question one in this assignment is given this account, list five assumptions that were made by the management team of this airline? And so I just wanna share one student's response. He says, "assumption one..." And also let me say this comes from the second of two Deming courses I do. So these students have been exposed to a one, one-semester course prior to this. So this is not intro stuff. This is getting deep into it. 0:13:34.3 BB: And so anyway he says, "assumption one, offering incentives like cash and pizza would motivate employees to prioritize on-time performance." Okay? That's an assumption. "Assumption two, employee morale and satisfaction directly correlate with on-time performance. Assumption three, the issue of on-time performance primarily stems from..." Are you ready? "Employee motivation or effort. The incentives provided were perceived as valuable by employees." And you're gonna love where this goes. "Assumption five, employees have significant control over factors that influence on-time performance such as aircraft maintenance, air traffic control and weather conditions." 0:14:20.2 AS: Good answers. 0:14:23.0 BB: Again, what I think is cool and for our listeners is what you're gonna get in question two, three, four, and five is builds upon a foundation where these students have, for one and a half semesters been exposed to Deming, Taguchi, Ackoff, Gipsie Ranney, Tom Johnson, the System of Profound Knowledge, hours and hours of videos. And so this is my way of Testing their Understanding. And so if you're a university professor, you might find interest in this. If you're within an organization, this could be a sense of how do you know what people are hearing in your explanations of Deming's work or whatever you're trying to bring to your organization? So anyway, I then have them read a blog at a Deming Institute link, and I'll add this blog when this is posted but it's deming.org/the insanity of extrinsic motivation. All right. And they've been exposed to these concepts but I just said, "Hey, go off and read this blog." And it was likely a blog by John Hunter. 0:15:32.0 AS: Yep. 0:15:32.2 BB: All right, question two. All right. Now it gets interesting, is that "in appreciation of Edward de Bono's, "Six Thinking Hats"," which they've been exposed to, "and the Yellow Hat, which is the logical positive, why is this such a great idea? Listen, explain five potential logical, positive benefits of incentives, which would explain why they would be implemented in a ME Organization." And so what's seen is I have them put themselves in a ME Organization, put on the Yellow Hat and think about what would be so exciting about this. And so logical, positive number one. "Incentives can serve as a powerful motivator for individuals within the organization, driving them to achieve higher levels of performance and productivity. When employees are offered rewards for their efforts, they're more likely to be motivated to excel in their roles," Andrew. Logical positive number two, enhanced performance. Explanation, "by tying incentives to specific goals or targets, organizations can encourage employees to focus their efforts on key priorities and objectives. 0:16:46.9 BB: This can lead to improved performance across various aspects of the business, ultimately driving better results." Number three, attraction and retention of talent. Oh, yeah. Explanation, "offering attractive incentives can help organizations attract top talent and retain existing employees. Attractive incentives can serve as a key differentiator for organizations seeking to attract and retain skilled professionals." Now, let me also say, this is an undergraduate class. As I mentioned, this is the second of two that I offer. Many of these students are working full-time or part-time. So this is coming from someone who is working full-time, probably mid to late 20s. So these are not... They're undergraduates but lifewise, they've got a lot of real-world experience. 0:17:44.0 BB: All right. Logical positive four, promotion of innovation and creativity. Explanation, "incentives can encourage employees to think creatively and innovative in their roles. By rewarding innovative ideas and contributions, organizations can foster..." Ready, Andrew? "A culture of creativity and continuous improvement, driving long-term success and competitive advantage." And the last one, positive organizational culture. "Implementing incentives can contribute to a positive organizational culture characterized by recognition, reward and appreciation. When employees feel valued and rewarded for their contributions, they're more likely to feel engaged, satisfied, and committed to the organization." But here's what's really cool about this test for understanding, I get to position them in the framework of a ME Organization with the Yellow Hat. 0:18:40.9 BB: Now question three, in appreciation of Edward de Bono's, "Six Thinking Hats" and the Black Hat, what Edward calls a logical negative, list and explain five potential aspects of incentives, which would explain why they would not be implemented in a WE Organization. And this is coming from the same person. This is why I think it's so, so cool that I wanna share with our listeners. The same person's being forced to look at it both ways. Negative number one, potential for... Ready, Andrew? "Unintended consequences." Oh my God. "Incentives can sometime lead to unintended consequences such as employees focusing solely on tasks that are incentivized while neglecting other important aspects of their roles. This tunnel vision can result in suboptimal outcomes for the organization as a whole." 0:19:30.7 BB: "Number two, risk of eroding intrinsic motivation. Explanation, offering external rewards like incentives can undermine intrinsic motivation leading employees to become less interested in the work and more focused on earning rewards. Number three, creation of unhealthy competition. Explanation, incentives can foster a competitive culture within the organization where employees may prioritize individual success over collaboration and teamwork. This competitive atmosphere can breed..." Ready? "Resentment and distrust among employees." Can you imagine that, Andrew? Resentment and distrust? That seems like it would clash with my previous positive thought, but it really just points out how careful management needs to be. 0:20:19.0 AS: Yes. 0:20:19.2 BB: All right. Cost considerations. "Implementing incentive programs can be costly for organizations, particularly if the rewards offered are substantial or if the program is not carefully managed. Organizations may be hesitant to invest resources and incentives, especially if they're uncertain about the return on investment if budget is of concern." And then number five, "short-term focus over our long-term goals." Explanation, "incentives often improve short-term gains rather than long-term strategic objectives. Employees may prioritize activities that yield immediate results, even if they're not aligned with the organization's broader goals or values." 0:21:02.7 BB: And then question four, here's the kicker. "In appreciation of your evolving understanding of the use of incentives, share, if you would, a personal account of a memorable attempt by someone to use incentives to motivate you, so that so many pizza parties or bringing a small box of donuts or coffee in for working a weekend I was supposed to have off." And then question five, "in appreciation of your answer to question four, why is this use of incentives so memorable to you? They were very ineffective. I often felt insulted that my boss thought that $20 worth of pizza or donuts made up for asking me to give 50% of my days off that week." 0:21:55.5 AS: Here's a donut for you. 0:22:00.6 BB: Here's a doggy bone, here's a doggy bone. I just wanted to share that this time. Next time we'll look at more. 0:22:09.3 AS: One of the things that... 0:22:10.6 BB: There are other examples of Test for Understanding. Go ahead, Andrew. 0:22:12.3 AS: One of the things that I wanted to... What you made me think about is that you and I can talk here about the downside of incentives but we have to accept the world is absolutely sold on the topic of incentives. 0:22:27.2 BB: Absolutely. 0:22:27.8 AS: A 100, I mean, 99.999% and if you're not sold on it, you're still gonna be forced to do it. 0:22:34.5 BB: Well, you know why they're sold on them, 'cause they work. 0:22:39.7 AS: It's like a shotgun. One of those pellets is gonna hit the target but... 0:22:47.7 BB: That's right. 0:22:48.4 AS: A lot of other pellets are gonna hit... 0:22:50.6 BB: And that's all that matters. And then what you get into is, you know what, Andrew, that that one person walks away excited, right? And that's the pellet that I look at. And I say, yep, and what about those others? You know what I say to that, Andrew? Those others, you know what, Andrew, you can't please everybody. 0:23:07.8 AS: Yeah. 0:23:07.9 BB: So this is so reinforcing. There's one person that gets all wrapped up based on my theory that this is a great thing to do and I hone in on that. And everything else I dismiss as, "ah, what are you gonna do? You can't please everybody." But what's missing is, what is that doing to destroy their willingness to collaborate with the one I gave the award to? 0:23:33.1 AS: Yeah, I'm picturing a bunch of people and laying on the ground injured by the pellets but that one black, or that one... Let's say the one target that we were going after, that target is down but there's 50 other people down also. 0:23:50.6 BB: No, but then this is where I get into the white bead variation we talked about early, early on, is that if all I'm doing is measuring, have you completed the task and we're looking at it from a black and white perspective and you leave the bowling ball in the doorway for the next person, meaning that you complete a task with the absolute minimum requirements for it to be deemed complete. Does the car have gas? Yes. You didn't say how much but when people then... When those people that were summarily dismissed didn't receive the award, when they go out and don't share an idea, don't give somebody a warning of something or not even maliciously leave the bowling ball in the doorway but believe that the way to get ahead is to do everything as fast as possible, but in doing so, what you're doing is creating a lot of extra work for others, and then you get promoted based on that. Now you get into... In episode 22 we talked about, as long as there's no transparency, you get away with that. And then the person at the end of the line gets buried with all that stuff and everybody else says, well, my part was good and my part was good. How come Andrew can't put these together? 0:25:26.8 AS: In wrapping this up, I want to think just briefly about how somebody... So we're talking about understanding transformation, but we're also talking about incentives. 0:25:39.8 BB: Yes. 0:25:40.5 AS: And I would like to get a takeaway from you about how somebody who lives in a world of incentives, how do they, after listening to this, go back to their office and how should they exist? It's not like they can run away from a structure of incentives. Maybe when they become CEO, they decide, I'm not gonna do it that way, but they're gonna go back to their office and they're gonna be subjected to the incentive system. Obviously, the first thing is we wanna open up their mind to think, oh, there's more to it than just, these darned employees aren't doing what I'm telling them, even when I'm giving them incentives. But what would you give them as far as a takeaway? 0:26:27.1 BB: Well, I'll give you some examples of what some brilliant colleagues did at Rocketdyne, as they became transformed, as they became aware, and one is politely decline. Say, I don't, I don't need that. Just again you have to be careful there. There could be some misinterpretations of that. So you have to be... 0:27:03.2 AS: What if you're required to put an incentive system on top of your employees? 0:27:09.5 BB: Well, first, if it's coming down to you to go off and implement this, then one thing you could do is create a system which is based on chance. Everyone who contributed an idea, their name goes into a lottery for free lunch the first Wednesday of the month, and everybody knows. So then we're using the incentive money but using it in a way that everyone deems as fair. So that's one thing. And you just say, I'll... So then if your boss asks, have you distributed the incentive money? You say, yes, but you're distributing it based on a system of chance of which everyone realize they stand an equal chance of winning. 0:27:56.9 AS: Okay. So let's address that for a second. So your boss believes in incentives. They ask you to implement this system. Now you proposed one option, which is to do something based upon chance, but now let's look at your employees under you that have been indoctrinated their whole life on the concept of incentives. And you give them a system of chance and they're gonna come back and say, wait a minute, you're not rewarding the person who's contributing the most here? Now obviously you have a teaching moment and you can do all that, but is there any other way that you can deal with this? 0:28:33.7 BB: No, it could be tough. You've got to... You may have to go along until you can create a teaching moment. And what I did with the colleagues, when there are these a "great minds doing great things" events, and an announcement would go out as to who are the privileged few that got invited to these events, and I would tell people that if you go to the event, then that's what I would say. You can decline, you can politely decline. There's some things you can decline. 0:29:17.4 AS: I guess the other thing you could do, you could also... When you have to, when you're forced to reward, you can celebrate everybody's contribution while you're also being forced to give that incentive to that one person that has been deemed as the one that contributed the most. 0:29:36.9 BB: Well, I'll give you another example that a colleague did, a work colleague. He didn't do it in a work setting. Not that it couldn't be done in a work setting, but he signed up to be as a judge in a science fair in a nearby school. It was a work-related thing. And as it got closer, he realized... It was a... It would involve... What is a science fair without the number one science experiment? And my theory is you can't get a bunch of adults and a bunch of kids together in any organized way without giving out an award that just, it's like, oh, we got everybody together. We got to find a way to single somebody out. So when he realized what was going on, instead of not going, what he did, he took it upon himself to interact with every kid whose science experiment he watched and asked them lots of questions about it, about what inspired them? What did they learn? 0:30:30.6 BB: So what he wanted by the end of the day was that they were more intrigued that someone came and really wanted to know what they learned and less inclined to listen to who won the award. And I've seen that in a work setting, again, where we had events and the next thing you know there's an award and I thought, well, what can we do? Well, we can go around and really engage in the people who's got tables set up for the share fair knowing at the end of the day, we have this. We just can't break this, we just can't break this. 0:31:08.2 AS: Yeah. All right. So... 0:31:10.3 BB: But the other thing I've seen, I've seen people who received rewards, use that money. Literally, one guy in the quality organization at Rocketdyne received an award. It might have been for a $1000. He used the money, Andrew, to buy copies of The New Economics for everyone in the organization. [laughter] 0:31:31.7 AS: Well, that brings us to another possibility, is that you convince your boss that you at least want to give... You want to reward the whole department. 0:31:40.5 BB: Yes. 0:31:40.9 AS: Any reward that you do, you want to reward your whole department. And so that could be something that your boss would say, "Okay, go ahead and do that." And they're not gonna go against it as opposed to trying to, say, no, I won't do it this way, but... 0:32:02.1 BB: Well, towards that end, I've seen people that are rewards crazy. At Rocketdyne, there's one guy in particular in a machine shop manufacturing environment and some big program wanted to thank five out of the 50 people in his organization with t-shirts. And he said, "You either give me 50 t-shirts or no t-shirts." 0:32:27.6 AS: Yeah. 0:32:28.8 BB: And I thought that was really cool 'cause this... And I don't know to what degree his exposure to what we were doing, but I thought that's what we need more of. Come back with 50 shirts and we'll take them. 0:32:44.1 AS: Okay. Let's wrap this up by doing a brief wrap-up of why you're saying... Why you've titled this Test for Understanding and what can the listeners take away. 0:32:56.6 BB: The idea is again, if in a seminar learning event situation is one thing, but if you're involved in leading in a transformation within your respective organizations, what I'm suggesting is that you think about how to Test the Understanding of that transformation's progress with your audience. And we talked in the past about leaving a coffee cup in the hallway, see if it's still there. That's a Test for Understanding of the culture of the organization. And that's what I'm suggesting here, is there are simple things you can do such when somebody says, come see what my son did. You can say, your son? Or is it, was there a spouse involved? And just as you become aware of the nuances of this transformation, you could be looking at somebody look at two data points and draw a conclusion and they're just a day out of some seminar with you about understanding variation and they're looking for a cause of one data point shift. 0:34:13.0 BB: So it's just, what can you do day in and day out, just your little things to test the organization or test an individual's understanding of this transformation process that we're talking about, which is, how are you seeing things differently? Are you becoming more aware of incentives and their destruction, more aware of theories? That's all. What just came to mind is... And the other aspect of it was this idea that very deliberately with the foundation of ME and WE, Red Pen/Blue Pen, then you can build upon that by saying to somebody, how might a Blue Pen Company go off and do this? How might a red pen company go off and do that? And that's not a guarantee that either one of them is right, but I find it becomes a really neat way on an individual basis to say, as you just pointed out, Andrew, so how would I as a manager in a Blue Pen Company deal with that awkward situation? 0:35:19.2 BB: Well, if I was in a red pen, this is what I would do. And so it's not only testing for understanding, but also the power of this contrast. And that's what I found with a group recently, especially the students. If I give them the contrast, I think it's easier for them to see one's about managing things in isolation and all that beckon such as belief in addition and root cause analysis, and one's about looking at things as a system. So it's not just Test for Understanding, but a test of both foundations is what I wanted to get across. 0:35:57.0 AS: Okay, great. Bill, on behalf of everyone at The Deming Institute, I wanna thank you again for this discussion. And for listeners, remember to go to deming.org to continue your journey. If you wanna keep in touch with Bill, hey, you can find him on LinkedIn and he listens. This is your host, Andrew Stotz, and I'll leave you with one of my favorite quotes from Dr. Deming. I mean, I say this quote every time until I will be bored stiff of it, but "people are entitled to joy in work."
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