“It takes a lot of hard work to make something simple” – Steve Jobs
Is it an advantage that Theory of Constraints (TOC) is so difficult to adopt?
Eli Goldratt wanted to make TOC the main way. That is even hard to imagine. Everyone who has implemented TOC understands the difficulty for organizations in embracing the change. Moving from cost focus to throughput focus is simple but not easy. It is hard work.
The difficulty is in bringing people along – breaking cycles of distrust and conflict. Distrust permeates a cost focussed organization. People are all trying to make themselves locally efficient. The bigger picture is nowhere in view. The pressure on cost breeds insecurity and lack of confidence. Politics and tribal thinking dominates. Social networks are more important than merit. Even thinking of changing this culture brings to mind the challenges of getting two porcupines to embrace each other. People are prickly, easy to take offense, not very open to criticism and protective of their turfs. Victims of circumstances lacking agency to make things better.
Implementing TOC means changing this culture to one based on trust, confidence and a focus on throughput. One where people communicate openly and respectfully, different teams are eager to help each other to achieve organizational goals, managers are focused on problem solving and creating a culture of success. Teams are challenging assumptions that get in the way of providing value to the customer. A culture where merit and success is rewarded more than politics.
The heart of this culture change is leadership. The brains in this culture change is designing the rules, policies and measurements that define the system. The muscle is the hard work of convincing people that the world can be different, that focusing on throughput is cheaper than focusing on cost, that uncertainty is not always bad, it can be an opportunity to provide value, intuition, emotion and logic can work together, that conflicts can be resolved, that people are good. And then teaching them a new language that makes it easy to grow this culture.
No, definitely not easy. Immensely valuable, simple and elegant, even evidently desirable. But not easy.
So if making TOC the main way means getting this culture to spread inside more and more organizations – it does seem like we have a very long road ahead. But what if, what if we accept this difficulty as a reality.
“Lighthouses don’t go running all over an island looking for boats to save; they just stand there shining.”
– Anne Lamott
What if just a few companies have the leadership strength to implement these ideas. What if these companies start out-performing their competition by margins well outside the noise? What if the difficulty of TOC becomes their competitive advantage? They become the lighthouse. Just stand there shining. Beacons that guide others to avoid dangers and find safe harbor.
If TOC was like buying software and implementing it- it would be easy, but ultimately of limited value. It’s difficulty may be it’s biggest strength. It’s unique advantage over every other easy to adopt fad that comes along. Something that will help it win this marathon rather than get ahead in the sprint. We have to play the long game to get to the goal.
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