"I'm still not impressed," my stubborn replacement says.
I feel obliged to remark, "The biggest benefit was probably the fact that due to Mendeleev's table people didn't have to waste time looking for more elements." And turning to Bob I say "You see, the classification helped in determining, once and for all, how many elements do exist. Putting any new element in the table would have upset the clear order."
Ralph coughs in embarrassment, "Sorry Alex but that's not the case. Only ten years after the table was fully accepted, several new elements were discovered, the noble gases. It turned out that
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the table should have been constructed to have eight columns, not seven."
"Just as I've said," Bob jumps in a triumphant voice. "Even when it works you still can't trust it."
"Calm down, Bob. You must admit that Ralph's story has a lot of merit for us. I suggest that we ask ourselves what's the difference between Mendeleev's classification of the chemical ele- ments and our many attempts to arrange the colored shapes in order? Why was his so powerful and ours so arbitrary?"
"That's just it," says Ralph, "Ours were arbitrary, and his was..."
"Was what? Not arbitrary?" Lou completes his sentence.
"Forget it." Ralph agrees. "That's not a serious answer. I'm just playing with words."
"What exactly do we mean by arbitrary, and not arbitrary?" I raise the question.
Since nobody answers I continue, "Actually, what are we looking for? We're looking to arrange the facts in some order. What type of order are we seeking? An arbitrary order that we superimpose externally on the facts, or are we trying to reveal an intrinsic order, an order that already exists there?"
"You're absolutely right," Ralph is getting excited, "Mende- leev definitely revealed an intrinsic order. He didn't reveal the reason for that order, that had to wait for another fifty years, when the internal structure of the atoms was found, but he defi- nitely revealed the intrinsic order. That's why his classification was so powerful. Any other classification that just tries to super- impose some order, any order, on the given facts is useful in only one sense-it gives the ability to present the facts in a sequence, tables, or graphs. In other words, helpful in preparing useless, thick reports.
"You see," he continues enthusiastically, "we, in our attempts to arrange the colored shapes, didn't reveal any intrinsic order. Simply because in that arbitrary collection there was no intrinsic order to be revealed. That's why all our attempts were arbitrary, all futile to the same extent."
"Yes, Ralph," Lou says in a cold tone, "But that doesn't mean that in other cases, where intrinsic order does exist, like in man- aging a division, we can't fool ourselves in the same way. We can always procrastinate by wasting our time playing with some artifi- cial, external order. Let's face it, what do you think Alex and I
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would have done with the pile of facts that we suggested he gather. Judging by what we've done for so long here in the plant, probably just that-playing a lot of games with numbers and words. The question is what are we going to do differently now? Anybody got an answer?"
Looking at Ralph sunk in his chair I say, "If we could reveal the intrinsic order of the events in the division, that would cer- tainly be of tremendous help."
"Yes," Lou says, "But how does one go about revealing the intrinsic order?"
"How can one identify an intrinsic order even when he stum- bles on it?" Bob adds.
After a while Lou says, "Probably in order to answer this question we should ask a more basic one: What provides the in- trinsic order among various facts? Looking at the elements that Mendeleev had to deal with, they all seemed different. Some were metals and some gases, some yellow and some black, no two were identical. Yes, there were some that exhibited similarities, but that's also the case for the arbitrary shapes that Alex drew on the board."
They continue to argue but I'm not listening any more. I'm stuck on Lou's question, "How does one go about revealing the intrinsic order?" He asked it as if it were a rhetorical question, as if the obvious answer is that it is impossible. But scientists do reveal the intrinsic order of things... and Jonah is a scientist.
"Suppose that it is possible," I break into the conversation, "suppose that a technique to reveal the intrinsic order does exist? Wouldn't such a technique be a powerful management tool?"
"Without a doubt," says Lou. "But what's the point in day- dreaming?"
"And what happened to you today?" I ask Julie, after I've told her the day's events in detail.
"I spent some time in the library. Do you know that Socrates didn't write anything? Socrates' dialogues actually were written by his pupil, Plato. The librarian here is a very pleasant woman, I like her a lot. Anyhow, she recommended some of the dialogues and I've started to read them."
I can't hold my surprise, "You read philosophy! What for, isn't it boring?"
She grins at me, "You were talking about the Socratic
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method as a method to persuade other people. I wouldn't touch philosophy with a ten foot pole, but to learn a method to per- suade my stubborn husband and kids-for that I'm willing to sweat."
"So you started to read philosophy," I'm still trying to digest it.
"You make it sound like a punishment," she laughs. "Alex, did you ever read the dialogues of Socrates?"
"No."
"They're not too bad. They're actually written like stories. They're quite interesting."
"How many have you read so far?" I ask,
"I'm still slaving on the first one, Protagoras."
"It'll be interesting to hear your opinion tomorrow." I say skeptically. "If it's still positive, maybe I'll read it, too."
"Yeah, when pigs fly," she says. Before I can answer, she stands up, "Let's hit the sack."
I yawn and join her. ^
We're getting started a little late since Stacey and Bob have to deal with some problematic orders. I wonder what's really hap- pening; are we drifting back into trouble? Is Stacey's warning about her Capacity Constraint Resources starting to materialize? She was concerned about any increase in sales and, for sure, sales are slowly but constantly on the rise. I dismiss these thoughts; it's just the natural friction that should be expected when your mate- rial manager moves her responsibilities to her replacement. I de- cided not to interfere; if it evolves into something serious they won't hesitate to tell me.
This is not going to be easy. We all are action-oriented and searching for basic procedures is almost against our nature, no matter how much Bob tells me that he's been transformed.
So when, at last, they all take seats I remind them about the issue on the table. If we want the same movement that we've succeeded in starting here to happen in the entire division, we have to clarify for ourselves what we actually have done-in a generic sense. Repeating the specific actions won't work. Not only are the plants very different from each other; how can one fight local efficiencies in sales, or cut batches in product design?
Stacey is the only one who has something to offer and her idea is simple. If Jonah forced us to start by asking, 'what is the goal of the company', Stacey suggests that we start by asking, 'what is our goal'-not as individuals, but as managers.
We don't like it. It's too theoretical. Bob yawns, looks bored. Lou responds to my unspoken request and volunteers to play the game.
With a smile he says, "This is trivial. If the goal of our com- pany is 'to make more money now as well as in the future,' then our job is to try and move our division to achieve that goal."