CONTACTS 

SUBJECTS
Legal Restraints on Saving Record
Diary record to increase understanding
Discovery, Strategic Resource
Feel Good Management - Social Constraints
Context Traceability Support Understanding
Complexity Frustrating Documents Meetings Listening Capturing Organiz
Proactive Problem Handling Intelligence Discover Opportunities Not Wr
Cooked Books Need SDS Proactive Problem Handling Bookkeeping Double E
Conventional Management Uses Feel Good Practices Rather than Good Man

2011 -
2011 -    ..
2012 - Summary/Objective
2013 -
201301 - Follow up ref SDS 1 0001.
201302 -
201303 - The poor economy has impacted Chips and Technologies, requiring Morris
201304 - to devote a lot of time to downsizing.  Reviewed policies becoming
201305 - common for organizations to destroy intellectual capital in order to
201306 - avoid accountability. ref SDS 0 WD6J
201307 -
201308 -
201310 -  ..
2014 -
2015 -
2016 - Progress
201701 -  ..
201702 - Cooked the Books to Make Bad Management Look Good
201703 - Feel Good Management Conceals Problems Prevents Timely Correction
201704 -
201705 - Morris said Chips is downsizing by 20%.
201706 -
201707 - He is now in charge of a commitee of 5 people to recommend projects
201708 - and staff to terminate.  They are to report to the president evidently
201709 - after the first of the year with recommendations.  Actually, the new
201710 - buzzword is "rightsizing!"
201712 -  ..
201713 - Accounting and marketing data turned out to be incorrect because some
201714 - executives "cooked the books" to make bad management look good.  We
201715 - did not discuss how this correlates to industry practice of relying on
201716 - "feel good" management, discussed on 911123. ref SDS 1 1331
201718 -  ..
201719 - Morris and his team are trying to assemble good data to determine the
201720 - direction to take the company.
201721 -
201723 -  ..
201724 - Scope Creep Delays Schedule Increases Costs Defers Revenues
201725 -
201726 - Morris described a problem driving up costs and delay getting products
201727 - to market to produce revenue has been "scope creep."
201729 -  ..
201730 - Marketing keeps asking for more features to keep Chips' products
201731 - competitive, and avoid negative presss reviews on feature comparisons,
201732 - The sales staff says they will not be able to make sales if Chips does
201733 - not keep up with market trends.  Engineering adds to scope creep when
201734 - one project asks another to add support for future improvements.
201735 - Morris and his team are trying to identify projects that are
201736 - hopelessly over budget, and those that have the best chance of
201737 - generating revenue.  They are trying to reduce scope creep in order to
201738 - shorten time to market, and get the company in the black.
201739 -
201740 -        [On 920215 downsizing problem greater than expected.
201741 -        ref SDS 2 HJ8G
201743 -         ..
201744 -        [On 950412 scope creep delayed release of Primavera schedule
201745 -        software update, ref SDS 3 GF45; discussed with Morris.
201746 -        ref SDS 3 0U4O
201748 -         ..
201749 -        [On 951221 scope creep explained as "pile on the features"
201750 -        without thinking about affecting the core objective of the
201751 -        program; this creates an unwieldy collection of modules, and
201752 -        nobody understands how they interact. ref SDS 6 0221
201754 -         ..
201755 -        [On 970525 scope creep common in defense contracting, reported
201756 -        by article. ref SDS 7 946T
201758 -         ..
201759 -        [On 980613 article on avoiding scope creep bringing engineering
201760 -        and marketing together. ref SDS 8 5208
201762 -         ..
201763 -        [On 001130 IBM difficulty converting Lotus Notes into Knowledge
201764 -        Management software because scope creep made the program too
201765 -        complex to understand. ref SDS 9 YH66
201767 -         ..
201768 -        [On 011109 similar experience at Enron. ref SDS 10 00DN
201770 -  ..
201771 - Morris was not real enthusiastic this evening.  He feels Chips
201772 - management has not been well served by staff, who have held back, and
201773 - in some cases not provided good data on costs, schedule, and revenues,
201774 - per above. ref SDS 0 C38U
201776 -  ..
201777 - We considered that people and management problems permeate all human
201778 - endeavors.  Bad news simply does not travel North.  Often it is not
201779 - really apparent to inexperienced managers.  You have to be proactive
201780 - and "dig it out" of the system.  You have to be proactive, and this
201781 - does not "feel good" to people.
201783 -      ..
201784 -     [On 91123 "Feel Good" management cited by Morris at ref SDS 1 1331
201785 -     -- see also below for published material.
201787 -      ..
201788 -     [On 950705 disaffection with Project Managers, ref SDS 4 2955, led
201789 -     to interest in automating Action Items. ref SDS 4 7409
201791 -      ..
201792 -     [On 951011 report that in 1989 Chips won awards for outstanding
201793 -     financial management, ref SDS 5 5008
201794 -
201795 -
201797 -  ..
201798 - Intends to Destroy Records
201799 -
201800 - Follow up ref SDS 1 8934.
201801 -
201802 - Morris expects the company will destroy the records of the analysis
201803 - for planning reengineering of the organization about 4 days after his
201804 - assignment is complete.
201806 -  ..
201807 - This implements the management philosophy of destroying intellectual
201808 - captial, i.e., knoweldge and ideas, contrary to concepts of POIMS,
201809 - which Morris mentioned on 911123. ref SDS 1 8934.
201811 -  ..
201812 - Various project managers are trying to get his attention to explain
201813 - the value of keeping particular projects and staff.  Morris feels a
201814 - lot of pressure to figure out what is best for the company.  He is
201815 - busy with finishing their new chip, and now he has to figure out how
201816 - to organize the company to be profitable.  This leaves little time for
201817 - him to consider if his analysis tools are adequate or can be signi-
201818 - ficantly improved with SDS.
201819 -
201821 -      ..
201822 -     Feel Good Management
201823 -
201824 -     I wonder if more "discovery" of problems, opportunities, ideas and
201825 -     complex, subtle facts might have enabled the people and projects
201826 -     being terminated at Chips to have done a better job for themselves
201827 -     and the company.  The concept of "Feel Good" management fails
201828 -     because it covers up both problems and opportunities in order to
201829 -     avoid small disappointments to spare feelings, yet eventually
201830 -     leads to much greater pain and calamity.
201832 -      ..
201833 -     There must be a better answer?
201834 -
201836 -         ..
201837 -        Managerial Mystique
201838 -
201839 -        Abraham Zaleznik has written this book originally
201840 -        published by Harper & Row, 1989, which states on page 278:
201841 -
201842 -           To keep people feeling good about themselves may require
201843 -           that the status quo be maintained.  However, maintaining the
201844 -           status quo may leave problems unsolved, prevent growth, and
201845 -           lead to crisis.
201846 -
201847 -           This dilemma is easily solved in times of crisis, when it is
201848 -           clear that survival depends on action and change, particu-
201849 -           larly where the leadership is new to the situation and is
201850 -           not identified with the causes of the criss.  But, unfortun-
201851 -           ately, by the time a corporation's symptoms are evident, the
201852 -           illness is so far gone that a cure may be difficult, if not
201853 -           impossible, to achieve
201855 -            ..
201856 -           Leaders must be critics rather than cheerleaders, yet their
201857 -           critical stance must avoid negativism.  To be critical and
201858 -           positive is to be substantive.  Therefore, leadrs have to
201859 -           lead in the content and direction of change.  To be a critic
201860 -           and merely the convener of process will depress subordinates
201861 -           and make them anxious.
201862 -
201864 -         ..
201865 -        Change Needs Leadership with Broader Vision
201866 -
201867 -        This last prescription is no guarentee of success in leader-
201868 -        ship.  People will feel threatened by "change" when they are
201869 -        unable to recognize that a "crisis" exists and will as a result
201870 -        resist and even undermine the efforts to change in order to
201871 -        preserve their position, access to power, self image and other
201872 -        lessor needs.  Such are the imperatives of "feel good" manage-
201873 -        ment.  The challenge of leadership is to implement change in
201874 -        order to avoid "crisis" because when crisis occurs there is no
201875 -        time for training and transitioning.  People are frozen by
201876 -        common sense to apply what they already know.
201877 -
201878 -
201880 -  ..
201881 - I asked Morris if he has done a CPM on the tasks, schedule, assign-
201882 - ments and correlation of executive perspectives on this downsizing
201883 - project?  He seemed not to see the need for this step, though I am not
201884 - sure if he appreciated the thrust of my inquiry.
201885 -
201887 -  ..
201888 - Looks like we will not be able to get together while I am here the
201889 - next two weeks.  He is very busy at work and when he is not busy at
201890 - work, there is a full slate of family matters and church.
201892 -  ..
201893 - It is hard to see how we will ever be able to spend enough time
201894 - together to do anything interesting with SDS.
201895 -
201896 -
201897 -
201898 -
201899 -
201900 -
201901 -
201902 -
201903 -
2020 -