Robert, you say,
>I'm sorry to get picky, but the triage concept isn't ranking, it's
>categorizing except if you have as many categories as people.
I wondered if that might be a source of confusion on this discussion.
Others have referred to this (categorizing) as ranking, so I do too.
Thank you for providing clarification, this may reduce some of the debate.
What do others think? Is categorization better -- more effective -- than
ranking? Or do others think this is an important distinction?
Then you said,
>More to the point, since my opinion is hardly that important, is the
>reactions of staff to a good number of formal systems (and by the way
>many managers). They hate it. They will often do anything to avoid
>doing it.
>
>The exceptions occur when managers are excellent and succeed with the
>process in spite of the system imposed upon them.
Sure, but are people upset with the system, or with the way it is being
applied by the manager? This has been my point right from the beginning.
The tool is fine, but is being misused. We never train managers to do
this well, and then we are dismayed that they do not do it well. Then,
because it is not done well (and because we never rate managers on their
ability to carry out this task, and then provide help), we decide the tool
is faulty, and we throw out the tool. Crazy.
Frankly, my experience is that you can take an average manager, and by
putting some investment into him or her, youenable them become what you
refer to as an excellent manager who can succeed -- as a matter of course
-- with the process. The normal organization never invests in this
process, so what I have come to expect as normal behavior always remains
the exception in those organizations.
Now, I hasten to add that we still have a lot to learn, and we are not
comfortable with our current performance in this arena. I think my
managers in 10 years will be head and shoulders more capable than today's.
Nevertheless, today's managers here (and probably in all of the best
companies) are pretty good at applying these tools that everyone finds to
be so faulty.
--Rol Fessenden
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>