. In the Taylorist days no one had ownership of the end product. People were not doing their best and nobody really cared. Mediocrity ruled the day. They clocked their hours and were paid. They did what was asked of them and nothing more, mere factors of production, that’s it. They didn’t care for their labors and hence quality products were a dream. Consultants leaped on this and found waSpirit in the work place?

Absurd, you say? After all why should it be there? We’re here to work and earn our daily wage.

On the weekends and in the evening many of us watch some amazing sporting feats. Some of us may even participate in some great events. What spirit those athletes have! How they throw everything they have to gain an extra yard, drive an extra foot or shave off an extra millisecond.

Then there’s Monday morning. What happens? People come to work and shuffle paper, see prospects, perhaps they make a sale, deal with customer complaints, speak to suppliers, arrange meetings, hold meetings, read e-mail, mail, send mail, e-mail. Are they challenged? Do they really want to be there? What would they be doing if they weren’t there?

You as manager or owner wonder why the quarterly results aren’t what you predicted. Even with a good spin they still suck like a bad dream. So what’s the problem? Motivation? You sent the sales guys to Zig Ziglar last year and that didn’t help. Sales training is not going to help the finance department get with the program. They don’t take any ownership of the results because they merely pulled them from the system.

So what could it take to have your team or your business working like a Pro sports team?

Involvement, accountability, understanding of the vision, learning more about the business, learning more about the function they perform and even about their team.

Now ole Fred Taylor really killed spirit when he decided to break work down into its constituent parts. In the Taylorist days no one had ownership of the end product. People were not doing their best and nobody really cared. Mediocrity ruled the day. They clocked their hours and were paid. They did what was asked of them and nothing more, mere factors of production, that’s it. They didn’t care for their labors and hence quality products were a dream. Consultants leaped on this and found way

an extra millisecond.

Then there’s Monday morning. What happens? People come to work and shuffle paper, see prospects, perhaps they make a sale, deal with customer complaints, speak to suppliers, arrange meetings, hold meetings, read e-mail, mail, send mail, e-mail. Are they challenged? Do they really want to be there? What would they be doing if they weren’t there?

You as manager or owner wonder why the quarterly results aren’t what you predicted. Even with a good spin they still suck like a bad dream. So what’s the problem? Motivation? You sent the sales guys to Zig Ziglar last year and that didn’t help. Sales training is not going to help the finance department get with the program. They don’t take any ownership of the results because they merely pulled them from the system.

So what could it take to have your team or your business working like a Pro sports team?

Involvement, accountability, understanding of the vision, learning more about the business, learning more about the function they perform and even about their team.

Now ole Fred Taylor really killed spirit when he decided to break work down into its constituent parts. In the Taylorist days no one had ownership of the end product. People were not doing their best and nobody really cared. Mediocrity ruled the day. They clocked their hours and were paid. They did what was asked of them and nothing more, mere factors of production, that’s it. They didn’t care for their labors and hence quality products were a dream. Consultants leaped on this and found wa

ager or owner wonder why the quarterly results aren’t what you predicted. Even with a good spin they still suck like a bad dream. So what’s the problem? Motivation? You sent the sales guys to Zig Ziglar last year and that didn’t help. Sales training is not going to help the finance department get with the program. They don’t take any ownership of the results because they merely pulled them from the system.

So what could it take to have your team or your business working like a Pro sports team?

Involvement, accountability, understanding of the vision, learning more about the business, learning more about the function they perform and even about their team.

Now ole Fred Taylor really killed spirit when he decided to break work down into its constituent parts. In the Taylorist days no one had ownership of the end product. People were not doing their best and nobody really cared. Mediocrity ruled the day. They clocked their hours and were paid. They did what was asked of them and nothing more, mere factors of production, that’s it. They didn’t care for their labors and hence quality products were a dream. Consultants leaped on this and found wa

from the system.

So what could it take to have your team or your business working like a Pro sports team?

Involvement, accountability, understanding of the vision, learning more about the business, learning more about the function they perform and even about their team.

Now ole Fred Taylor really killed spirit when he decided to break work down into its constituent parts. In the Taylorist days no one had ownership of the end product. People were not doing their best and nobody really cared. Mediocrity ruled the day. They clocked their hours and were paid. They did what was asked of them and nothing more, mere factors of production, that’s it. They didn’t care for their labors and hence quality products were a dream. Consultants leaped on this and found wa

. In the Taylorist days no one had ownership of the end product. People were not doing their best and nobody really cared. Mediocrity ruled the day. They clocked their hours and were paid. They did what was asked of them and nothing more, mere factors of production, that’s it. They didn’t care for their labors and hence quality products were a dream. Consultants leaped on this and found ways of improving quality, reducing waste, saving time, working smarter not harder. Still, however the worker was not really engaged, just worked harder in the name of productivity.

Total Quality Management (TQM), however, in a weird way actually brings spirit back into the place of work! Things slowly began to change. The Japanese approach where anybody can shut down a line at any time brings ownership of the final product back to the workers. The workers thus had a return of their integrity; they could have a mission in life, a value, a purpose. Amazing, they could swear they had made the best gosh darn car there was. And mean it!

So could it be that by not doing your best and saying that you were is a lie? We know how we hate liars! Just ask a recent ex US President! They say lying corrupts the soul; it sure has corrupted our business world. From poor quality products to ENRON scale corruption. Can we turn over a new leaf? Can we take pride in our activities? Youbetcha!

Now if TQM’s philosophy is about getting things right the first time and doing better tomorrow than you did today. It could be seen as pretty close to a religious tenant. In this day and age where we are seeing the return of religious morals back to the work place, TQM and its resulting focus on excellence is a way in which we are doing it. Perhaps not striving for excellence could be contrived as heresy. If Monty Python were a manager he’d have his staff stoned, with rocks not pot!

What does this mean for us as CEO’s, managers or even supervisors?