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April 2007

Book Review: The Five Dysfunctions of a Team

by Pete Abilla on April 30, 2007

I just finished reading The Five Dysfunctions of a Team.  It took me just a few hours and it was really enjoyable reading.  The book presents leadership in teams in the form of a self-reflective story that is engaging, educational, and in ways that ring true. Patrick Lencioni presents the following model as the The [...]

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Amazon Alumni on Linkedin

by Pete Abilla on April 28, 2007

This is an invitation to all former Amazon employees to join the Amazon Alumni Group on Linkedin.  I moderate the group and we currently have 91 members that were former employees at Amazon.  Some of the former Amazonians are now at Google, eBay, Facebook (5 at last count), Peerflix, Jobster, Microsoft, Last.fm, Yahoo!, TripAdvisor, and [...]

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Quasi-Lean at a Call Center

by Pete Abilla on April 26, 2007

call center jobs, philippines, india, costa rica

I stumbledupon an interesting article on Lean implemented at a Call Center.  Their implementation of Lean is pretty basic, but I think it’s a decent start.  In addition to what they did, I would have taken the Lean For Service and Lean Provision approach. Specifically, this is what they implemented: Use visual workplace to expose [...]

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Obeya & Communication Breakdown

by Pete Abilla on April 22, 2007

I’ve written previously about team dynamics and team size.  I’ve since modified my feelings regarding those previous claims. Here is what I said previously: 2 people are smarter than one 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 people are smarter than 2 a team larger than 9 people is just one big dumb blob Ok, that’s [...]

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On Queueing and Elevator Mirrors

by Pete Abilla on April 20, 2007

waiting in an elevator

I went to California earlier this week for business.  I rode in an elevator and that experience reminded me of a simple, yet effective way to aleviate the negative feelings that accompany waiting, or the Psychology of Queueing — mirrors in an elevator. There are a few key behavioral responses or reactions to queues, or [...]

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Deming’s 14 Points and Home Building

by Pete Abilla on April 19, 2007

deming, quality toolbox

While at the doctor’s office sometime back, I picked up a copy of a local Utah business magazine.  In that magazine, there was an article that highlighted Magleby Home Construction as the recipient of the national home builder award of the year.  The article included an interview in which Paul Magleby shared his thoughts on [...]

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“Ask ‘Why’ Five Times About Every Matter”

by Pete Abilla on April 16, 2007

5 why example, lean manufacturing

Taiichi Ohno is known to have said that “having no problems is the biggest problem of all.”  He viewed problems not as a negative but as a “Kaizen opportunity in disguise.”  Whenever problems arose, he encouraged his staff to investigate the problem at the source and to as “ask ‘why’ five times about every matter [...]

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Kanban Types and Analytical Sizing

by Pete Abilla on April 12, 2007

kanban cards examples how

Unlike traditional “push” systems, where material is moved downstream according to a schedule, or simply “shoved” downstream even when the downstream partner is not ready for it, a “pull” system encourages and almost forces cooperation, from a systems perspective.  “Push” also causes congestion, which grows exponentially as more items enter the queue.  Aside from cooperation [...]

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