Beware of the Context!

Workplace behaviors are very contextual and the key is to know the importance of adapting these behaviors based on the context. How desirable behaviors can quickly become unwelcome simply because of the wrong understanding of the context or the context just changed.

One common desirable behavior is: “Be Solid as a Rock”!

Every business runs with a set of performance metrics be it financial, sales, R&D, production, quality or any other. The assumed context is right way of doing business. No matter what pressure people are under to show performance on any of the metrics, the right way of doing business would be the only way of doing business. We need to be Solid as a Rock and show character when it comes to upholding our core values, adhering to principles and integrity. The rock gets viewed as a sacred idol worthy of worship.

Let us imagine that everybody becomes a rock and the context changed to ‘need for improvement’. The behavior that is driven by the thinking of “this has always been done this way or “this is the only way things get done here” or “this is not invented here and hence cannot be good for us”. Then the same rock like behavior poses an obstacle to ‘Improvements and Change’. The rock will end up getting chiseled and hammered.

Take another behavior: “Follow the Process”

Most organizations have reams of definitions of business processes. A lot of time and money is spent on training people on developing an understanding of the process and to implement the same. The management also reinforces people behaviors in following the process. The assumed context is that the experts have defined process steps when followed can deliver a certain output with a predictable outcome or quality. This also assumes that the experts have used accumulated knowledge from the past. Freedom in implementation only leads to more un-predictability. There is no room for ‘Bad Jugaad’ or uncontrolled tweaks in the implementation. So everybody is expected to follow this process.

Again just imagine the context changed where people implementing the process are less qualified or trained or the inputs changed or operating environment changed as compared to what the experts had assumed. Then plain insistence on following process will be meaningless. People will only end up hiding their inefficiencies behind processes. As the Lean experts say, the beauty of process definition and implementation should be in such a way that everybody can keep thinking of ways for continuous improvement. However the Lean thinking also states that any process change or improvisation needs a good review and controlled roll out. This way we can promote more of the ‘Good Jugaad’ thinking among people and make the message “don’t get bogged down by the process”.

As leaders it is so very important to keep reminding people of the ‘context’ along with desirable behaviors.