My great grandfather had a team of mules he used for farming. He was the envy of the other farmers in the area because, as I learned, it is difficult to get mules work together as a team. Just because you have two mules, you don’t automatically have a team. As a freshman in college he would tell me stories about his mules and how he managed them to become a team. He would also show me letters from all over the mid-west offering to buy his mule team. They were something rare and valuable.

We are not mules.  We make up the human capital of this business.  Human capital is our most valuable asset. As Michael Gurz is fond of saying, machines depreciate in value over time, but people increase in value (and cost). We are worth even more as a team than we are as individuals. So how do you move from a group of individuals, to a team, to a high performance team? 

Warren Bennis, in his book “Organizing Genius”, states, “Good leaders make people feel that they’re at the very heart of things, not at the periphery.  Everyone feels that he or she makes a difference to the success of the organization.  When that happens people feel centered and that gives their work meaning”.  This is about giving purpose to our work.  In my experience, after being exposed to purpose, everything changes. 

One of the best opportunities we have in continuous improvement, in my opinion, has more to do with our people than it does our processes. Notice that we use the phrase “continuous improvement” not “continuous process improvement”.  I encourage all of you to invest more into developing your team. This means listening with the intent to understand, asking their opinion, and working to get their buy-in. Leadership is always more effective than supervision.

It is similar to the goose and the golden egg.  If you want more golden eggs, invest in the goose.