RE: Educating the Colour-Blind

["Ivan Webb" <Ivan.Webb@bigpond.com>]

David Kerridge wrote...

>... Why should anyone want to make the effort to change their way of
thinking?

This question is at the heart of the matter. One of the first steps in
achieving a role as teacher within a working relationship is to establish
rapport. Related to this is the identification of
 - some common, shared or complementary purposes and
 - some acceptable means for achieving those purposes.
And being a Deming devotee is not a meaningful purpose: I imagine WED would
have been horrified at such a possibility. Purposes have to do with
contributing to success and well-being, and not with membership of any club.

Deming based management is a top-down method: and few people are at the top.
In addition few people currently work in places where Deming's methods would
be acceptable. But they have to return to their workplaces after they have
been offered enlightenment by the "colour-sighted" Deming people. And when
they say Deming's ideas wouldn't be any good they actually could be right.
Not because Deming was wrong, but because their current systems would not
accept nor accommodate Deming's ideas.

I imagine Deming taught his four-day courses as a form of service to those
who attended. His success, like ours, probably came when he encountered
someone who was in a position to apply what he/she learned from WED. Someone
who could make some choices that didn't have to align with the greater
corporate policy, performance based contracts, accounting systems that
measure isolated costs... Perhaps there are fewer such people around now
than previously.

If the system determines 85-95% of the outputs/outcomes, then I guess that
includes 'colour-blindness'. Perhaps it is time to stop being critical the
colour-blind individuals we encounter and to begin understanding the
systemic causes of colour-blindness. Maybe we could use the five-why's to
explore the issue of colour-blindness.

Other suggestions?

With respect,

Ivan Webb