Train-Wreck Management v.s. Systems Thinking

If you haven’t read The Leader’s Handbook: Making Things Happen, Getting Things Done I highly recommend it for you iconoclasts out there. It provides a great history of how management structures of the past 150 years got started (after a Western Railroad train-wreck in 1841), how they worked (briefly) and ultimately how Lean and Systems Thinking have disrupted them (even if they don’t know it) over the past 50+ years. Every page of this book had me giggling or guffawing at some point. The rest of the time I was simply fascinated.

To make a long story short, this book takes you on a journey into systems thinking and completely dissects the entire concept of carrot and stick, hierarchical management. The premise is that at the end of the day you just can’t improve a business by managing dozens, hundreds or thousands of variables — your employees. All you can really manage, and improve, are systems; which defines the daily work and engagement of your employees. The belief is that if you d…