Participating

Participating with others requires interfaces and that means communication "across those interfaces.
regards,
Dwika-ExecuTrain



Tip #5: "Believe Everyone Will Do There Job (and therefore avoid the interface conversations)"
by: Steven Cerri

I want to tell you a story. I once observed a training session in which the instructor set up a "roll-playing" scenario. (By the way, I don't use roll-playing.) This instructor set up a situation in which a team of people were to "construct" a "product." The product was a cup with labels on it and a string attached to a popsicle stick. An "assembly line" was set up composed of the training participants and the last person in the assembly line was a "quality assurance inspector", a QA inspector. The QA inspector had a specific set of parameters to inspect for and everyone on the assembly line knew what those parameters were. The process began and I was an observer.

I was stationed at the end of the assembly line and I noticed that as the "cups" were coming off the assembly line, approximately one out of 10 cups was passing quality inspection. After about 15 or so cups had been manufactured I stopped the training and made the statement that most cups were failing QA inspection. People on the assembly line looked at me and at each other with a blank stare but no one said anything. So I said, OK, continue manufacturing your cups.

The process continued for another minute or so with nothing changing in the quality of the cups. Once again I stopped the training and pointed out that most cups were failing QA. Once again, no one said anything and once again I told the team to continue with their manufacturing process.

Finally, at the end of the exercise, the training instructor asked the team how they had done. The individuals all thought that the exercise had gone well. However, at the end of the line, the QA inspector was surrounded by 30 cups only 4 of which had passed QA inspection.

Once again I asked the group a question. I said, "Twice I stopped your manufacturing process and told you that quality was poor and twice you ignored my statement. What were you thinking that allowed you to continue on with your processes without changing anything?"

The answer was telling. The participants responded this way: "We were each doing our job. We assumed that the people upstream from us and downstream from us were doing their jobs as well. We didn't feel comfortable questioning the people we depended on or the people who depended on us nor did we feel comfortable telling them how to do their jobs. So we just stuck to our tasks and to our focus of doing our jobs well and we assumed the others would do their jobs well too."

There you have it. That's the perfect definition of NOT BEING ON A TEAM. Working in our own little world is not being on a team. Being on a team is looking "upstream" and "downstream." Being on a team is taking responsibility not only for what you give to others and but also for what others give you to.

It's called, "having the interface conversations." Those people, those organizations you "interface" with and depend upon must be communicated with. And you cannot assume that everyone will do their job as expected. Being on a team is "participating" with others. Participating with others requires interfaces and that means communication "across those interfaces."