Learning from failure

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Posted by Justin Long ⋅ June 24, 2008 ⋅

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Today Steve Addison wrote about our planning for failure. I remember many years back giving a talk–which was not well received at all, I have to admit–about “planning for failure.” Many of the Americans in the audience felt that I did not have enough faith and power, but it was probably my own failure–to communicate–that caused them to miss the point. We have to experiment, to be willing to fail, if we are to succeed. In other words, it is small failures that keep big failures from happening.

This is (one of) the secret(s) of Toyota’s rise to become the most profitable car company in the world, and one of the largest producers of cars: that they are willing to experiment, willing to fail–because they learn from their mistakes. It is no good experimenting if you are unwilling to learn. “Insanity,” as Einstein so famously said (and has been so often quoted by unreached peoples strategists), “is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

Two stunning examples to consider:

Each year, Toyota solicits and receives 1 million suggestions from its line workers. These are not crazy, off-the-cuff, simplistic suggestions. They are the result of a deep questioning of existing processes using a continuous improvement exercise called the “5 Whys.” And every year, do you know how many of those suggestions Toyota implements? Highlight the text in the paranthesis to learn the answer: (all of them)
Every process in Toyota’s manufacturing system is documented in manuals that are easily available. Each page of each process is numbered and dated. They are regularly reviewed and, if not recently modified, the manager is called in to answer to his supervisors. Do you know why? Answer: (because it’s the manager’s job to be constantly looking for suggestions and ideas for improving processes).

If you want to learn from this, the best thing to do is to Google for “continuous improvement” and “lean manufacturing”–and then think about how to apply this to missions.

See also: Scott Berkun’s post on people who want to be creative without change. (Scott is an ex-Microsoft employee who focuses on innovation and project management. He has a great book titled, “How to make things happen”).