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On Baseball and Teamwork
A s with many success stories, the American pastime of baseball has many fathers (and mothers), with a heritage that extends well beyond the original thirteen colonies to England. Often called a "game of inches," baseball is a team sport, but lacking the constant motion of players in a football match (soccer in the U.S.). Consider the design of the playing field, with "foul" lines emanating from "home plate," to the left, past third base, all the way to the outfield fence, and to the right, past first base, to the right field fence. In the foreground lie the four 90-degree corners of a "diamond," from home plate to first base to second base, on to third base, and back to home plate. Nine defensive players are distributed around this diamond and across the outfield. None of their jobs are defined by outlines that restrict their roles in the way that a goalkeeper in football can use his or her hands only within the confines of the penalty area. As a result, the defensive players in baseball are highly interdependent in their field positioning, much the same as players on both teams in a football match.
What if, in contrast, baseball players were each constrained in their field positions by solid boundaries, painted on the field? Instead of players routinely adjusting their roles and positions for the motions of their teammates, with the catcher running to assist the first baseman, each player remained in their pre-defined zones. Might this situation begin to approximate the operation of an organization with inflexible job descriptions, wherein employees are left to believe their respective roles are independent? Such rigidity is a classic attribute of what W. Edwards Deming termed "the prevailing style of management," with each co-worker seeking to conform to a pre-defined set of requirements for their role, presumably independent of the performance of others within the organization. In the absence of interdependence, the concept of a team sport might instead be known as a group sport, with a common aim superseded by individual aims. Through his seminars, lectures, videos, and books, Dr. Deming shared a vision of systems well-managed. In his last book, The New Economics, he reminded us that "a system is a network of interdependent components that work together to try to accomplish the aim of the system......The greater the interdependence between components, the greater will be the need for communication and cooperation between them." Beginning in 2002, we have hosted an annual international Forum, designed with a
If you are interested in exploring and dissolving unseen forces that stand in the way of leadership and teamwork in industry, government, and education, through thinking together about thinking, we invite you to join with peers at the In2:InThinking Network's 2016 Forum in Los Angeles, California, from June 8th through 12th, on the campus of Woodbury University. This year, our ever timely focus will be;
"Know" Less - "Learn" More - INNOVATE!
Expand Your Future
Following a change we instituted for the first time in 2015, we are charging a daily fee ($25) to participate in the Pre-Conference sessions. This fee will help us to offset expenses for meals (Continental Breakfast and Lunch) and handouts associated with these sessions. As for incidental expenses, note that Woodbury University does not charge a parking fee.
Registration Deadlines
Register by Sunday, May 15th to reserve our discounted room rates at the Hampton Inn Register by Monday, June 6th to attend any of our Pre-Conference sessions
Register by Saturday, June 11th to attend our Weekend Conference
For a glimpse of the excitement we offer, link here for a photo montage from our 2012 Forum. Link here for a complete list of our previous 2016 Forum UPDATES. In2:InThinking Network 2016 Forum Team
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NEW - Forum Video Subscription Service
Through the services of Vimeo on Demand, we now offer a Forum Video subscription series. Select videos from our Forum catalog are available for online viewing for a low monthly fee (launching at $5 per month), with new videos from our 15-year library added quarterly. Eventually, our entire Forum video library will be viewable through this subscription series, with monthly rates maintained at the level at which subscribers join. This will be a great way to revisit some of your favorite presentations or see speakers you missed. Link here to learn more .
Coming Next
Through a partnership with CC-M Productions, we are proud to announce that our Vimeo on Demand library will soon expend to include the videos such as CC-M's 7-volume "Better Management for a Changing World." Our CC-M subscription series will include Russ Ackoff on The New World View, The Big Picture, The New Leadership, and Doing the Right Thing Right. It also includes Gerald Suarez on Managing Fear; Change, Improvement, and Fear; and Managing Fear: How to Begin.
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Deming Institute Workshop, May 23-25, New York
The W. Edwards Deming Institute, a 15-year "Forum Partner InThinking," is excited to announce a 2.5-day workshop on Effective & Efficient Leadership. At this seminar you will learn to look at your organization through a new lens: a lens of how to make your system better - and thus get better results. You will gain new knowledge to remove barriers, increase efficiencies, reduce wasted time, boost motivation, and provide better insight into what's really going on in your organization.
Link here to learn more. |
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Dutch Association of Research Quality Assurance
Jubilee Conference, May 26, Amersvoort, NL
DARQA, the Dutch Association of Research Quality Assurance, a new "Forum Partner InThinking," is celebrating 35 years of activity with a Jubiliee event, featuring a conference on May 27th, preceded by a pre-conference on May 26th.
Quality thinking and systems thinking is universally applicable, therefore the pre-conference and conference events welcome delegates from ALL quality driven sectors including; chemical & energy industry, ICT, aviation/aeronautics, aerospace, automotive, lithography, education, agriculture and financial institutions. Take full advantage of this unique opportunity to learn from the experts and ask your questions during the panel discussions by preparing questions and sending cases with your registration.
Link here to learn more about these events.
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