13 May 2021 by Phillip Johnston • Last updated 15 August 2023Out of the Crisis (archive.org scan) is a classic and influential work by Dr. Edwards Deming that changed manufacturing. It also should have changed the way that managers work, but in my experience his principles haven’t been widely adopted within software and hardware companies. Dr. Deming outlined “14 Points for Management” and organized the book around exploring these points, their rationale, their application, and their implications. These “14 points” serve as principles to follow for anyone that wants to transform their organization to produce higher quality products at lower …
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I was listening to the Jocko Podcast, and Jocko was reading from a U.S. Marine Corps (USMC) publication titled "The Squad Leader Makes a Difference". Jocko relayed the story of Corporal Gregory, who served with the USMC in Vietnam. I thought that Corporal Gregory was an outstanding example of a leader who focused on training, …
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I am a fan of the Jocko Podcast. Over the past few months I have been listening to the episodes on General Bruce C. Clarke's 1963 book, Guidelines for Leaders and Commanders. I highly recommend this series to anyone in a leadership position. This series is also valuable for contractors and consultants, many of whom …
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Today we have a guest post by Saket Vora about building a product development team aligned with your company's business value propositions. Saket is a hardware product developer who has helped create iPods, iPhones, and Watch at Apple, and was a founding team member at Pearl Automation. You can contact him via email or on …
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As I mentioned in the lessons learned from the software architecture workshop, we can draw inspiration and lessons from all over. Today I want to share some wonderful leadership advice courtesy of Lao-Tzu (~500BC), the founder of Taoism. This advice comes from verse 17 of the Tao Te Ching. In this verse, Lao-Tzu is discussing …
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