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ОглавлениеEffective leadership is putting first things first. Effective management is discipline, carrying it out.
—STEPHEN COVEY
After reading this chapter, you will be able to understand:
• Organizational culture
• Leadership and its role
• Vision, mission, and goals
• Reliability culture
• Change management and the role of a change agent
Successful implementation of a best practice or a new practice, small or large, is a challenge for any organization. A best practice is an improvement and a change. The implementation requires enthusiasm rather than distrust or fear from the individuals who will be impacted by the change. Guiding, nurturing, and shepherding the workforce are the skills needed to ensure that changes are received and implemented with a positive attitude. Usually, how the workforce perceives these changes needs to be evaluated and considered in developing a “change” implementation plan. And so do people’s beliefs, values, attitudes, and expectations need to be evaluated and considered.
Leadership plays a key role in enabling this process by providing both vision and resources. Creating a reliability culture conducive to change is a long journey. It is not just the maintenance workforce that needs to change its thinking, but also others in the organization (operations, production, design, stores, information technology, etc.). All need to be working together as a team to create a sustainable reliability culture and eventually a culture of excellence.
The vision of where the organization, or some unit of it, wants to be is an important element of creating a reliability culture. Stephen Covey, a leading motivational author, emphasizes the importance of mission, vision, and goals when he talks about “beginning with the end in mind” in his famous best seller, 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. According to a study by a Stanford management professor and reported in the Wall Street Journal, organizations using mission and vision statements successfully outperform those that do not (with the key being these organizations actually using their mission and vision statements). When we visualize, we are able to materialize and convert our vision into goals and then into reality.
All organizations want to improve their processes in order to become efficient and effective. For maintenance and reliability (M&R) organizational culture, progress requires not only reducing but also eliminating failures while optimizing and educating workers to perform their tasks effectively.
These efforts could require significant changes in work practices,processes, and organization structure. Eventually, these changes become part of people’s daily work habits in the organization and lead to a positive reliability culture. But for these changes to truly become part of a reliability culture, an effective change management process must be executed.
Change Management
The process of bringing planned change to an organization. Change management usually means leading an organization through a series of steps to meet a defined goal. It requires the involvement of key players and stakeholders in order to minimize resistance to change. Synonymous with management of change (MOC).
Cultural Change
A major shift in the attitudes, norms, sentiments, beliefs, values, operating principles, and behavior of an organization.
Culture
A common set of values, beliefs, attitudes, perceptions, and accepted behaviors shared by individuals within an organization.
Leader
A person who guides others or whom other people follow. A leader holds a dominant position within a particular field and can exercise a high degree of influence over others.
Leadership
The act of inspiring a group of people or an organization to perform and engage in achieving a common goal. Leaders of the organization must establish a clear vision, communicate that vision to those in the organization, and provide the direction, resources, and knowledge necessary to achieve goals and accomplish the vision. Leadership may require coordinating and balancing the conflicting interests of all members or stakeholders.
Mission
An organization’s purpose and scope of operations that distinguishes the organization from others of its type. A mission is something to be accomplished, whereas a vision is something to be pursued for that accomplishment.
Organizational Culture
The beliefs and values that define how people interpret experiences and how they behave, both individually and in groups within an organization.
Strategy
An action plan that sets the direction for the coordinated use of resources through programs, projects, policies, and procedures, as well as organizational design and the establishment of performance standards.
Vision
The achievable dream of what an organization or a person wants to do and where it wants to go.
Leadership and Organizational Culture:Leadership Styles and Frameworks
What Is Leadership?
Leadership is not a position or a title; it is action and example.
— UNKNOWN
The great leader Nelson Mandela once said,“A leader is like a shepherd. He stays behind the flock, letting the most nimble go out ahead, whereupon the others follow, not realizing that all along that they are being directed from behind.”
Leadership is polymorphic in nature; it takes on different meanings in different instances. Many times we confuse leadership and management. They have different roles. Many times we have to perform both roles, but they are often independent of each other. Managers are concerned about today; they often deal with budgets, schedules, etc. In contrast, leaders are concerned about tomorrow.
Contrary to popular belief, leadership has little to do with a person’s stature or placement in the organization’s hierarchy. It’s more about developing a positive attitude and transmitting it to others, encouraging them to reach a common goal. No matter what a person’s job responsibilities are, employees are expected to show their leadership skills at some point in the workplace.
Leadership Styles and Framework
Leadership style refers to a leader’s characteristic behaviors when directing, motivating, guiding, and managing groups of people. Great leaders can inspire a change movement and can also motivate others to perform, create, and innovate.
When we consider great leaders, we often see vast differences in how each person leads. Researchers have developed various theories and frameworks that allow us to better identify and understand these different leadership styles.
Lewin’s Leadership Styles
In 1939, a group of researchers led by psychologist Kurt Lewin identified different styles of leadership: authoritarian (autocratic), participative (democratic), and delegative (laissez-faire). Further research has since identified more distinct types of leadership. Nevertheless, this early study was very influential and provided a springboard for more defined leadership theories.
Authoritarian Leadership (Autocratic) Authoritarian leaders, also known as autocratic leaders, provide clear expectations for what needs to be done, when it should be done, and how it should be done. This style of leadership is focused strongly on both commands by the leader and control of the followers. There is also a clear division between the leader of the group and the members. Authoritarian leaders make decisions independently, with little or no input from the rest of the group.
An autocratic leadership style is a strong one-dimensional leadership style that gives full power or authority to the leader (boss/manager). The leader is the ultimate decision maker.
Participative Leadership (Democratic) The democratic leadership style is more participative in nature: The leader involves team members while making critical decisions. This style works well for an organization where team members are highly skilled and experienced. The best part of this kind of leadership style is that communication is active from top to bottom. Participative leaders encourage group members to be actively engaged in the process. As a result, the members are more motivated and creative. Democratic leaders tend to make followers feel like they are an important part of the team, which helps foster commitment to the team’s goals.
Delegative Leadership (Laissez-Faire) Delegative leaders offer little or no guidance to group members and leave the decision making up to the group members. Although this style can be useful in situations involving highly qualified experts, it often leads to poorly defined roles and a lack of motivation. Lewin noted that laissez-faire leadership tended to result in groups that lacked direction—where members blamed each other for mistakes, refused to accept personal responsibility, and produced a lack of progress and work.
Lewin’s study found that participative leadership, also known as democratic leadership, is typically the most effective leadership style.
Additional Styles of Leadership
In addition to the three styles identified by Lewin and his colleagues,researchers in this field have described numerous other characteristic patterns of leadership. Here are just a few of the best-known leadership styles:
Transformational Leadership Transformational leadership is often identified as the single most effective style. This style was first described during the late 1970s and later expanded upon by researcher Bernard M. Bass. Some of its key characteristics are the ability to motivate and inspire followers and to direct positive changes in groups.
Transformational leaders tend to be emotionally intelligent, energetic, and passionate. They are committed not only to helping the organization achieve its goals but also to helping group members fulfill their potential. Research has revealed that this style of leadership results in higher performance and more improved group satisfaction than other leadership styles.
Situational Leadership Situational leadership stresses the significant influence of the environment and the situation on leadership. Hersey and Blanchard’s model is one of the best-known situational theories. First published in 1969, this model describes four primary styles of leadership:
• The telling style is characterized by telling people what to do.
• The selling style involves leaders convincing followers to buy into their ideas and messages.
• The participating style is marked by allowing group members to take a more active role in the decision-making process.
• The delegating style involves taking a hands-off approach to leadership and allowing group members to make the majority of decisions.
Later, Blanchard expanded upon the original Hersey and Blanchard model to emphasize how the developmental and skill level of learners influences the style that should be used by leaders. Blanchard also described four different learning styles:
• The directing style involves giving orders and expecting obedience but offers little in the way of guidance and assistance.
• The coaching style means giving lots of orders, but leaders also give lots of support.
• The supporting style is an approach that offers plenty of help but very little direction.
• The delegating style is low in both directions.
Transactional Leadership This style starts with the idea that team members agree to obey their leader when they accept a job. The “transaction” usually involves the organization paying team members in return for their effort and compliance on a short-term task. The leader has a right to “punish” team members if their work doesn’t meet an appropriate standard.
Transactional leadership is present in many business leadership situations, and it does offer some benefits. For example, it clarifies everyone’s roles and responsibilities. Because transactional leadership judges team members on performance, people who are ambitious or who are motivated by external rewards—including compensation—often thrive.
The downside of this style is that, on its own, it can be chilling and amoral, and it can lead to high staff turnover. It also has serious limitations for knowledge-based or creative work. As a result, team members can often do little to improve their job satisfaction.
Charismatic Leadership Charismatic leadership resembles transformational leadership—both types of leaders inspire and motivate their team members. The difference lies in their intent. Transformational leaders want to transform their teams and organizations, while leaders who rely on charisma often focus on themselves and their ambitions,and they may not want to change anything. Charismatic leaders might believe that they can do no wrong, even when others warn them about the path that they’re on.
Coaching Leadership This style has been part of the discussion for quite some time about whether or not it should be considered a style of leadership. It is, however, an effective leadership style, one that doesn’t lead directly, but indirectly. In this style, leaders are more like coaches or teachers when working with team members.
Coaching is a relatively modern leadership style that is being employed more often by many organizations. It comes with a bouquet of additional benefits such as boosting employee motivation, increasing their performance skills, grooming, and motivating team members.
Tribal Leadership The tribal leadership model, which is based on leveraging natural groups to build a thriving organization, is advocated by author Dave Logan and his associates. As they write in their book Tribal Leadership:
Tribes in an organization get work done—sometimes a lot of work—but they don’t form because of work. Tribes are a basic building block of any large human effort, including earning a living. As such, their influence is greater than that of teams, the entire company, and even superstar CEOs or managers. In companies, tribes decide whether the new leader is going to flourish or get taken out. They determine how much work gets done, and of what quality.
This leadership style, as discussed, is a clear road map for the reality of managing organizations, careers, and life, says Reid Hoffman,cofounder of LinkedIn.
Strategic Leadership Strategic leadership refers to the leader’s expression of a strategic vision for the organization in a way that persuades others to pursue that vision with the help of the right strategies and tools. Different leadership styles impact the vision and direction of growth and the potential success of an organization. To successfully deal with change, all executives need the skills and tools for both strategy formulation and implementation. Managing change requires strategic leaders who not only provide a sense of direction but also build ownership and alignment within their workgroups to implement change.
This leadership style leads to team members who are well trained and well equipped to deal with unforeseen risks and threats.
Servant Leadership A servant leader is someone, regardless of level,who leads simply by meeting the needs of the team. The term sometimes describes a person without formal recognition as a leader. These people often lead by example. Servant leaders have high integrity and lead with generosity. Their approach can create a positive corporate culture and can lead to high morale among team members.
“How you get the results is more important than the results themselves,” according to Art Barter, the author of The Art of Servant Leadership.
Supporters of the servant leadership model suggest that it’s a good way to move ahead in a world where values are increasingly important and where servant leaders can achieve power because of their values,ideals, and ethics.
The most effective leaders know that leadership is not a “one-size-fitsall” approach. They adapt their style to fit each unique situation. When you understand the different leadership frameworks and styles available, you’re better able to guide your team through challenging situations.
Organizational Culture
What Is Organizational Culture?
Culture refers to an organization’s values, beliefs, and behaviors. In general, it consists of the beliefs and values that define how people interpret experiences and behave, both individually and in groups. Culture is both a cause and a consequence of the way people behave. Cultural statements become operationalized when leaders articulate and publish the values of their organization. Cultural statements provide a pattern for how employees should behave. Organizations with strong work cultures—including reliability cultures—achieve higher results because employees sustain focus on both what to do and how to do it.
Behavior and success are key enablers in creating the culture. There is a circular flow of mutual causation among organizational behavior, success, and culture, as shown in Figure 2.1. When a change is accepted by the team members, it changes their behavior. They do tasks differently as required by the new change. Then, if this change allows work to get done more easily, they can see some success. This success makes them accept the change and leads to changing habits or routine work methods. Eventually, it becomes the culture to do the tasks a new way (Figure 2.2).
FIGURE 2.1 Organizational Culture and Success Flow
FIGURE 2.2 Change and Culture
Leadership’s Role in Creating and Sustaining Organizational Culture
Leaders at both the corporate and plant/factory levels must keenly understand the impact that reliability has on the bottom-line performance of the organization. The valuation of an asset-dependent organization is significantly affected by the effectiveness with which that asset is managed. Leadership is a key enabler in creating an environment to implement reliability strategies, which helps in fostering a “reliability”culture in the long run.
True leadership is uncommon in today’s society and organizations because it is not genuinely understood. Furthermore, it has been misinterpreted, according to James McGregor Burns, author of the book Leadership, who wrote: “Leadership is leaders inducing followers to act for certain goals that represent the values and the motivations—the wants and needs, the aspirations and expectations—of both leaders and followers. And the genius of leadership lies in the manner in which leaders see and act their own and their followers’ values and motivations.”
General Colin Powell said, “Leadership is the art of accomplishing more than the science of management says possible.” In fact, observed author Oren Harari in The Leadership Secrets of Colin Powell, aspiring business leaders would do well to adopt Powell’s style. Powell captured his leadership approach in 18 lessons:
• Lesson 1. Being responsible sometimes means pissing people off.
• Lesson 2. The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help them or concluded that you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.
• Lesson 3. Don’t be buffaloed by experts and elites. Experts often possess more data than judgment. Elites can become so inbred that they produce hemophiliacs who bleed to death as soon as they are nicked by the real world.
• Lesson 4. Don’t be afraid to challenge the pros, even in their own backyard.
• Lesson 5. Never neglect details. When everyone’s mind is dulled or distracted, the leader must be doubly vigilant.
• Lesson 6. You don’t know what you can get away with until you try.
• Lesson 7. Keep looking below surface appearances. Don’t shrink from doing so (just) because you might not like what you find.
• Lesson 8. Organization doesn’t really accomplish anything. Plans don’t accomplish anything, either. Theories of management don’t much matter. Endeavors succeed or fail because of the people involved. Only by attracting the best people will you accomplish great deeds.
• Lesson 9. Organization charts and fancy titles count for next to nothing.
• Lesson 10. Never let your ego get so close to your position that when your position goes, your ego goes with it.
• Lesson 11. Fit no stereotypes. Don’t chase the latest management fads. The situation dictates which approach best accomplishes the team’s mission.
• Lesson 12. Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier.
• Lesson 13. Powell’s Rules for Picking People: Look for intelligence and judgment and, most critically, a capacity to anticipate, to see around corners. Also, look for loyalty, integrity, a high energy drive, a balanced ego, and the drive to get things done.
• Lesson 14. Great leaders are almost always great simplifiers,who can cut through argument, debate, and doubt, to offer a solution everybody can understand.
• Lesson 15. Part I: Use the formula P = 40 to 70, in which P stands for the probability of success and the numbers indicate the percentage of information acquired. Part II: Once the information is in the 40 to 70 range, go with your gut.
• Lesson 16. The commander in the field is always right, and the rear echelon is wrong unless proved otherwise.
• Lesson 17. Have fun in your command. Don’t always run at a breakneck pace. Take leave when you’ve earned it. Spend time with your families. Corollary: Surround yourself with people who take their work seriously, but not themselves, those who work hard and play hard.
• Lesson 18. Command is lonely.
Harari, who was a management professor at the University of San Francisco, said Powell engaged in “the kind of practical, mission- and people-based leadership that has translated into performance excellence and competitive success.” Powell didn’t use bluster to inspire his troops. He was polite and was “not interested in intimidating people. He [was] convinced that frightened people don’t take the initiative or responsibility and that their organizations suffer as a result.”
On the other hand, Harari said Powell didn’t mind making people angry—particularly in pursuit of organizational excellence. To repeat Lesson 1 above, “Being responsible sometimes means pissing people off,” Harari quoted Powell, who believed that good leaders must defy the status quo.
Harari closed The Leadership Secrets of Colin Powell with this observation: “Leadership is not rank, privilege, titles, or money. It is a responsibility.”
Donald Phillips, the author of Lincoln on Leadership—Executive Strategies for Tough Times, points out the following of Lincoln’s principles on leadership:
• Get out of the office and circulate among the troops.
• Build strong alliances.
• Persuade rather than coerce.
• Honesty and integrity are the best policies.
• Never act out of vengeance.
• Have the courage to accept unjust criticism.
• Be decisive.
• Lead by being led.
• Set goals and be results-oriented.
• Encourage innovations.
• Preach a VISION and continually reaffirm it.
In modern days, Lincoln’s principle of “Get out of the office and circulate among the troops” is known to us as management by wandering around (MBWA), as dubbed by Tom Peters and Robert Waterman in their 1982 book, In Search of Excellence. The principle has also been given other names and phrases, such as roving leadership, being in touch, and get out of the ivory tower. It is simply the process of getting out of the office and interacting with people. Peters and Nancy Austin, in A Passion for Excellence, define MBWA as “the technologies of the obvious.”
Leaders emerge in every life situation to guide others along a particular path of change and toward a final destination point. Effective leadership is not easy. History has shown us that the responsibilities and hazards of leadership are as great as their rewards. Studies in the field of leadership recognize and stress the need for building strong interpersonal relationships and bonds. In their book, Leaders, Warren Bennis and Burt Nanus wrote that “leadership establishes trust,” that “leaders pay attention,” and that “they have the ability to trust others even if the risk seems great.”
One dictionary definition of “leader” describes a primary shoot of a plant, the main artery through which the organism lives and thrives. In much the same way, organizations prosper or die as the result of their leader’s ability to embody and communicate the organization’s vision. How the M&R leader influences others very much dictates the health of the M&R department and, ultimately, the entire organization.
Effective visions, according to Tom Peters, are inspiring. They should be “clear and challenging—and about excellence.” An effective vision consists of a concise statement or picture of where the organization and its people are heading and why they should be proud of it. An effective vision empowers people and prepares for the future while also having roots in the past.
Leadership creates a vision and energizes people to make organizations and people successful. Figure 2.3 shows the results of a survey ranking five key attributes of leadership:
1. Charisma
2. Competence
3. Communication
4. Energizing people
5. Vision (in creating)
FIGURE 2.3 Leadership Attributes Survey Results
It’s interesting to note that charisma, which used to be a key attribute of a leader in the past, is not an important factor any more. Other attributes such as creating a vision, energizing people, communication,etc., have become more important attributes of a leader.
Leadership plays an important role in creating a vision and energizing the workforce, as reported by this survey. One of the important factors impeding success in an organization is a lack of or not enough leadership support to implement changes. It has been found that successful leaders share a number of qualities needed to improve their processes. They support:
• Creating the organization’s vision and mission
• Ensuring resource availability
• Empowering line managers with authority and accountability
• Ensuring that both individual and group goals are aligned with the organization’s vision and goals
• Viewing training as an investment in developing the workforce rather than an unnecessary expense
• Aligning and integrating all changes and process improvements (the best practices) toward meeting the organization’s overall objectives
Strategic Framework: Vision, Mission, and Goals
Both the organization and its people need to establish a strategic framework for significant success. This framework, which is illustrated in Figure 2.4, consists of:
• A vision for the future. Where are the organization and we going?
• A mission that defines what we are planning to do. What will be accomplished?
• Values that shape our actions. Why are we going in this direction?
• Strategies that zero in on a key success approach. How will we get there?
• Goals and an action plan to guide our daily, weekly, and monthly actions. When will we get there?
FIGURE 2.4 A Strategic Framework for Success
An organization’s success and our success depend on how well we define and live by each of these important concepts.
It has been found that the organizations whose employees are engaged and understand company policies—vision/mission/goals etc.— enjoy a greater financial return than other organizations as reported in Watson Wyatt’s 2008/2009 WorkUSA report.
The report found that when employees are highly engaged, their companies enjoy 26 percent higher employee productivity, have lower turnover risk, and are more likely to attract top talent. Their companies have also earned 13 percent greater total returns to shareholders over the last five years.
The report said that highly engaged employees are twice as likely as their less engaged peers to be top performers. They also miss 20 percent fewer days of work and three-quarters of them exceed or far exceed expectations in their most recent performance review. Additionally,highly engaged workers tend to be more supportive of organizational change initiatives and resilient in the face of change.
Vision
A vision statement is a short, succinct, and inspiring declaration of what the organization intends to become or to achieve at some point in the future. Vision refers to the category of intentions that are broad, all-inclusive, and forward-thinking. It is the image that a business must have of its goals before it sets out to reach them. It describes aspirations for the future, without specifying the means that will be used to achieve those desired ends.
Corporate success depends on the vision articulated by the organization’s leaders and the management. For a vision to have any impact on the employees of an organization, it has to be conveyed in a dramatic and enduring way. The most effective visions are those that inspire, asking employees for their best, and communicating that constantly. A vision statement is a pronouncement about what an organization wants to become. It should resonate with all members of the organization and help them feel proud, excited, and part of something much bigger than themselves. A vision statement should stretch the organization’s capabilities and image of itself. It gives shape and direction to the organization’s future. Vision statements range in length from a couple of words to several pages. Sample vision and mission statements are shown in Figure 2.5.
FIGURE 2.5 Sample Vision and Mission Statements
Warren Bennis, a noted writer on leadership, said, “To choose a direction, leaders must have developed a mental image of the possible and desirable future state of the organization. This image, which we call a vision, may be as vague as a dream or as precise as a goal or a mission statement.”
SMRP is a leading, not-for-profit, maintenance and reliability society; it provides opportunities for its members to exchange best practices and other educational and networking opportunities through conferences, symposiums, online blogs, discussions, and workshops. It has taken the initiative to standardize maintenance and reliability definitions, including metrics. The certification arm of SMRP has the vision to have at least one Certified Maintenance & Reliability Professional (CMRP) in every plant in the world. There are around 6,000 certified professionals worldwide. The author has been heavily involved in the development of this certification program and also collecting and documenting best practices and metrics since its inception in 1998.
Reliabilityweb and Uptime Magazine have also created a certification in this area called Certified Reliability Leader, which is also becoming popular among many professionals. The author was also involved with its development and in creating study material. Many organizations are working to get their technical people certified to ensure that they are aware of current best practices. The process validates that the person holding the certification has the appropriate knowledge of current best practices.
Sometimes a picture portraying the vision can convey the message very effectively. Figure 2.6 displays the intent of an organization’s vision statement. This organization developed its vision picture in the mid 1990s to become the best M&R organization. The buses (people) are lined up to see a very successful M&R program. This organization has come a long way from a reactive mode to a proactive, reliability-based culture; its journey to excellence continues in spite of several changes in the management of the M&R organization and the top management. It took the organization many years to build a reliability culture, but it is engrained in its DNA now.
FIGURE 2.6 Sample Vision Picture
Examples of some maintenance vision statements include:
Maintenance Vision Statement
To leverage a highly skilled workforce and employ effective maintenance strategies to position XYZ organization as the leading manufacturer across the industry.
Maintenance Vision Statement
A world-class maintenance system with a standardized approach to plan, execute, track, and analyze maintenance and production processes.
The vision must convey the essence of how the organization desires to accomplish feats that prove to be big, exciting, and compelling.
Mission Statements
Mission and vision statements are very different. A mission statement is an organization’s vision translated into written form. It’s the leader’s view of the direction and purpose of the organization. For many corporate leaders, it is a vital element in any attempt to motivate employees and to give them a sense of priorities.
A mission statement should be a short and concise statement of goals and priorities. In turn, goals are specific objectives that relate to specific periods and are stated regarding facts. The primary goal of any business is to increase stakeholder value. The most important stakeholders are shareholders who own the business, employees who work for the business, and clients or customers who purchase products or services from the business.
The mission should answer four questions:
1. What do we do? (What is the purpose of the organization?)
2. How do we do it? (What’s unique about the organization?)
3. For whom do we do it? (Who are our customers and stakeholders?)
4. What are our values and beliefs?
We can look at each question in more detail to see what the answers should entail:
• What do we do? This question should not be answered in terms of what is physically delivered to customers. Instead, it should address the real needs that are fulfilled when customers buy our products or services. Customers make purchase decisions for many reasons, including economical, logistical,and emotional factors.
• How do we do it? This question captures the more technical elements of the business. Our answer should encompass the physical product or service, how it is sold and delivered to customers, and how it fits with the need that the customer fulfills with its purchase.
• For whom do we do it? The answer to this question is also vital, as it will help us to focus our efforts. Anybody who uses our products or services is our customer. It could be a person or system next in the production line that takes what we build or provides a service. In a broader sense, it could include stakeholders for whom we ultimately do it.
• What are our values and beliefs? Values and beliefs guide our plans, decisions, and actions. Values become real when we demonstrate them in the way we act and the way we insist that others behave. In forward-looking and energized organizations, values are the real boss. They drive the workforce and keep people moving in the right direction.
Developing a Mission Statement
There are three main benefits attributed to mission statements:
1. They help companies focus their strategy by defining some boundaries within which to operate.
2. They define the dimensions along which an organization’s performance is measured and judged.
3. They suggest standards for individual ethical behavior.
In his book First Things First, Stephen Covey pointed out that mission statements are often not taken seriously in organizations because they are developed by top executives, with no buy-in at the lower levels. But it’s a pretty safe assumption that there probably is buy-in when we develop our own mission statements.
First Things First is actually about time management, but Covey and his coauthors used the personal mission statement as an important principle. The idea is that if we live by a statement of what’s really important to us, we can make better time management decisions. The authors asked, “Why to worry about saving minutes when we might be wasting years?”
A mission statement may be valuable, but how in the world do we go about crafting one? As one way to develop a mission statement,Covey talks about visualizing your 80th birthday or 50th wedding anniversary and imagining what all your friends and family would say about you. A somewhat more morbid, but effective, approach is writing your own obituary.
Sometimes vision and mission statements could be a little confusing. To clarify, a comparison of vision and mission statements is shown in Figure 2.7.
FIGURE 2.7 Comparing Vision vs Mission Statement
Can we visualize what it would be like if there were no asset failures or if production met its schedule without any overtime for 1 month or even 3 months, or if there were not a single midnight call for 3 months, and we were able to sleep without worrying?
When developing a mission statement, keep these points in mind:
• The mission statement should describe the overall purpose of the organization.
• If the organization elects to develop a vision statement before developing the mission statement, ask, “Why does the image,the vision, exist—what is its purpose?”This purpose is often the same as the mission.
• When wording the mission statement, consider the organization’s products, services, markets, values, concern for public image, and maybe priorities of activities for survival.
• Also when wording the mission statement, ensure that it is written such that management and employees can infer some order of priorities in how products and services are delivered.
Some sample mission statements related to M&R are:
A Physical Plant Mission Statement (School/University)
The Physical Plant Department is a service organization whose main purpose and goal are to provide the best possible facilities and climate in which to support the instruction, learning programs, and public services of the university. We strive to make our customers feel nurtured,inspired, and uplifted by the excellence of our service and the caring concern of our service providers.
Mission Statement of a Maintenance Department
To manage the business of maintenance in a manner that ensures production effort to yield high-quality products at low operating costs, utilizes all resources, and involves production and maintenance employees working together toward a common goal.
Mission Statement of a Maintenance Organization
To maximize equipment performance, fostering an environment of ownership and pride, through a structured approach to predictive and preventative maintenance.
Mission Statement of the Society of Maintenance & Reliability Professionals
• Facilitate information exchange through a structured network of maintenance and reliability professionals.
• Support maintenance and reliability as an integral part of business management.
• Present a collective voice on maintenance and reliability issues and advance innovative maintenance and reliability practices.
• Promote and support maintenance and reliability education for people, production, and quality processes to improve the work environment.
If the environment changes, mission statements may require revisions to include additional or different needs being fulfilled, delivery systems, or customer groups. With this in mind, vision and mission statements should be revisited periodically to determine whether modifications are desirable to more accurately reflect the current environment or strategic direction.
SMRP recently reviewed and updated its mission statement. It says now:
To develop and promote excellence in maintenance, reliability, and physical asset management.
SMRP’s vision and core value statements (from SMRP’s website, smrp.org) are:
Vision
To be the global leader for the maintenance, reliability, and physical asset management profession.
Values
SMRP values data-driven excellence, sharing/collaboration,membership focus, continuous improvement, accountability,trust and respect, integrity, and social responsibility.
Corporate Strategy
Strategy is a very broad term that commonly describes any thinking that looks at the bigger picture. Successful organizations are those that focus their efforts strategically. To meet and exceed customer satisfaction, the business team needs to follow an overall organizational strategy. A successful strategy adds value for the targeted customers over the long run by consistently meeting their needs better than the competition does.
The strategy is the way an organization orients itself toward the market in which it operates and toward the other companies in the marketplace against which it competes. It is a plan based on the mission an organization formulates to gain a sustainable advantage over the competition.
The objectives must be:
• Focused on a result, not an activity
• Consistent
• Specific
• Measurable
• Related to time
• Attainable
Goals and Action Plans
The major outcome of strategic planning, after gathering all necessary information, is the setting of goals and action plans for the organization based on its vision and mission statement. A goal is a long-range aim for a specific period. It must be specific and realistic. Long-range goals set through strategic planning are translated into activities that will ensure reaching the goal through operational planning. Examples of an M&R goal include achieving 90% PM compliance and reducing the overtime to less than 5% in a specified period.
Change Management and Implementing Change
No matter how many goals are set or how grand the vision is, an organization can go only as far as the organizational culture will allow it. Best practices are improvements, and improvements are change. A real (effective) change cannot happen unless the employees accept the change with a heart; that can’t happen without having a desire for change. The employees have to have trust and see some benefits for them and for the overall good. The intended change may not bring a financial gain but instead ease of operation, maintenance, work safety, etc. Employees must see “what’s in it for me” (WIIFM). The organization needs to have a change management process to implement a change effectively.
Several models can be adopted to implement change, including:
• Prosci’s ADKAR (awareness, desire, knowledge, ability, and reinforcement) model
• Kotter’s eight-stage process change model
• Kurt Lewin’s change management model—unfreeze, change,refreeze
• The McKinsey 7-S model
• Stephen Covey’s 7 Habits model
Some of these change models and processes are discussed in more detail by the author in 10 Rights of Asset Management by Ramesh Gulati and Terrence O’Hanlon.
Any organization that will succeed in bringing about a culture change must have some form of a change management process. Even if the organization does not have a formal (written-down) process, one will exist in that organization. However, the success rate of any changes will probably be limited by the charisma of the leadership or the vision of its team.
Changing the culture from reactive thinking to proactive follows a similar process to what was discussed in,“Leadership and Organizational Culture.” It has to be shown why preventive and condition-based approaches are better than reactive work. Making people change what they do or how they think takes time. After all, it took them a long time to build their current habits. People do certain things in certain ways. In turn, when we ask them to do things differently or ask them to buy into our plan (vision), we are taking them out of their comfort zone. We must have very convincing reasons for people to change; we must inspire them to accept change. Clear reasons would help greatly in the implementation process. We have found that implementing changes in small steps or a small pilot area helps the process. Figure 2.8 shows the culture change process.
FIGURE 2.8 Culture Change Process
Organizational change management takes a structured approach to change, helping executive management, business units, and individual employees make the transition from the current state to a desired future state. The goal is to assist employees in assimilating change: to minimize the disruption of expectations and loss of control that can easily lead to resistance on the part of those who must actually change.
Two key elements of any successful effort to change the culture are:
1. Influencing the behavior to change
2. Overcoming resistance to change
To influence the behavior to change, the following actions are suggested:
• Increase understanding (i.e., why the change is needed and how it relates to vision).
• Set goals and expectations.
• Establish a process for praise and recognition.
• Define and clarify roles.
• Establish and standardize processes and procedures.
• Create discipline, develop tenacity, and be persistent.
To overcome resistance to change, the following actions are suggested:
• Listen and communicate.
• Create awareness.
• Educate and train to create understanding.
• Get team members involved and let them see some success.
• Empower team members to improve and tailor the process—change if needed.
Role of a Change Agent
The change agent is another important person who helps implement changes successfully. Change agents have the clout, conviction, charisma,and resourcefulness to make things happen and keep others engaged in implementing change. They usually have some skills including:
• They understand the organization’s politics to get work accomplished but do not participate in the work.
• They have a good understanding of processes, the improvements needed, and interface issues, including any financial impact of the change.
• They are keen analyzers who can persuade and defend changes to every level of the organization.
• They speak several organizational languages or have certain backgrounds or traits—marketing, finance, operations, engineering, etc.
• They have a passion for improvement; in essence, they bring order out of chaos.
The change agent is a very important role in an organization that is trying to implement a reliability culture. This role should be filled by a senior management person who has respect for and the trust of the people.
What Is Reliability Culture?
Can we define reliability culture? What does it mean if someone says that organization XYZ has a reliability culture? Is there a metric to measure it? The problem is that culture—any kind of culture—is a “touchyfeely” concept that is difficult to define and specifically measure.
We can see the impact of a reliability culture on the outcome or services provided by the organization. Reliability improves the bottom line of an organization because it can meet the customer’s needs on time and cost-effectively. In a reliability-based organization:
• Assets are reliable and available as and when needed—high uptime.
• Assets are functioning and producing as designed.
• Maintenance costs are reasonable (at optimum level).
• The plant/factory operates safely and reliably.
The importance of reliability and of implementing best M&R practices is discussed at the highest level of the organization. Many organizations talk about RCM/reliability, but it’s treated as the “program of the month” and loses its emphasis over time. Changing an existing culture of “run to failure” or little or no PM program to a sustainable reliability culture takes many years and consistent management support and resources.
In a reliability culture, the prevention of failures becomes an emphasis at every organizational level. The entire workforce is focused on asset reliability. Everyone in the workforce—operators, maintainers,engineers—thinks and acts to ensure:
• Assets are available to produce when needed.
• Assets are maintained at a reasonable cost.
• An optimized maintenance plan (FMEA-/RCM-/CBMbased) is in place that includes:
• All assets identified with criticality and having a documented maintenance plan
• A defect elimination program
• 80/20 principles applied to prioritize the work
• Most of the work planned and scheduled
If an asset fails, it gets fixed quickly, the root cause is determined,and action is taken to prevent future failures. Plant/asset reliability analysis is performed on a regular basis to improve uptime. The workforce is trained and taught to practice reliability-based concepts and best practices on a continuous basis.
Reliability Culture—Creating and Sustaining
Let us look into a real plant scenario where an asset breakdown/failure has occurred:
Operations reported that Valve P-139 would not close. An operations workaround was used to divert the process temporarily. The breakdown was reported to the maintenance department with an urgent request in the CMMS/EAM system to fix the valve.
The following events happened:
• Maintenance dispatched a mechanic to evaluate and fix the valve.
• The mechanic noticed “a burning smell” upon arrival and suspected the electric motor on a hydraulic pump had burned up. He called an electrician to help.
• The electrician determined that the motor had failed. He asked his supervisor to find a replacement motor.
• The supervisor called the storekeeper, who found that no spare motor was available.
• The supervisor called operations to report that the motor had failed and would take a couple of days to repair. Operations demanded the repair immediately, so the supervisor called the plant engineer to help locate a spare motor.
• The plant engineer and supervisor found the same type of motor on a similar system not being used. The supervisor sent another crew to remove this motor while the first crew removed the failed motor.
• Maintenance replaced the motor and adjusted linkages due to sluggish operation. The valve was released to operations.
• The work order was closed with the comment “Valve was fixed.”
• The folks in operations were so happy with a 4-hour repair time (rather than 2 to 3 days) that they sent an e-mail thanking the maintenance crew for a job well done. The maintenance manager also recognized the crew and thanked them for a good job done.
What kind of culture does this plant have? What kind of message is being delivered to the workforce? It appears that this organization has a reactive culture. Fixing things is recognized and appreciated.
Now, let us look into another plant with the same breakdown scenario, but where the sequence of events happened a little differently:
• After receiving the information/call, the maintenance supervisor/scheduler visited the site, assessed the failure, and found that the valve linkage was tight and dry. Probably the electric motor on the hydraulic system had burned, causing failure.
• The supervisor/scheduler assigned a mechanic, and an electrician requested both a 6-month chronological history report and a recommended parts list, and also alerted the plant engineer of the problem.
• The electrician determined that the motor had failed (burned). The overload relays didn’t function properly. The mechanic found that the linkage was tight due to inadequate lubrication.
• The repair history (attached to the work order) showed that the following problem had arisen a few months ago: “Problem with valve closing. The mechanic had adjusted and greased the linkage. The hydraulic pressure on the system had been raised from 1,500 psi to 1,800 psi to make the actuator and linkage work smoothly.”
• The scheduler/supervisor quickly put a repair plan together,which included the replacement of the motor and overload relays, restoration of the hydraulic pressure to system design,and greasing/adjusting the linkage. A spare motor was available as a part of the repairable program.
• Work was completed as planned. The operator supported the repair and helped in testing the system. The valve returned to operation.
• The WO was closed, and repair details were documented.
• The operations people were pleased with a 2-hour repair. After personally thanking the maintenance crew for a job well done and for finding the root cause, the maintenance manager asked the crew for a plan of further action needed to improve the reliability for review in 10 days so future failures could be prevented.
Now let’s review what happened in this plant. It seems like this plant was doing fairly well. A lot of things went well during this repair and in the follow-up actions suggested by the maintenance manager. But is everything going as well as it could? Is the CMMS/EAM system providing the data we need to make the right decisions? What kind of message is being delivered to the workforce? What kind of culture is in this plant?
In this plant, the CMMS/EAM system has provided the information to help make the right decisions. The maintenance manager is emphasizing failure prevention. It’s a proactive culture—a step in the right direction.
And now let us look at another plant, with a similar type of situation, but where events happened a little differently. In this case, the plant operations (operator) noted that on Valve # P–139:
• Motor: Current data on the operations panel indicated a higher-than-normal current. The visual inspection and site visit indicated that the valve actuator was running sluggish. Maintenance was alerted by the operator.
• Maintenance evaluated the situation with the help of the operator and planned the repair on a scheduled downtime period.
• The repair was completed, and there was no unscheduled downtime. All repairs were documented in the CMMS/EAM system for asset history.
• PM tasks were reviewed, and root cause analysis was performed. Based on this analysis, PM tasks were updated. A work order to redesign the linkage based on root cause analysis was also issued to design/engineering.
• Operators were thanked for watching the asset/system closely
What happened in this plant? What kind of culture does this organization have? In this plant, “failure” was identified and addressed before it happened. Additionally:
• Operations and maintenance worked together as a team.
• The system provided the “warning” data.
• The process was designed to make it happen.
In this organization, the reliability/maintenance leaders have done their work. They provided the right tools, trained both operators and maintenance, and created the right culture—a culture of reliability excellence.
Thus, reliability culture can be defined when all stakeholders—not just the operator and maintainer, but everyone involved in all the steps, from the concept of the asset, to design, procure, build/fabricate,install, operate, maintain/sustain, improve, and dispose of—ensure that the asset performs when required and cost-effectively. All do their job correctly and work together as a team to ensure the right actions are performed during the asset’s entire life cycle.
Leadership is one of the most prominent aspects of the organizational context. Organizations face challenges defining and assessing the performance of their leaders and managers. It can take a significant amount of resource investment to make decisions about what and how to measure. However, measures of leadership effectiveness are difficult to quantify.
To measure the impact (effectiveness) of leadership, we need to understand to what extent it influences and drives performance. Leadership is basically the capacity of someone to bring about change.
An accepted model for measuring leadership comes from James M. Kouzes and Barry Z. Posner, authors of The Leadership Challenge: How to Keep Getting Extraordinary Things Done in Organizations. Kouzes and Posner devised the Leadership Practices Inventory (LPI). The LPI measurement model uses a series of questions to assess leadership effectiveness. People under designated leaders are observers, evaluating leaders on a series of qualities, such as:
• Discusses future trends regarding how they can change their work
• Provides positive feedback on accomplishments
• Follows through on promises
• Treats others with respect
• Solicits feedback and opinions from others
Observers are also required to assess their leadership based on several behaviors, such as:
• Sets a good personal example
• Actively listens to other viewpoints
• Supports others in their decisions
• Willing to take certain risks and experiment
Another framework for performance analysis was created by John Campbell, a psychology professor at the University of Minnesota. He conducted a comprehensive review of several decades of performance research and practices. His findings appeared in The Oxford Handbook of Leadership under the title “Leadership, the Old, the New, and the Timeless: A Commentary.” Campbell identified 14 factors that can be used to assess leadership and management across the organization.
Leadership Factors
1. Guides and directs work methods and roles
2. Trains and coaches others
3. Provides recognition and support
4. Delegates authority and responsibility
5. Serves as a role model
6. Encourages goal achievement
Management Factors:
1. Makes decisions and solves problems
2. Sets goals, plans, organizes and budget
3. Coordinates the work
4. Monitors unit/groups effectiveness
5. Manages to staff
6. Represents the organization externally
7. Ensures compliance and commitment to rules
8. Performs administrative tasks
Another model to measure leadership effectiveness is advocated by Robert Mann, author of The Measure of a Leader. He originally developed this leadership appraisal tool to help the Ontario school system to train principals. His method can help any leader identify weaknesses and strengths. Mann’s research expected to identify the personality trait of good leaders. It turns out that leaders’ personalities vary widely. However, there are some specific behaviors that will make a leader effective. He believes anyone can learn these behaviors or attributes to be a good leader. They are:
1. Have a mission and inspire others to join.
2. Create a strong organization.
3. Have strong interpersonal skills.
4. Be a good motivator.
Leadership effectiveness can be assessed by developing a questionnaire based on these attributes.
Corporate success depends on the vision articulated by organizational leaders and managers. For a vision to impact the employees of an organization, it has to be conveyed in a dramatic and enduring way. The most effective visions are those that inspire, usually asking employees for the best, the most, or the greatest. A vision explains where the organization wants to be and is an important element of creating a reliability culture.
Culture refers to an organization’s values, beliefs, and behaviors. In general, culture is concerned with the beliefs and values of people based on their interpretation of experiences and how they behave, both individually and in groups. Cultural statements become operationalized when leaders articulate and publish the values of their organization,which provide patterns for how employees should behave. Organizations with strong reliability cultures achieve higher results because employees sustain focus on both what to do and how to do it.
When we visualize, we are able to materialize—we convert our vision into goals and then into reality. Leadership enables this process by providing direction and resources to make this happen. In fact, leadership plays a key role in creating a sustainable reliability culture.
Leadership is an important factor whether we are running a small store or business, a large organization, or a country. It comes with its own set of responsibilities and challenges, as each one of us has a distinct style. Leadership is the act of inspiring a person, group, or organization to perform and engage in achieving a common goal. A considerable amount of literature is available that discusses styles of leadership models, including:
• Authoritarian
• Participative
• Delegative
• Transformational
• Situational
• Transactional
• Charismatic
• Coaching
• Tribal
• Strategic
• Servant
No matter what your job responsibilities entail, you would be expected to show your leadership skills at some point in the workplace. Exhibiting leadership is an extension of your personality that speaks about your credibility as a working professional. The leader is someone who has the ability to take the team members in the right direction by leading them to success.
Creating a sustainable reliability culture is a long journey that requires sound change management practices. Many organizations get impatient and stop supporting reliability change or implementing best practices in the organization; they fail to understand it takes many years to create a sustainable reliability culture.
To sustain a reliability culture, the reliability/maintenance leaders in an organization must continue to provide the right tools, training,and education to both the operators and maintainers together as a team. They need to ensure that the workforce is always current on:
• Knowledge—of best practices
• Teamwork—to assure communication and understanding
• Focus—on the right goals for business success
• Planning—to create a road map for knowing where they are and where they want to be
• Processes—documentation, adherence, and discipline
• Measurements—to provide feedback and control and to ensure that they, the leadership, continue to support the continuous improvement environment and are creating a conducive, sustainable culture
Q2.1 What are the key attributes of a leader?
Q2.2 Why is vision important?
Q2.3 Define MBWA. Why is it considered one of the key leadership practices?
Q2.4 Define an organizational culture.
Q2.5 What are the key benefits of having a mission statement?
Q2.6 Why are the mission and vision statements important for an organization?
Q2.7 Define reliability culture.
Q2.8 Why is change management an important part of creating the right reliability culture?
Q2.9 Define the role of a change agent. Who is best qualified to perform this role?
Q2.10 How do we measure leadership effectiveness?
Q2.11 State four key attributes of a leader. Explain why these attributes are important.
Q2.12 State the differences between a manager and a leader.
Q2.13 Discuss Colin Powell’s 18 lessons. Can they be adapted to the business environment?
Q2.14 What is the difference between transformational and transactional in leadership styles?
Q2.15 What is the difference between a servant- and participative-style leadership?
References and Suggested Reading
Barter, Art. The Art of Servant Leadership II: How You Get Results Is More Important Than the Results Themselves. Wheatmark Publishing, 2018.
Bennis, Warren, and Burt Nanus. Leaders. HarperCollins Publishers, 1985.
Burns, James McGregor. Leadership. Harper Perennial Modern Classics, 1982.
Campbell, John. “Leadership, the Old, the New, and the Timeless:A Commentary.” The Oxford Handbook of Leadership. Oxford University Press, 2012.
Covey, Stephen R. 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Simon & Schuster, Fireside Edition, 1990.
Covey, Stephen R. First Things First. Simon & Schuster, 1994.
Harari, Oren. Leadership Secrets of Colin Powell. McGraw-Hill, July 2003.
Kotter, John P. Leading Change. Harvard Business Review Press, 2012.
Kouzes, James M., and Barry Z. Posner. The Leadership Challenge, 4th ed. Jossey-Bass, August 2008.
Logan, Dave, John King, and Halee Fischer-Wright. Tribal Leadership. Harper Business, 2008.
Mann, Robert L. The Measure of a Leader: A Review of Theories about Leadership and a Methodology for Appraising Leader Effectiveness.iUnivers, 2013.
Maxwell, John C. Leadership 101: What Every Leader Needs to Know. Thomas Nelson Publishers, 2002.
Peters, Tom, and Nancy Austin. A Passion for Excellence. Grand Central Publishing, 1989.
Peters, Tom, and Robert Waterman. In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America’s Best-Run Companies. Warner Books, 1982.
Phillips, Donald. Lincoln on Leadership: Executive Strategies for Tough Times. Warner Business Books, 1992.
Schwartz, David. The Magic of Thinking BIG. Simon & Schuster, Fireside Edition, 2007.
Thomas, Stephen. Improving Maintenance & Reliability Through Cultural Change. Industrial Press, 2005.
Watson Wyatt’s Survey report, “Watson Wyatt’s Work USA Survey Identifies Steps to Keep Employees Engaged, Productive in a Downturn.” HR.com February 10, 2010.
