Why adapt?

Human beings have a pretty good idea of what we want: More, Better, Cheaper, and Faster. Continuous improvement requires not just perpetual change, but constructive, adaptive change.

“Insanity is doing the same thing… and expecting different results.”

Everyone, every organization, can improve:

Capital investments with low or negative returns
Project delays and cost overruns
Late orders, and customers who need a solution right now
Missed handoffs and duplicated effort
Unclear roles and responsibilities
Unreliable processes, and underutilized capacity
Late deliveries from suppliers, and the wrong mix of inventory

Many of the issues that make our stakeholders miserable are the same ones that are costing us money.

“That challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one we intend to win.”

By making adaptation a core competency, your organization can:

Understand performance in real time
Focus attention where it is needed the most
Align effort where it can deliver the greatest impact
Recover lost time and resources
Redirect them for better results
Serve customers more effectively
Maintain a more satisfying work environment
Earn greater rewards for your efforts

This is the capability that brought humanity from the Stone Age to the moon.

Einstein photo: By Unknown photographer [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
Challenge quote from JFK’s “Moon Speech” at Rice University, September 12, 1962. Photo by Robert Knudsen (President Kennedy at Rice University) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons