VELOCITY - DEE JACOB [111]
“We’ve achieved exactly the opposite of what we set out to do,” said Amy.
At the end of the day, Amy was still sitting at her dining room table, studying the whiteboard with its little rectangles of sticky notes and lines and arrows drawn with markers connecting one note to the next. The others had left a short while ago, but a plan had been formed. It was just an action plan, not a solution or a strategy, but it was the next step nevertheless.
“The one thing I do not want,” Amy had told them, “is for us to throw together some laundry list of changes only to find in three or six months that we got it wrong or it’s been ineffective. We need a well-grounded, logical strategy. Trouble is, we don’t have months to put one together. It has to be right, but it also has to be done on the fly.”
So it was decided that the first order of business would be to gather and confirm facts, and to assess the situation. Wayne Reese would travel to Rockville, and with the help of Sarah Schwick, would spend the week learning everything he could about the F&D analysts. He would put together a “quick and dirty” value stream map in order to study the work flow to and from the analysts. He would talk to everyone around them, note their work habits, take them to lunch and dinner individually and collectively, and learn the analysts’ own thinking about what they did and how they did it. At the end of the week, Wayne and Sarah would return to Highboro with their findings.
In the meantime, Murphy Maguire would go to Oakton, where he would assess what had happened in his absence. He would also do anything obvious that would help bring Godzilla back to better efficiency. But he had solemnly promised not to dismantle the Lean Six Sigma projects – not yet at least, although everyone including Wayne knew that changes would have to be made.
Amy was now gazing at the whiteboard, when she heard herself muttering aloud, “It’s that damned balanced line.”
That was certainly a root cause of so much of the difficulty, she concluded. But the analyst issues, too, were a large – and largely hidden – factor in their problems.
She heard the familiar rumble of Harry and Zelda’s big Ford as it turned onto the driveway. Seconds later the kids bolted through the kitchen door. Michelle kissed Amy on her cheek; Ben, who was now just slightly taller than his mother, on her forehead. Then they were racing each other for the remote control of the television. In the meantime, Amy went to help her mother get up the back steps. Zelda was having a lot of trouble with her knees. Then Amy had to help her father; he was “stuck” trying to get out of the Ford. Lately, while getting out of the car, Harry would attempt to stand up on the leg that was still inside the vehicle, whereupon he would be unable to sort out what he should do.
Once everyone was inside and the chaos had settled down, Amy poured a glass of wine, much needed, and sat down again at the dining room table. Harry shuffled in and looked at the whiteboard.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“It’s how the best intentions can end up with bad results.”
“Looks like some kind of a tree,” he said. “An ugly tree.”
“It’s the UDE tree,” said Amy.
“The what?”
“The tree of undesirables.”
“I’m confused,” said Harry.
“For once, I’m not.”
Then the doorbell chimed.
“Now what?” Amy asked fate.
And when she opened the front door, there stood Tom Dawson.
“Hi,” he said, “I was in the neighborhood, thought I’d stop by.”
Shaking her head, she smiled, and then said, “Come in.”
She slipped her arms around his waist, and was surprised at how thin he was. The fatigue of his journey showed on his face. He was sunburned, yet somehow pale. They hugged each other for some time – before Harry noticed.
“Hey, hey, hey, young man! That’s my daughter!”
“Yes, sir, I know,” said Tom.
“Dad, do you remember Tom?” asked Amy.
“Pleased to meet you,” Harry said, shaking Tom’s hand.
“Maybe we could go for a drive,” Amy suggested.
“I want her home no later than ten o’clock,” Harry said with complete seriousness.
They did