United States – Page 72 – understand-culture

Much unease

Americans become very uneasy whenever they see their German colleagues address processes with their characteristic intensity. German process discipline is almost synonymous with rigidity.

Another, more careful, look reveals, however, a contradiction. On the one side, German processes are generic, theoretical, complex and seemingly not fully focused on the goal. On the other, Americans have the sense that Germans expect processes to be followed by the letter. They ask themselves how they are supposed to follow a process which is hardly described?

German procedures are also generic and not spelled out. The Germans take this as a signal to decide independently, to make their own judgement, in a given situation. Instead of requesting input or permission from their manager, they either decide themselves or discuss with an experienced colleague how to handle a given procedure within the context of its process.

To the Americans this represents a severe breakdown in process discipline. They have little understanding, thus tolerance, for processes or procedures which allow for so much independent action when that action can lead to mistakes, errors, problems, to an domino effect.

Deviation from prozess goal

In 2011 PwC presented the results of its study Zukunftsthema Prozessmanagement – literally Future Topic Process Management, which surveyed its current state in German companies.

95% of executive management in Germany agreed that business process management was either important or very important to their success. Process management has become a critical function at the corporate level.

At the same time only 5% of those surveyed said that their process management was well developed. 46% of the companies did not have a clear plan on how to react to process deviation. Only 12% claimed to have an established mechanism for handling deviation from the most critical internal business processes.

While the study documents how much room for improvement there is in the area of process management governance, it was equally clear how flexibly German companies react to process deviation. Which, in turn, contradicts the cliché that Germans have a process for everything and always stick to the process.

proximity and dialogue

Power: Ability to act or produce an effect; legal or official authority, capacity, or right; possession of control, authority, or influence over others; a controlling group; physical might; mental or moral efficacy; political control or influence; the number of times as indicated by an exponent that a number occurs as a factor in a product; a source or means of supplying energy; the time rate at which work is done or energy emitted or transferred. From Anglo-French poer, pouer, from poer to be able, from Vulgar Latin *potēre, alteration of Latin posse potent.

Influence: An ethereal (other worldly) fluid held to flow from the stars and to affect the actions of humans; an emanation of spiritual or moral force; the act or power of producing an effect without apparent exertion of force or direct exercise of command; corrupt interference with authority for personal gain; the power or capacity of causing an effect in indirect or intangible ways. Latin influere to flow in.

Importance of sales/marketing: Americans place very high value on market- and customer-orientation. And orientation means listening to, understanding and interpreting, the needs of the customer. Meeting customer needs is the path to success.

Which means understanding and interpreting is the basis for making and delivering products and services. Understanding and interpreting requires proximity to and dialogue with customers. These are the primary functions of sales (account management) and marketing.

In its purest form, sales/marketing listens, interprets, then passes back into the organization to those responsible for the product/service portfolio. Who, in turn, pass back to colleagues in product development. Who, in turn, pass back to research and development.

From this perspective, everything flows from sales/marketing back into the organization. This puts sales/marketing in the lead.

Definition of processes

Ein Prozess ist ein Satz von in Wechselbeziehung oder Wechselwirkung stehenden Tätigkeiten, der Eingaben in Ergebnisse umwandelt. A process is a set of activities which are interrelated, interdependent, influence each other mutually, and turn inputs into results.

The Bavarian Ministry for Commerce defines a process as: „The sequence of all activities which are linked with each other and convert inputs – based on customer requirements, legal boundary conditions, market demands – into a desired outcome.“

Simply put, a process is a set of work steps, which are sequenced logically, that have a beginning and lead to a specific desired outcome.

United Breaks Guitars

In 2008, United Airlines baggage handlers damaged Dave Carroll’s guitar. After the airline refused to pay to fix the damage to his instrument, he and his band wrote a song called “United Breaks Guitars” and put it on YouTube.

Within two days it had more than 24,000 views (and more than 14 million views by 2015), and it was estimated that the bad press cost United Airlines around $180 million the following year (2009).

This incident also inspired Carroll to co-found Gripevine – a company that helps customers use social media to expose their complaints and convince companies to give better service.

Processes provide clarity

Processes provide clarity. They allow employees to concentrate on core activities. They lead to cost reductions by identifying and eliminating unnecessary work steps. Thinking in terms of processes – how the work should be done – strengthens conscientious work and allows for quality control.

Well documented processes are critical for orienting new employees. Processes make transparent, make understandable, each and every segment of complex work methods. They are the basis for optimization, for reducing mistakes, for root cause analysis of systemic errors. All of these benefits lead to increased product quality. Work processes, however, must be understood and accepted by those doing the actual work.

In Germany it is critical that processes do not take on the character of laws, but instead remain guidelines. German workers expect a certain level of freedom in terms of how they perform their daily tasks. Processes should not become a kind of straightjacket.

American Teaching Styles

Perhaps because of the high cost of tuition at American universities, Americans typically view students as customers and schools as businesses. As such, teachers will attempt to cater to the needs of their students – if a certain process doesn’t interest the customers (students), the teacher will change it in order to keep the customers attentive.

During their classes, if American teachers notice that students aren’t paying attention, they will often include several amusing anecdotes that they tell throughout the class to keep their students’ focus.

For example, during a physics class, it would not be uncommon for an American professor to stop the lecture to talk to students about how Herman Weyl (one of the early proponents of group theory) had an affair with Erwin Schrodinger’s (the physicist who’s best known not only for his quantum mechanics equation but also for his potentially dead cat) wife, or how Murray Gell-Mann (who won the 1969 Nobel Prize in physics) was so narcissistic that he once warned his cab driver not to cash his check, because he believed that his signature was worth more than his cab fare had been.

American teachers will also include anecdotal stories from their own lives if these stories have any relevance to the subject matter.

Checklists

Checklists. To-do lists. Cookbook-like recipes. “Americans don’t really understand what they are doing and why. They are not trained, nor are they allowed, to think independently. There is no real mitdenken, thinking with.”

Not uncommon sentiments among Germans who interact with Americans. A misperception. Partly. Partly not.

Checklists are practical, pragmatic. They free up the mind to concentrate on more important things. They allow for self-supervision, for checking, if necessary for double-checking. They minimize unforced errors. They structure work.

For folks who do the same thing, the same way, time and again, for years, with the same colleagues, checklists surely are unnecessary. These folks can think for themselves, independently. People same. Think same. Do same.

But what about those who do different things, at different times, in different ways and with different people? Checklists become both tool and metaphor for how to manage the differences, the change, the flux.

America is constantly challenged by flux. An immigrant nation. Influx of peoples from different backgrounds, with different skill sets, levels of education. Some craftsmen. Others semi-literate. Some rooted to the land and permanent. Others who move every couple of years.

Add to this the American belief in learning by doing, and checklists – in the sense of detailed descriptions of how to do the work – become a necessity, a helpful tool, management’s assistant.

Germans learn the checklists in their extensive theoretical training. Duales Ausbildungsystem. Dual training. Over many years. Only then are they permitted to do the work. Americans learn just enough to be permitted to learn by doing. Same goal. Two approaches. Timing about the same.

Oh, and let’s not forget. Sometimes government bodies simply impose checklists.

“Have it your way!”

“The customer is always right” is a very common phrase in American business. It was first made popular in the early 20th century when it was used as the slogan for Marshall Field’s Department Store in Chicago and London’s Selfridges Store (founded by American Harry Gordon Selfridge).

Both of these stores became extremely profitable, primarily because they had a reputation for good customer service. As a result, many American businesses have attempted to model their processes on the principle that “the customer is always right.”

In 1911, in an attempt to promote a local business, the Kansas City Star newspaper included an article about the business owner George E. Scott, saying “Scott has done in the country what Marshall Field did in Chicago, Wannamaker did in New York and Selfridge in London. In his store he follows the Field rule and assumes that the customer is always right.”

Many American companies have slogans that show that they care more about customer service than anything else. Examples:

Burger King – “Have it Your Way”

UPS – “What Can Brown Do For You?”

United States Postal Service – “We Deliver for You”

Mounds and Almond Joy – “Sometimes You Feel Like a Nut, Sometimes You Don’t”

Purpose of processes

Procedures, policies, guidelines, compliance, and other types of structure. In the end, however, most business cultures would agree that the purpose of processes and procedures is to structure how the work should be done, and allow for repeatability, consistency, and quality control.

Processes as a success factor: If asked which are the key success factors in any enterprise most Americans would name: market/customer orientation, innovation, speed, price, service. Seldom, if ever, would they cite internal business processes.

If American customers were asked which factors are key to them when choosing a product or service they would name, among others, value and service. Value is the relationship between quality and price. It would never occur to them to say the internal business processes of the company whose product or service they are purchasing (or workmanship).

In other words, although American companies have many processes and procedures, Americans are not inclined to believe that these will ensure success.