Here’s an article on Slashdot that talks about college students failing because of poor grammar. Do you know what the reason is for the importance of grammar? No, it has nothing to do with the anal retentive among you who do things right because you’re supposed to do things right. Grammar is there to help refine thinking. If you think things through, apply logic, apply the rules of grammar for communicating those clear thoughts, then you stand a chance of communicating. Shorthand may work (may…) for texting, but when you’re trying to communicate something important, you’d better think it through.
Another article from Evolving Excellence talks about the problem of hiring Lean consultants. They come in, do a crash study and then leave. Then a year later top management wonders why the numbers never improved like they were supposed to. I learned this lesson more than 30 years ago when I saw consultants swoop into the company I worked for, recommend a few things, collect a check and leave. And nothing really changed. The only true change is when you change the culture, really abosorb a continuous Lean way of life that values every person and embed the changes in the company DNA.
A third article I just found “Public Speaking Demands Productivity” talks about the waste of time attending a seminar presented poorly. It is a responsibility of speakers to respect the productivity of the audience.
