Business Practices for Engineers

I just can’t stand them anymore. Those consultants and smart advisors who go from company to company telling everyone—whether they want to hear it or not—how brilliantly Chinese firms are making Western companies look old and foolish. But you know what? These consultants are right about one thing: Competition has gotten tougher, there’s no denying that. If we want to survive in this new world and thrive long-term, a whole lot needs to change in our companies. But the solution doesn't lie in copying Chinese companies—it lies in being better. I won’t address all the aspects that play a role on the path to long-term competitiveness in this article. I’ll only select one aspect, but one I consider absolutely crucial. And honestly, it’s long overdue that we tackle this. We need to transform the potential of our employees and leaders into outstanding products with high efficiency and without wasting time. Today, let’s talk about how we can make this happen! Efficiency as a Critical Competitive Factor In my last article, I wrote about why individuals can achieve little alone but accomplish much through collaboration, and why building personal relationships and networks is essential to this. I described how people with many strong relationships are more successful than lone wolves. But what if we didn’t leave it up to individuals to build and maintain their relationships? What would happen if we implemented a way of working in the company that methodically and systematically promotes the formation of strong relationships between people? Exactly — we would activate the potential of our entire workforce as an integrated collective, and the company’s performance and thus competitiveness would increase! Costs decrease, products improve, customers become more satisfied. One effective way to do this is to make the Drum Beat, which I introduced as a project management method in previous newsletter articles, the general working rhythm throughout the entire company. Experience shows that cost reduction programs only produce short-term results. The Drum Beat, however, when practiced continuously as a work mode, ensures lasting efficiency that increases steadily with growing experience and ever-strengthening relationships. What I'm explaining using the Drum Beat as an example naturally works with all similar methods, such as product increments in agile project management. I think you'll recognize the parallels and be able to transfer this to your process if you're using something similar instead of the Drum Beat. If you have questions, don’t hesitate to contact me. So let’s look at the details of what matters. Shared Goals Are the Key to Company Success, but Also to Individual Success. If the potential of every employee and every leader is to be efficiently deployed to increase efficiency for the entire company, then it’s an important prerequisite that the goals and results of all process participants are aligned. From the company’s perspective, it’s simply not enough for employees to individually achieve their personal goals. It’s necessary for these individual goals to work together toward a common company goal. This doesn’t happen by chance but must be ensured through a well-structured process. The Drum Beat planning process offers an excellent opportunity for this. In the project, the project manager develops short-term Drum Beat Deliverables with their project management team. These are goals aligned with achieving project objectives and give the entire project team orientation and priorities. They are also a recognized measure of each project team member’s success, giving everyone clarity about what’s worth putting effort into. The Drum Beat Deliverables serve to clearly align and prioritize important value-adding activities, as well as to share acceptable risks. This ensures that valuable resources and funds are truly invested in the right priorities. Clarity regarding the results to be achieved helps both individual employees and the entire company. In many companies, projects are the essential part of business operations that determine success. Nevertheless, there are many reasons to use the Drum Beat method outside of projects as well, in the ongoing daily business of all indirect administrative areas. In addition to project goals, this also addresses company goals that aren’t directly influenced by projects. I’m excluding manufacturing areas here because they usually have other objectively measurable goals that enable elegant efficiency measurement. We can talk about that if there’s interest. Clear Agreements Strengthen Relationships Once the deliverables and thus the priorities are clear to everyone, it’s about all employees making their individual agreements to be ready to work and deliver. This is nothing less than well-organized relationship building. People talk to each other about who needs what from whom and document it properly so it won’t be forgotten. In this phase of Drum Beat planning, the foundation for trust and good relationships is laid here. Exactly as I described it in detail in my last article. Communication is intensive, support needs and necessary contributions become concrete and completely transparent to those affected. Remember? In my last article, I challenged you to make a personal plan for how you can intensify your relationship maintenance. The Drum Beat Planning ensures that an organizational framework is provided in which everyone simultaneously works on their support needs and commitments to others, making exactly this plan. This increases the intensity and quality of this aspect of relationship maintenance, creating a strong relationship network throughout the entire organization while also helping each individual. Through the shared rhythm and beat, an intensity is possible that couldn’t be achieved through singular individual actions. Now We Really Do It Once the planning event has taken place, it’s time to deliver on the promises. Here again, everyone is working together with the same priorities. The Drum Beat ensures that the probability of actually achieving the goals is very high. I think an achievement rate of over 80% should definitely be reached. If it’s lower, the goal ambition must be reduced so that the organization’s performance level and ambition level align. The increasing efficiency over time will ensure that ambition can also rise. So don’t plan for 100%, but aim for a range between 80 and 90%, so there’s a corridor for efficiency growth. It’s clear that this promotes the trust aspect. Achieving jointly agreed deliverables provides confidence that it will work again next time. This increases people's trust in each other. As a result, people become more ambitious and learn how much more can be accomplished. Celebrate Achieved Results and Be Grateful At the end of every Drum Beat, we review what was achieved together. This makes it clear to everyone what worked and what perhaps didn’t. This shared pause and appreciation of what was achieved is a crucial point that helps solidify relationships between people. It’s not necessarily common to take this time and talk together about what was achieved. The Drum Beat offers a unique opportunity to show gratitude for a colleague’s support. Don’t take this lightly. Here in Germany, especially in Swabia, they say: not scolded is praised enough. It’s meant to suggest that celebrating gratitude is seen as a waste of time. But the exact opposite is true! Strong relationships and trust—indispensable for efficient collaboration—only form when people receive feedback that their efforts are seen and there's willingness to show appreciation in the future. Here again, the Drum Beat offers the opportunity to handle this important aspect of relationship maintenance simultaneously and in a well-organized manner. How Can We Be Even More Successful I think you’ll agree with me that it’s not satisfying to remain at a once-achieved performance level. There are many scientific studies proving that ambition isn’t coincidental but belongs to human nature for many reasons. But we also know that the field in which each individual person displays their ambition doesn’t always lie in business. However, when a group of people work together trustfully and then consult together about how to improve as a team, ambition becomes contagious. Here too, the Drum Beat offers an organizational framework with its retrospective that makes a level achievable that’s greater than the sum of individual persons. Personal Success and Company Success Go Hand in Hand I wanted to make clear in this article that personal success and company success are symbiotic. If the majority of employees in a company are successful, then the company is usually successful too. But the reverse is also true: if the majority of employees aren’t successful in their work, then the company has a results problem and is very likely not competitive in the long term. I always start from the employee perspective, because the notion that employees automatically become successful just by working for a successful company is an unrealistic fantasy with no basis in reality. That’s why I believe the right and important path is to start with organizing employee collaboration to lift the company’s overall performance to a level that wouldn’t be achievable through individual successful employees or leaders alone. Now it’s true that there are other important factors to address as well — more on that in future articles. But let’s start with employees and their collaboration. I hope I’ve convinced you that significant improvement potential can be realized this way. However, it still needs to be operationally implemented in daily business processes, and I haven’t described all the details here in the article. So if you’ve decided to implement this proposal, contact me and I’ll discuss the opera