Page 267 - The Toyota Way Fieldbook

Chapter 11. Develop Exceptional Team Associates 243

this manager you can sense the pride in the people and what they accomplish.
Of course, this manager does not live in a ivory tower, nor is she living in some
fantasyland. It is just a different perception of the situation. The work is not
more glamorous, the pay not significantly higher (if at all), nor the benefits, yet
the people are “good.”
When we begin to work with people, we find that they are similar and have
basic needs (see The Toyota Way, pages 194-98, for a discussion on motivation
theory). Growing exceptional people goes beyond just providing better pay and
benefits. You can throw all kinds of perks at people and still not create the prop-
er environment for them to blossom. If you’re a manager, the key is what you
truly believe about the nature of people and what they mean to you. The soil
must be tended and the seeds nurtured so they bear fruit that will provide sus-
tenance and survival for you! As with all other aspects of creating the Toyota
Way, it all begins with your thinking.

TRAP
How Do You Refer to People?
One sure sign that you and the leadership team have the wrong
view of people is in how you refer to individuals during meet-
ings and planning sessions. We often hear references to people as
“heads” (as in head count), and “bodies,” or worse “warm bodies”
(which implies that if they are alive and breathing, that’s all that
is needed). These references are innocuous, and you may not even
be aware of them, but they speak to your deeper level beliefs of
the value of people. Are they just “bodies” with a purpose only
to fill a position? Do you expect people to check their brains at
the door when they come to work? Do you do more work to try
to reduce your greatest asset, or to grow and develop it?

Start by Selecting the Right People

A good selection process helps to “thin the crop,” to identify the people who will
best fit your culture and needs. You may look at this section and think, “We already
have all our people, and we’re stuck with some bad ones, and there’s nothing that
we can do.” Take heart. Even the best selection process in the world will allow
some bad seeds to pass through. In the end you must work with what you have
and make the best of that. The skills and traits that are targeted during the selec-
tion process are skills that can be developed. But every company has people who
leave and must be replaced. Spending time up front with the selection process
can help to reduce the time needed to develop these skills later.