Leonardo da Vinci – Inventor of the Scientific Method, Systems Thinker and Gemba Practitioner

All process improvement must start with understanding the system through observation.

As you might surmise I have considerable admiration for Leonardo da Vinci given the number of his drawings I’ve placed on my blog and website www.solutionelements.com. Recently I had the chance to read a compilation of his notes¹ and immediately came across his philosophy about how to understand the nature of the world. Core to da Vinci’s thinking was that the basic way to understanding anything was to observe, experiment, experience, in other words empirical observation. In his words²

Consider now, O reader! What trust can we place in the ancients, who tried to define what Soul and Life are – which are beyond proof – whereas those things which can at any time be clearly known and proved by experience remained for many centuries unknown or falsely understood.

Many think that they can with reason blame me, alleging that my proofs are contrary to the authority of certain men held in great reverence by their inexperienced judgments, not considering that my works are the issue of simple and plain experience which is the true mistress.

These rules enable you to know the true from the false – and this induces men to look only for things that are possible and with due moderation – and they forbid you to use a cloak of ignorance, which will bring about that you attain to no result and despair abandon yourself to melancholy.

Leonardo challenged the traditions of Scholastic theologians who viewed scientific experiments as subversive attacks on Aristotle and the Church. Over a century before Galileo he single-handedly developed the essential characteristics of the scientific method; study the available literature combined with an empirical approach of: systematic observations, repeated measurements, logical reasoning to form theoretical models and the use of mathematics³.  The ‘science’ of the time was based solely on uncritical reiteration of the classical texts leaving no room for discovery or new thinking. Leonardo was somewhat self deprecating calling himself omo sanza lettere, ‘man without formal education’ although he later taught himself Latin so he could read many of the classic texts. Throughout his writings there is a consistent and often defensive theme accusing those who were ‘educated’ as truly ignorant to the ways of nature. One other simple quote⁴ of his also lays a fundamental precursor to the basic understanding of science and business as we know it today:

In nature there is no effect without cause; understand the cause and you will have no need of the experiment.

So what is the connection to Process Improvement and Quality?

Throughout the community of Process Improvement professionals, Lean practitioners, Six Sigma, TPS, etc. these same ideas of observation, validating cause & effect, etc. are fundamental to the understanding and improvement of any system. Of note is the concept of Gemba (現場) ,which means ‘the actual place’ is a fundamental piece of how one must observe any process in order to understand it and improve it. In other words go to where the work is done, observe and learn. Evidence of Leonardo’s Gemba can be seen in his drawings of water, anatomy, the flight of birds, etc. His mastery at reproducing what he saw was so accurate that his drawings of moving water and the motion of birds wings in flight wasn’t reproduced until stop motion photography came about in the last century. Throughout the 6000 pages of his notes that remain it is clear that Leonardo’s constant reiteration of ideas, drawings, and theories reinforce his central thesis that understanding is borne of observation.

All our knowledge has its origin in the senses⁵

All too often managers and engineers make decisions based on their theories and mental models of how the work they are responsible for is performed but in reality they haven’t spent the time on the factory floor, in the office, at the call center, etc. to really see how things are done. Ironically Leonardo’s assertion that ignorance will lead to despair and melancholy is the reality of what often happens for the leaders of Process Improvement initiatives that are focused from a basis of theory instead of true understanding of the processes through careful observations. How often have we learned that our model of a process was faulty and not until direct observation did we correctly ascertain how a process is actually performed?

Hence,
All process improvement must start with understanding the system through observation.

Leonardo planted the seeds for our profession over five hundred years ago.

¹ Irma A. Richter, Leonardo da Vinci Notebooks, Oxford University Press, 1952

² ibid pg 3

³ Fritjof Capra, The Science of Leonardo: Inside the Mind of the Great Genius of the Renaissance, 2007, pg 158

⁴ Irma A. Richter, Leonardo da Vinci Notebooks, Oxford University Press, 1952, pg 8

⁵ Codex Trivulzianus

Great Customer Experience & The Kano Model

Providing a great customer experience is one of the best differentiators for any product or service and can lead to success through increased revenue, profits and especially repeat customer business. The challenge we all face is what does it take to create, deliver and maintain great customer experiences day in and day out? One approach with some representative examples is described here.

In the 1980’s Professor Noriaki Kano developed a model that created a framework of describing product features that correlate to customer satisfaction known as The Kano Model¹. The Kano Model basically described three basic categories that relate product features to customer satisfaction: must be quality, more is better and exciters (delighters). Rather than try to describe the theories of the model it is best understood through some examples.

For example in 1999 when Research In Motion (RIM) first introduced the first wireless handheld, the immediate predecessor to the Blackberry, it created excitement i.e. a delighter, with an easy to use text only mobile email device with a QWERTY keyboard that allowed it’s users to stay connected through email virtually anywhere with a device that was small, easy to use and relatively inexpensive. The perceived need to stay connected by users became so pervasive that eventually the term ‘Crackberry’ was coined due to incessant use during meetings, at meals, in bed, etc.

Over the next several years cell phone makers and other companies along with RIM began introducing smart phones that combined the features of: email, text messaging, calendaring, graphics, web browsing and many other applications, these being examples of both more is better and delighters in the Kano Model terminology. As a result merely having a texting device with a QWERTY keyboard was no longer exciting but had become commonplace and therefore a ‘must have’ feature, the marketplace had shifted. The key lesson is that customer expectations evolve with time and what was once exciting can become commonplace and in order to retain customers companies must also evolve their offerings. Later when Apple introduced the iPhone in 2007 there were a multitude of multi-functional devices in the marketplace, so what was different?

The iPhone was different by packaging these now common functions into something that was physically appealing along with new functions such as full function web browsers, videos (which Apple had experience from its iPod devices), but one of the real key differentiators was how easy and intuitive it was to use. One the key characteristics of all the Apple portable devices had always been how easy they were to use, prior to the iPhone every other smart phone device came with a thick instruction manual and more importantly it took an average user several hours to be able to use these devices. Nevertheless the capabilities that these products delivered fell into the delighters and more is better categories thus offsetting the difficulty in initial product use.  With the iPhone Apple changed all that by essentially eliminating the instruction manual replaced with just a single sheet that took each new customer through a few steps along with an intuitive user interface combined with a well developed software application in iTunes that guided the user to functionality in a matter of minutes. The ease of use became the ‘delighter’ and of course all the current competitors followed suit and several others also jumped into the marketplace and once again form and intuitive ease of use shifted from the ‘delighter’ category to the must have category, this time however the cycle time for the expectations shortened to just over one year demonstrating that in some marketplaces there is an acceleration

Apple continued to evolve by offering more applications and also inviting others to develop applications for that platform, of course the New Product Introduction (NPI) cycle time continues to shrink, others also have added additional applications and have opened their platforms to others to develop applications and this week Google introduced its entry into this market with the Nexus One Android phone. The take away from all of this is that product features that enter into the marketplace as innovations that delight customers rapidly become commonplace with competition and shortened cycle times for new product introductions.

In order for companies like Apple to retain and increase the number of customers is to continue to find ways to delight them in some way, be it features, cost, ease of use, etc. To this point Apple has been adding value and delight to its customers through services available through iTunes thus shifting the entire customer experience to a broader set of products and services of course everyone else is following suit but the advantage today is similar to that of PCs and Microsoft, the installed base of hardware and software, in this case music, videos and applications is orders of magnitude larger than that of the competition.

Here the evolution of what constitutes features that delight customers often starts with technical innovations and over time encompasses various aspects of service and the overall user experience. Every industry that touches a large consumer base is going through these evolutionary changes, be it how PCs are purchased, configured and maintained, the automotive industry with ‘free’ maintenance, longer warranties, free car rentals, etc. These trends are valid even for companies with business models where the core is a service through the internet, think of Amazon, Craig’s List, eBay, etc. For each we see a virtually continuous introduction of capabilities that ‘delight’ customers that become commonplace and are replaced by new capabilities. Expect these trends to continue as companies seek ways to retain and grow their customer base.

Of course finding ways to delight customers is by no means trivial and can require significant investments in technology, people and time. And not all attempts to delight succeed and unfortunately sometimes have the opposite effect, nevertheless those that succeed are rewarded in the marketplace.

What examples can you think of where the principles of the Kano Model have been applied? What about your company or service? Let me know and I’ll publish a summary of examples in a future Blog.

¹ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kano_model

So What is Quality?

Quality comes in many forms, guises and experiences. When I first started working in Semiconductor manufacturing one of the key definitions of quality was pretty simple, the chip either worked or it didn’t, we called that the “device yield”. We only knew how well the product worked when we finished fabrication which took many weeks. Learning at the end of the process is a very costly and ineffective feedback system. As the industry matured along with the pressure of competition, we developed the capability to better predict device functionality by measuring critical characteristics which led to an overall quality improved by several orders of magnitude. Many other industries also began with a focus on product functionality and have similar histories improving their yields and reducing functional quality issues.

Today however the definition of quality has evolved to encompass a much more complex set of criteria. It is not enough that a manufactured product is merely functional, now the customer experience that takes place during the lifetime of the manufactured product’s existence is often how the customer defines the quality of the product. The customer experiences can range from finding the product, ease of purchase, ease of use, support after the purchase and many other aspects of the ownership of the product. Purchase decisions and customer loyalty are increasingly based on these other criteria. Quality has to be defined in the context of the expectations of the customer. Understanding this and capitalizing on this fact is a key to success.

This is the definition of quality that I’ve been using for several years now. Coming from Juran’s Quality Handbook (1), it allows for the perspective of both the producer and the customer.

1. “Quality” means those features of products which meet customer needs and thereby provide customer satisfaction.

2. “Quality” means freedom from deficiencies – freedom from errors that require doing work over again (rework) or that result in field failures, customer dissatisfaction, customer claims, and so on.

Every day we experience good and bad quality from both perspectives. Examples are: making a reservation online, getting help on the phone for fixing your computer, picking up your prescription, getting your car serviced, waiting for the cable installer, having a meal at a restaurant and so on. We can all recall examples in each of these examples where we had a great experience and ones where we had an experience so bad that we posted it on Yelp or Facebook!

Clearly defining the important product features and deficiencies is one of the most basic challenges in business today. In my next Blog I’ll touch on this challenge: The Kano Model and why it applies to you.

Insights and feedback: What is the definition of quality in your business? How do you know how well you are delivering quality?

(1) Juran, J. M. and Godfrey A. B. (1999). Juran’s Quality Handbook 5th ed. McGraw-Hill, New York

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