Photo by h.koppdelaney
In 3 weeks, it’s are off to Houston, TX, to attend the APICS (Association for Management Operations) 6-Packed Supply Chain Conference. Oh, and happy coincidence, the world’s largest rodeo is also in Houston that week! Topics of special interest (at the conference, not
the rodeo) include:
- Crafting a Successful Continuous Process Improvement Initiative
- New Approach to Inventory Planning Process
- Aligning Your SC with Strategic Priorities & Creating Competitive Advantage
- Off-shoring, Self Inflicted Pain until You Apply LEAN to Improve
- The Q in You: Understanding Your Own KPI
- Lifecycle Management – the Missing Piece to Effective Planning
But what is wrong with this crowd!? Where is the emotion?? Where is the soul?? Have we failed to learn from two new business books, Super Rich: A Guide to Having It All – Russell Simmons, and The Soul of Leadership: Unlocking Your Potential for Greatness – Deepack Chopra?
According to a new review in BusinessWeek, pearls of wisdom in these tomes include:
- “Success is elusive. In both authors’ works, it’s difficult to find concrete business lessons. And perhaps that’s the point. For example, writes Chopra: ‘Your body is a constant projection of you in the world. Every cell eavesdrops on your thoughts.’”
- “Be. And just keep being… Simmons assures us that ‘within a few years you will be able to transform from the unpaid intern into the multimillionaire CEO.’ Chopra vows that those who lead from the soul will gain the support of invisible powers and can expect miracles to happen—a useful strategy for any executive.”
- “The pain leads to insight. It’s easy to mock Simmons for sprinkling product mentions among his yogic revelations or to snicker at Chopra’s pseudoscientific bromides, which would be a lot more effective if he occasionally cited the scientific research he vaguely alludes to. Although anyone who perseveres to the end of both books will be struck with a revelation—we’ve heard a lot of these tips before. Usually from our mothers. And often before the age of five. ”
Now I will get busy soaking up the acumen in these books so that I can share some insights with my fellow operations professionals, some of whom may be sadly uninformed about miracle processes. Surely people focused on such fussy issues as value for customers and continuous improvement will be rewarded with new revelations by “appreciating the wonder” of it all.
The ultimate inspiration? “These books reawaken a sense of wonder—that such stuff still sells. That’s something worth meditating on.”