Saying no to such work pattern requires a lot of leadership,
planning, courage and communications.
Sometimes we are overwhelmed with so many issues that we
are lost and unable to lead ourselves out of those situations. Therefore we
continued to firefight for the rest of our working lives and hated our work.
The situation is aggravated if you working for management
does not have a clear understanding of what is going on and no objective how to
minimize even prevent problems.
We must treat all
problems as our enemy, lead ourselves
and our team to go to war to conquer this enemy.
Know yourself well, know your enemy even
better, a hundred battles fought a hundred battles win.
This is a famous quote by Sun Tzu, a military strategist
found in the Art of War, an ancient Chinese military treatise. It starts with taking the lead to understand
the problem very well, such as asking questions of what, where, when, who and
how and gathering accurate data. This
seems to be a simple step; however, many had failed due to lack of knowledge
and perspective to look at the problem differently. Once the problem is well defined, we should have some insights if the problem
is within our capability to solve or there is no immediate solution. Learn to acknowledge that the problem cannot
be prevented with current resources is essential for us to manage the problem.
This is where the problem gets bigger as everyone is only
thinking of solving it instead of managing it.
I will discuss more about it in the future.
Once you know the problem, then planning is needed to
establish a solution to prevent or manage the problem. A problem that is well defined will make
planning for action is more straightforward.
This will require knowledge gain from learning and experience. Our knowledge is will help us to search for
the eureka moment in planning for a solution.
We must have the courage to plan for a solution which could go beyond
the four walls of the manufacturing facility.
Improvement in minimizing or prevent problem will not
happen by just planning. We need to put
the problem and action plan into the right perspective so that we can
communicate clearly to the management and team member.
Communication to the management is very important to
influence the management to support and invest in resources to make the plan
into reality.
We must eliminate the victim’s mentality and be proactive
in leading ourselves towards a better work-life as the first step towards in
being control. If you are in a
leadership position, ensure that you are part of the solution to the problem.
