Igor Centric, CEO of Dysfuncompany of America Inc., is lolling behind his desk with his legs crossed on top of it. He is staring up at the ceiling with his hands clasped behind his head.

Igor has just called Miyagi, holder of a thin Six Delta Black Hat, and the company’s purchasing manager, Paul Oriface (P.O.), into his office. Bumping into each other en route, Miyagi and P.O. wonder why Igor sounded so pensive over the phone. They both find it strange that he would call just the two of them in when they hardly ever interact.

Igor sees them coming and waves them in.

Igor: “Hey guys, sit down. You’re probably wondering why I called you both in on such short notice. To be honest, I’m not sure myself. I had a dream last night—and you two were in it. [Looks expectantly at Miyagi and P.O. They stare back, politely blank.]

Yes, well, I won’t go into the details of the dream, but I will tell you that for some reason, I feel that I need to talk to you two about the business, and I want you both to be completely open with me. There will be no ramifications with regard to what either of you say.” [Another expectant look, to which Miyagi attempts a response.]

Miyagi: “Should I get B.S. in here if we are talking about the business?” [B.S. is Bob Speech, Dysfuncompany’s business consultant.]

Igor: “No! No B.S. in this meeting. I think I’ve had enough of that. That’s part of the problem, I think.”

P.O.: [Clears his throat.] “Uh, what problem are you talking about, Igor?”

Igor: “All of the problems! For starters, we’ve got financial issues. We’re not hitting our profit numbers, and sales are still down. We lost one major customer this year due to poor quality. On-time deliveries aren’t where we want them to be, and some of our customers are getting ticked off because of our poor customer service. Hell, we’re not even innovative like we used to be.”

P.O.:  “So, how does B.S. fit into this?”

Igor: “It’s not B.S. himself; it’s what he represents. Listen, B.S. has taught us some wonderful stuff, but where are we? We’ve tried every single fad out there—Six Delta, thin, ISO registration, offshoring, balanced scorecard, SWOT analysis, performance appraisals, management by objectives, quotas, suggestions systems, reduction of costs systems… I can’t keep them all straight.”

Miyagi:  “They are good things—aren’t they? These are the practices that all the good companies are doing.”

Igor: “That’s part of the problem. We just keep copying everything and never developing anything ourselves. Yeah, I know—I’m the biggest culprit, going after the next great thing. You now, I thought we were smart. I hired smart people like the two of you. [Glares.] But if that’s the case, why can’t we develop what we need on our own, instead of copying every fad out there?”

Miyagi: “Because that takes a long time. Isn’t it better to learn from proven techniques instead of reinventing the wheel at every turn? I mean, if some of these tools worked elsewhere, shouldn’t they work here?”

Igor: “I don’t know. This is why I asked the two of you to come in. Because I think you ‘get it’ better than most people around here, even those you report to.”

P.O.: “I guess it doesn’t make sense to copy anything from anybody just because everyone else is doing it. I mean, what if we copy something that doesn’t work for our company, for who we are?”

Miyagi: [Nodding thoughtfully.] “That’s right. If we copied all the thin tools invented by the Great Co., then we’d be actually less like the Great Co.”

Igor: “Huh?”

Miyagi: “Well, the Great Co. would never copy anyone. The thin tools they created are just byproducts of who they are. They don’t need anyone else’s ideas; they’re self-reliant. Ironically, the more we try to become like them, the less we actually do.”

Igor: “Miyagi, you’re on to something.”

P.O.: “Yeah, we should be developing our own tools, just like the Great Co. did. They didn’t jump on the ISO and Six Delta bandwagons because they didn’t have to, or because it didn’t make sense for them. Even when they’ve had problems—which they have—they stick to their principles and learn from their mistakes.”

Igor: “That’s right. Whatever we do has got to make sense for who we are.”

Miyagi: “OK, but who are we?” [All three stare into space, considering.]

P.O.: “What makes our culture unique? Well… nothing right now. I guess you could say we’re a hodgepodge of everyone else.”

Igor: “That’s right: We have no identity. We need direction—and we need to get people motivated to go in that direction.”

Miyagi: “We do have a general motivation problem with many of the employees. B.S. could probably train us all to improve there.”

Igor: [Irritated.] “No, Miyagi. I said no more B.S. All the stuff he taught us—suggestion systems, Six Delta, kamikaze events—were supposed to be motivators, but all we’ve done is confuse people. I actually think they have demotivated more than anything else.”

Miyagi: “So to create motivation, we should identify and get rid of the demotivators?”

Igor: “Yes! God knows, we have a boatload of them. First, though, we need to understand the principles behind what gets people motivated.”

P.O.: “The Great Co. believes and lives by the principle of ‘respect and involvement of the people.’ To feel motivated, people have to feel respected and involved in the decision making.”

Miyagi: “Back up a second. Are we all on the same page regarding what a principle is? I mean, could a company have bad principles?”

Igor: “No. [Puts on his quoting face.] ‘A principle is an accepted rule of conduct that is generally inarguable, depending on one’s purpose or goal.’ This is true whether you’re running a business or raising a family, or playing on a sports team. Respect and involvement are inarguable, so I think we can all pretty much agree that, as a principle, that’s a good thing.

P.O.: “But a value’s different, right? It’s an opinion, and it is arguable.”

Igor: “That’s what I understand. So someone like Hitler wasn’t principled, but he had values… bad ones.”

Miyagi: OK, we can say then that principles have permanent, lasting value to the organization. In other words, they’re not gonna stop being useful or relevant the way tools come and go.

Igor: “Then if we say that respect and involvement of all employees is one of our principles, shouldn’t we then look at our business practices to see if they support it?”

P.O.: “You could argue that our suggestion and quota systems, even our appraisal system, don’t respect employees.”

Miyagi: [Nodding again.] “Some people might say that having Pink Hats and Black Hats running around the building trying to solve other people’s problems is not very respectful of the other employees.”

Igor: “OK, really good points, ones that we need to address—but not now. What I want you both to start thinking about is what our principles should be. We need to start at the beginning.”

Miyagi: “We could always identify the principles of the Great Co. and build from there.”

Igor: “I agree that’s a good a source, but we should look at other successful companies as well as scholars and past business gurus. And there’s us. Maybe we have some unique principles that we should establish—by us for us. Whatever we come with, let’s not just do more copying again. Let’s do some real thinking.”

P.O.: [Stops fiddling with pen and looks up.] “I like it. Then anytime a new technology or business practice comes along, we can evaluate its merits against our principles, instead of blindly adding it into our system and confusing the hell out of everyone. We can finally become a principle-based organization.”

Igor: “Exactly! And we need to keep in mind that not every principle will work for every business. For instance, I know there’s a lot of fear in this organization—and maybe I’m one of the sources of it. [Pauses to let the others deny this, but they remain silent.] Perhaps we need a guiding principle to drive out fear. The Great Co. probably wouldn’t need that because they don’t have the same fear in their organization that we have.”

P.O.: “What’s important is that we establish our principles, know what they are, ensure that our business practices support them, and build them explicitly into our organization, right?

Igor: “Yes, and we must preserve them over time.”

Miyagi: “This is good stuff!”

Igor: [Leans back in his chair again.] “Yep. And we can do this without a tool or something that another company developed. This is the first step to our becoming more self-reliant. [Leans forward excitedly.] Hey, self-reliance! That should be one of our key principles!”

P.O. and Miyagi: “Yeah!”

Igor: “I’ll get the management team together. We’ll develop our own principles and lay out a plan from there. It’s gonna be hard work, and people are gonna to be uncomfortable, but this needs to be done. We need some order in all of the chaos. [Gets up to shake hands all around.] Gentlemen, shall we start this engine?”