Variation Amplification: Even a 3-Year-Old Understands It

Do you?

This weekend my 3-year-old son and I were playing with his marble run set, and he said to me, “The marbles start together, but they don’t finish together!”

It dawned on me that the phenomenon he was observing seems so obvious in the context of a marble run, and yet many practitioners fail to see the same thing happening in their processes. I quickly made a video of me placing six marbles in the run simultaneously so I could illustrate to others what I will call “variation amplification”:

It is obvious in the video, that there is little variation in the positions of the marbles in the beginning, but as they progress through the run, the variation in times becomes greater and greater. These facts are obvious even to a 3-year-old:
• The balls spread out as they progress.
• Certain parts of the run cause the balls to spread out more than others.
• The balls do not finish in the same order that they started.
• Some pieces allow balls to change position, while others do not.

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Immigration Variation Amplification

My new son-in-law from Scotland has certainly experienced variation amplification over the past 20 months trying to get his green card. He and my daughter performed every step in the process as quickly as humanly possible, but the Imigration Service missed EVERY deadline they set for themselves and LOST documents that had to be re-submitted (along with additional processing fees!!!) on two occasions. No wonder people come here illegally - IT IS MUCH EASIER!!!! We learned yesterday (finally) that his green card is "in the mail".