The Next Big Thing
by Scott M. Paton
The next big thing is…
Gotcha! Admit it, you are reading my column this month because
the headline promised to reveal the secret to the next big
thing, the next big management stampede to the holy grail,
the next big load of… Well, you get the picture.
In the 1980s, it was quality circles and TQM. In the 1990s,
it was reengineering and ISO 9000. Now, it’s Six Sigma--still.
It seems as though the entire quality profession is holding
its breath waiting. At every conference I attend, I’m
asked, “What’s the next big thing?” or
“What comes after Six Sigma?” or “Isn’t
ISO 9000 dead yet?” Apparently editor-in-chiefdom
comes with psychic powers that I’ve yet to discover.
I always tell people that they’ll be the first to
know as soon as I know what the next big thing is. What
I don’t say--to their faces anyway--is, “In
the meantime, why don’t you get back to work?”
That’s the problem with next-big-thingism; it prevents
the real work from being done. People get so hung up on
waiting for something new to pop up that they fail to do
the important work in the here and now. “Why bother
with maintaining our ISO 9001 registration?” “Six
Sigma is passé.” “TQM? Positively prehistoric!”
Most of the big new things of the last 20 or 30 years
are just repackaged versions of earlier next big things
anyway. Motorola may have given the world Six Sigma, but
it owes a lot to Philip Crosby, Armand Feigenbaum, W. Edwards
Deming, Joseph M. Juran, Kaoru Ishikawa, Walter Shewhart,
Alan Mogensen and a host of others.
But I promised the next big thing, so here it is. First,
I’ll need a name for it. The International Organization
for Standardization will sue me if I use ISO in the title,
so that’s out. And the number with the greek letter
combo is definitely not an option. With the huge job losses
to China and other Asian nations, I can’t very well
use an Asian term. It needs to be politically correct, so
it has to be nongender-specific, contain no references to
any one particular ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation
or any other reference that someone, somewhere might find
offensive.
I should base it on something that’s popular right
now. The Lord of the Rings trilogy swept the Oscars and
raked in more than a billion dollars. That’s it! I’ll
call it “Lords of Quality.” Quality managers
will don robes and set off on a grand adventure across the
organization to the top of the ivory tower where the evil
senior managers reside. Along the way, they’ll have
to battle purchasing managers, design engineers, manufacturing
managers and the dreaded internal auditors. (Caution: The
training materials for Lords of Quality may be too intense
for younger children and older employees.)
Now, I just need to find an egomaniac who looks good in
a robe and long beard to go on the lecture circuit and can
cast a spell over a few senior managers. Then we’ll
publish the books and training videos. Maybe we can get
Peter Jackson to direct!
If you don’t like that idea, I’ve got a backup.
We recruit young wizards and send them off on a train to
a quality academy… I know, I know. Get back to work.
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