RENO, Nev. — Tired of constantly putting out fires? Stressed from dealing with the demands of troublesome employees who bring down everyone’s morale? Do safety hazards keep cropping up and ruining productivity? Those questions and more were discussed last month at the STN EXPO.
These issues and many others facing modern-day workplaces were hashed out during a workshop, “Thinking and Managing Systemically in an Anecdotal World,” moderated by Pete Meslin, director of transportation for Newport-Mesa Unified School District in Orange County, California.
Meslin shared with attendees the “the little tips” that can dramatically improve the workplace. To start, one must be aware of the statistical fallacies that impede the recognition of problems in the first place: confirmation bias, the Halo effect, correlation vs. causation and the law of averages.
“You must determine whether the problem is a pattern or an anecdote, but once you find that pattern, you can solve the problem,” said Meslin.
However, it’s not as simple as addressing the problem — the process must be fixed in order to prevent the issue from cropping up again. Humans, Meslin stated, are the only species that can rationalize issues away. This can be attributed to “screwy systemic thinking,” he said.
To confirm whether or not the issue affecting operational procedures is a systemic problem or a one-time incident, transportation directors need to get in the habit of recording the event, then following up with it later to see if the episode has been solved, ignored or grown worse.
Meslin encouraged attendees to foster an environment that emboldens people to provide feedback. It’s about fixing problems and processes, so that down the road, a minor issue doesn’t escalate into something more severe.
“If you ever have to say, “We should have known better,” it’s your fault,” said Meslin.
