Oakland Athletics Baseball and Component Manufacturing?

Issue #12249 - April 2020 | Page #53

By Todd Drummond

Anyone who knows me to any degree will tell you I am not a sports fan. I do not follow any professional sports or know much about the players and culture. So it may surprise you to have me compare component manufacturing (CM) to baseball. To be honest, I mean to compare the management practices of the Oakland A’s, whom I witnessed in the movie “Moneyball,” which was based on their 2002 season. What I saw in this movie shocked me because I witnessed the same human behavior I deal with in my professional career as a consultant in our industry.

In a nutshell, the general manager, Billy Beane, did not have enough money to hire the very best players to get the winning results he was tasked to achieve. If he did the same thing as always, he knew the results were going to be the same as they had always been before. So instead of recruiting players the traditional way, with the tried and tested method of scouts looking for the best players and then relying on the highest bidder to win, he broke all the rules. He used what they now call a sophisticated “sabermetric” approach to scouting and analyzing players (pure empirical analysis). What do you think the resistance in the team, and especially the rest of the management group, was like when he implemented these brand-new ideas? Again, Billy was telling people that their old methods were no longer going to be used. There was a torrent of resistance. This was a great example of what happens when we implement changes to what we think are the best methods that most of us have been following for years.

Think about it for a moment: Do you really think managing a sports team is all that different than managing a CM plant? Both have a need for qualified personnel who have a set of skills to perform tasks so that stated goals can be achieved. Human behavior is the same on a baseball team as it is in the CM shops and office. All of us want to achieve something and be recognized for our achievements. But the management practices of motivation and benchmarks are not what I want to explain. What was most important was that the implementation of change itself caused General Manager Billy to endure a storm of resistance. Because he prevailed, his team went on to create the longest winning streak in baseball’s history: 20 games. He broke all the rules, and it changed baseball and every other professional sports team forever.

Human nature is the same everywhere. I continuously hear the same types of things Billy heard from everyone:

"I have 40 years’ experience and know what I am doing!” I never doubt someone’s experience and deep knowledge, but have they been exposed to better practices and embraced them in those 40 years?
“We have always used board footage, sales dollars, or the number of pieces, and it is good enough!” These will never give you consistent benchmarks, so they are not reliable. There are better methods.
“We have a labor shortage (shop and/or office) because we cannot find the right people!” There are ways to afford to attract better talent and obtain more from what you have, but you are fooling yourself if you think somehow the world has changed and that the people are no longer available.
“My plate vendor will let us know what the best practices are, and his/her advice is free!” Yes, trusting your plate vendor was like trusting IBM stock value in the 1980s. Just like in your company, if you tell people your truss plate vendor provided the software, equipment, or idea, you are somewhat protected from the “radical” change. They are a safe, reliable resource. But you are gravely mistaken if you think their advice is unbiased, free, or is always the best idea. Just ask the salespeople within your company to see if they try to keep out any CM competition from their customers. Do you think your vendor is trying to prevent you from listening to any other suppliers of service and sales? Is that really in your best interest? The answer to that is no, it isn’t, and it may cost you a great deal of money because you never knew you were failing to realize it.

Implementing change is difficult in itself because it is time-consuming, and we can make mistakes. Failure is something we all do our best to avoid. Using older tried and true methods appears safer and creates far less resistance from the groups. But implementing change can and does provide results far more than many of us would initially believe. Having someone showing you what those changes are and how to make them mitigates the risk and lowers the cost dramatically. But you have to tell yourself: no more excuses, the time to start is now no matter how busy you are or the current events.

Billy was able to change professional sports forever because he no longer accepted the status quo and was not going to listen to the excuses anymore. Just like baseball, wood truss and wall panel component manufacturing is changing. Actual tried and true common-sense methods are ready for you to embrace and will make you more money.

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