Synopsis and Quotes

Synopsis

Getting What You Want Via a Simple Mindset “Tweak”

by Sam Carpenter

 

Website visitor: Thanks for taking the time to go deeper into the Work the System methodology. Here, I’ll give you the nutshell version of what it’s about.

Most business success books suggest that the reader do certain physical things – follow the recommended tips – and life will be swell. The Work the System methodology takes another approach, one that requires a simple “tweak” in the individual’s perspective of how the world mechanically functions. Once that shift occurs,  subsequent necessary actions come naturally. The Work the System method does not negate the brilliant thoughts of top motivators and philosophers such as Steven Covey, Anthony Robbins, Jim Collins, Michael Gerber or Dale Carnegie. The method gets underneath these valid and proven methodologies and makes them even more potent. (However,  with the new perspective, blatantly inefficient methodologies are easy to detect.)

In my small business I worked 80-100 hours a week for 15 years, with an income just barely enough to support my two kids and me (I was a single custodial parent for all of those 15 years). When the new vision came to me  ten years ago, I immediately turned things around. I now work 2 hours a week while my personal income is more than twenty times what it was just a few years ago. My business, Centratel, a telephone answering service with approximately 2,500 competitors nationwide, is #1 in the industry and shows a net profit of nearly 50%. Also, at the end of that 15 year nightmare stretch I was a physical and mental wreck, and I had no friends. I turned all that around, too (the details of the story are in my book – you can download it for free on the front page of this website).

Work the System addresses the following reality: Too many corporate managers and small business owners see their businesses and the world as a complex mass of sights, sounds, and events. And too many times the leader is working long, stressed hours killing fires and performing tasks, and there are usually concurrent cash flow problems. There is no time or money to do R&D, coddle customers, or otherwise do the creative tasks necessary for growth. Personal life is a struggle, too. Add to this, health problems. An entire life can be spent this way, killing fires, performing tedious recurring routines, in conflict with staff, scrounging operating funds, and at home, missing out on the kids as they grow up day by day….

What is the foundational reason for business mediocrity and failure? The leader isn’t seeing the mechanisms that are producing the bad results. If a leader is blind to the mechanics, he or she won’t be able to climb out of the morass. But this is important: The leader’s hectic fire-killing methodology is NOT the foundational problem: It’s only a SYMPTOM of the leader’s lack of understanding of real-world mechanics.

The Work the System methodology goes “one layer deeper,” requiring a simple yet profound change in mindset – an “outside and slightly elevated” vantage point – a mindset that sees clearly how the separate systems of the world actually function. Once one “gets” the new perspective, subsequent correct actions are obvious. The WTS mindset is simple, absurdly logical, and self-evident as it leads naturally to incredible efficiency at work and in personal life. The added bonus is a relaxed, positive state of mind due to the newfound control over events and outcomes. The WTS methodology is not hocus-pocus, mystical, esoteric, or faith-based. It’s simple, believable mechanics. There is no need for a list of tips or for motivational-gimmicks although Work the System offers a thorough compendium of guidelines. In most cases, there is no need to change occupations. Once the vision is acquired – the moment-to-moment ability to perceive the myriad of separate systems in one’s world – different actions will naturally be taken and things will fall into place as confusion diminishes. (The first third of my book is geared to help the reader “get” the new mindset.)

The heart of the mindset: Our individual lives are not inherently chaotic and at the mercy outside influences. And despite the media’s never-ending dooms-day diatribes, the world itself is not going to Hell. Your world is a collection of individual linear systems, most of which operate at 99.9% efficiency, and each of which ultimately produces some kind of a result. Every result and situation in our lives is the end result of an underlying system and most systems work just fine! In fact, most systems WANT to work as they are designed. Consider the complexities of a tree, cat, car, house, or human body. All of these “primary systems” are in existence due to a myriad of sub-systems that work together to form that particular entity. For example, the human body is an incredibly complex arrangement of billions of cells and trillions of electrical signals. Subsystems include neuromuscular, structural; cardiovascular, etc. It all works flawlessly as systems interact, adjust, and maintain themselves. The whole world operates in this way! So, inductive reasoning confidently points to the following conclusion: The world as a whole is 99.9% flawless in its operation despite our tendency to focus on the relatively few flaws in our lives and in the world. Really ”getting” this new vision causes a much more efficient perspective of life, a life more in tune with how the world actually operates.  

If we thoroughly understand how a machine works, we’re better able to fix it and then take it to optimum functionality. It’s that simple, and it’s exactly what I did with every facet of my own life.

At work, how does one fix what is inefficient? It’s breathtakingly simple. Break down the workplace into separate linear systems – how the phone is answered, how the bank deposit is made, how a sales presentation is performed. For each system, in a simple 1-2-3 step format, document the execution of the process. Get the staff to “climb on board” this system-improvement quest. Then, with coworkers, brainstorm and then, again on paper, improve the sequence of steps until they are perfect. Reinsert the perfected system back into the operation. As a matter of policy, everyone in the organization will execute each perfected system in the same exact sequence every single time – yet everyone understands that if a system can be improved, adjustment will be made instantly. This is “working the system.” The key is this (and this is the heart of the new perspective): Focus on the systems that create the results, not on the bad results that occur due to unmanaged systems.

This sounds regimented! It is regimented but the release valve is in giving your people instant and generous autonomy to “tweak” systems to higher efficiency. It’s a workplace culture centered around system improvement, not in fire-killing. The staff creates and adjusts business systems daily, as needed. Again, managers are “working their systems,” rather than dealing with the bad results of unmanaged systems. Getting everyone to climb on board is a simple matter because once things begin to fall into place, and it won’t take long, you and your people will make more money and have more time, the work environment will be serene, and there will be a powerful sense of pride throughout the organization.

Is there something here for a one-person operation or for a corporate middle manager? Yes, absolutely! This is about dramatically improving personal efficiency and the more efficient one is, the more one gets what one wants out of life!

Why am I giving my book away for free? Go here to find out.

Want to know more? Download the audio and/or pdf of the book (go to the front page of this site), or buy the book either from this site, Amazon or in book stores. Note also that I periodically conduct boot camps in my hometown of Bend, Oregon. Another good bet is to subscribe to my newsletter and blog.

-Sam Carpenter

 

 


Quotes from the book

  • “Outside-and-slightly-elevated’ is opposite the common vantage point in which one is integral to the workings of his or her day. The essential perspective of the Work the System metho dology is external, looking down. The view downward encompasses the viewer: Objectively, we see ourselves down there, too, as separate and distinct.”
  • “Here’s another, more general observation: In the past thirty years, the lure of instant gratification has gripped a large chunk of our population. For the hooked-up masses—those who are seriously addicted to iPods and Blackberries and the immediacy/pervasiveness of the entertainment industry—it’s a stretch to go backward to consider the root of things. The gratification of the moment is a distraction from thoughtful contemplation of the reasons why events happen as they do. Today, unlike thirty years ago, a good “now” is available by just turning off and plugging in. For too many of us, slowing down to examine things is not entertaining, and that’s too bad because it is mandatory that we understand the machinery of our lives if we are to modify that machinery to produce the results we want.”
  • “OK, I’ll say it. I have had it up to HERE with empowering, value-adding, TQM’ing, paradigm-shifting, team-building, synergizing, reinventing, quality circling, de-layering, in-sourcing, out-sourcing, diversity-training and the latest craze of “fun in the workplace.” The Work the System method is management based on common sense and built on the mechanics of how the world actually works, not how we think it should work or on some feel-good theory. You’ll find arguments for concise documentation of protocol, treating employees like adults, drawing black and white lines, working hard, eliminating waste and intensely focusing on efficiency. No hocus pocus. No mysticism. Is the method applicable to management of a personal life, one’s health, and relationships? Yes, because the foundation of it is based on the simple mechanics of how everything, everywhere works.”
  • “There will be a mechanical adjustment in the way you see your world. And when this quiet yet profound shift occurs, systems-methodology will make ireefutable sense, and you will never be the same.”
  • “Life is serious business and whether you know it or not, or whether you like it or not, your personal systems are the threads of the fabric of your life. Together, your personal systems add up to YOU. And if you are like most people, your days are negotiated without seeing these systems as the singular entities they are, some working well, and some not working so well.”
  • “The focus must be on the proactive management of systems, not in coping with bad results due to unmanaged systems. If the majority of the manager’s time is spent examining and tweaking systems to perfection, great results will enter through the side door.”
  •  “Without question, blue blood, old-school psychologists who see endless dour complexity in the human condition will deride the nearly absurd simplicity of the Work the System message. Things are more complicated than that, they’ll say. I thank them in advance for their oblique compliment. This book is a simple and dispassionate, drop-the-load-dispatch that describes lives as they really are: cause-and-effect mechanisms that can easily become logical, predictable, and satisfying.”
  • “Late that night, I looked at my entire life. I took a vantage point outside-and-slightly-above it. I saw that my fire-killing stance had been reactionary and defensive — and fundamentally wrong.”