I recently read Flawless Execution (Flawless Execution: Use the Techniques and Systems of America's Fighter Pilots to Perform at Your Peak and Win the Battles of the Business World - by James D. Murphy).
Mr. Murphy is a former fighter pilot and the CEO of Afterburners (http://www.afterburnerseminars.com/flawless-execution.php).
Afterburners is a consulting firm that is all about helping companies execute strategic initiatives using the cornerstones that Murphy describes in ‘Flawless Execution’. As a former fighter pilot, Murphy shares the methodology that the Air Force uses when training pilots as well as when flying live missions. I like the fighter pilot lingo, flash backs to ‘Top Gun’ – a ‘classic’ regardless of what you think about Tom Cruise. I am still on the fence as to whether I am buying the concept of using ‘air force mission’ lingo in a business environment, although not dismissing the potential benefits, but I am not certain that it fits the culture at our company. Regardless, the references to the fighter lingo helps to keep the book interesting at times when it gets a little slow. I don’t penalize books too much for padding – I believe that authors by nature feel that they owe the readers 200 pages. My preference; give me the messages – give me one or two meaningful examples of each message and then be done. If the message or related messages need 300 pages – give me 300 pages, but don’t waste my time with countless pages of repetitive messaging.
The central message in Flawless Execution is about the ‘Plan, Brief, Execute, Debrief – Win’ cycle that is used by the Air Force. It is a very solid process enhancement. Hard to argue with any of the underlying philosophies – just solid, solid process – especially for the constantly moving pieces of a business – which obviously offer the greatest potential to improve. Murphy does a great job of bringing the benefits of using these disciplined steps to life. Just like anything, the real potential impact lies in how these cycles are implemented.
The other day I read an article that indicated that 2008 represented the 2nd straight year of fatality free flights by U.S. Airlines. According to the article, the airlines transported 1.5 Billion passengers during that time period without a casualty. I heard a blurb on CNBC that suggested that a child has a better likelihood of becoming President of The United States than of dying in an airplane accident on a U.S. airline. WOW! That caused an immediate reference to ‘Flawless Execution’. The airlines continuously improve because they use a process that must mirror in some fashion the ‘Plan, Brief, Execute, Debrief – Win’ model. Airlines can’t afford failure – ever. When they fail, lives are lost. When we fall short of expectations, our earnings are impacted or we don’t land an important account. When airlines fail – people die. I get that message and have added these cycles as a resource to my tool kit – thinking about ways that our planning and execution processes might benefit. Again yesterday, ‘Flawless Execution’ appeared again in the real world when the U.S. Airways flight made an emergency landing in the Hudson River. The decisions that pilot made appeared to be clear examples of the incremental learning that comes from ‘lessons learned’ in ‘Flawless’. ‘Lessons Learned’ as Murphy explained, is the outcome of having a great plan, brief, execute, debrief process. That U.S. Airways flight experience would be a great chapter in a future release of his book. The pilot had been trained for water landings. The pilot was very aware of the factors that were putting his mission at risk (keeping his passengers safe) and was programmed to quickly pursue the water landing alternative and executed flawlessly. What a great story – what a great example for ‘Flawless Execution’.
I also really liked Murphy’s section on ‘Standards’. There are so many places in our company where ‘standards’ can be applied. Previously when I thought of ‘standards’, I thought of production, job-costing, and manufacturing process. Murphy brings standards to life for practical application in the business environment. Back in the day, when I ran a computer retail store, circa 1982…, one of my customers – turned advisor tried to impress upon me the need for Standard Operating Procedures – which is a very close cousin, if not synonym for Standards; but Murphy was able to get me to see how standards can be a useful tool.
If you have read ‘Flawless’, please feel free to share your thoughts. I rate Flawless Execution as a ‘GREAT BUSINESS BOOK – MUST READ’. Let me know if you read it and what you think!
I am in the middle of a really interesting book and look forward to sharing my thoughts soon.
Until then – Be Well! Mike
Posts
I, too, have read a book.
ReplyDelete