CHAPTER EIGHT
DIAGNOSING AND IMPROVING PERFORMANCE: A CASE STUDY
Medicine, to produce health, has to examine disease.
—PLUTARCH
The pharmaceutical industry has developed a host of effective medicines. Penicillin, for example, is a drug of demonstrated effectiveness. However, it probably won’t help a cataract. There’s no evidence that cortisone will do anything for a fever. Aspirin has been called a wonder drug, but it is actually harmful to someone suffering from an ulcer. Unfortunately, every effective medicine addresses only a limited number of ailments. Professional diagnosticians, called doctors, are paid to match medications with patients’ illnesses.
Similarly, there are lots of proven performance improvement “medicines” out there. Training ...
Get Improving Performance: How to Manage the White Space on the Organization Chart, Third Edition now with the O’Reilly learning platform.
O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.
