Video of the Week: Six Sigma Training

For anyone with whom I work, this will most assuredly make you laugh...

And for those who have absolutely no idea, well, let's just say this is what we're doing at work minus the singing...

Enjoy...

Corporation... Continued IV

Work... Exertion of effort directed to produce or accomplish something (Dictionary.com).

So, if I'm not accomplishing anything in particular during my day, even if I'm exerting myself constantly, can I consider it work?

The last time we chatted, I spoke more about Six Sigma and the company vision. Well, I'm proud to announce that the company now has a vision. I can't say that I'm overly proud to announce what that particular vision is, but we'll get to that.

It has been three weeks on the proverbial nose since I last brought you word of the happenings on the 9th floor in the Darth Vader Building. The CEO and President went to Dallas to suggest a strategy for moving the company forward. The strategy focused mainly on acquiring new bankruptcy servicing contracts so that the company does not have to attain the capital to purchase accounts and wait inordinate amounts of time for the return. Lone Star thought it a good idea; better stated, they thought it one good idea.

It seems - as a I discussed last time - that collecting on bankrupt debt promises to become a heck of a lot more difficult in the coming years. Especially for those companies - mine - that collect on unsecured bankrupt debt. In short, debtors have to pay back their debt now. And most don't have the money to pay back all the debt. Some declare bankruptcy. Most of those who will declare bankruptcy will have very little money. Those who do have a little money will concentrate on paying back the secured debt. What does that mean for companies that are collecting on unsecured bankrupt debt (that's us)? Zilch. Nada. Zero.

So, Lone Star said that servicing is a great idea since we wouldn't have to put up any money; we'd just get the fees. But it can't be the only idea. A company that can't diversify in tough times is doomed to failure. And thus, Ed and Rui returned talking about servicing non-bankrupt debt. In short, collections. Dismissed bankrupt accounts (accounts belonging to those who could not sustain a bankruptcy for whatever reason). First and second lien mortgage deficiencies. Second lien mortgage delinquencies. Don't ask me the difference between deficiency and delinquency, I haven't looked it up yet.

Combine this 'suggestion' from Lone Star with the fact that our company is also in the process of becoming interconnected with two other Lone Star subsidiaries: Accredited Home Lenders and CIT Bank. I'm presently working on a project for CIT Bank out of Oklahoma City. But I'm not going to talk about them at any length here since I'm already far too wordy.

I will, however, talk about Accredited Home Lenders. Lest I get some of the specifics wrong, let's just say that Lone Star owns Accredited (it is more complicated than that). Accredited - one of the premiere subprime home lenders for the past 3-5 years - can no longer originate subprime loans. Go figure. They have consolidated, significantly. They once had three offices packed to the gills with employees in Cincinnati, OH; San Diego, CA; and Lake Mary, FL. They have necessarily consolidated down to one office, San Diego, where they will work their much reduced portfolio of accounts. That leaves the Ohio and Florida shops to close.

Well, Lone Star and our company leaders had an idea. We could take over one of those offices for our own new collections line, especially since those offices essentially specialize in the types of collections - except for dismissal collections - in which my company would like to be involved. In the process, we might even be able to save a few jobs down in Florida.

About two weeks ago, I was invited to a meeting that included about 14 other people in the company. It was in that meeting that Ed - the CEO - made the announcement that we would be opening a new office in Lake Mary, FL and that it needed to be operational by the end of the year, i.e. 12/31/2008. Rui - the President - was put in charge of the effort to give birth to the new company.

After that meeting, everything took a turn for the incredibly insane. Rui asked my boss if I could be the Project Manager that helped to lead the way into Florida. My boss agreed. And so, my projects are being offloaded one by one as I ramp up for work on this new business model.

Oh, and have I mentioned that 40% of my weeks these past three weeks have been devoted to Six Sigma training off site? And it's supposed to be next Monday and Tuesday too. But no...

I'm going to Florida. Leaving on Sunday. Coming back on Wednesday. Just found out yesterday.

Crazy turn of events.

And then I remembered, voting! I need to vote. So, that means voting will need to happen in the next couple of days before I leave.

Finally, a coincidence. This will mark the second time in my life that I will be just outside Orlando for an election, I who have no real connection to Orlando in any way, shape, or form. I was there 16 years ago visiting Disney World, and on the final night I watched as Bill Clinton became the first and only Democrat I've ever seen elected to the White House. Odd...

Well, there you have it. My life is nothing if not consistently interesting. For now, I exert significant amounts of effort and feel as though I am accomplishing next to nothing...

More to come...

A Busy Week 10/13-10/18

One day doesn't make a busy week. A busy week makes a busy week.

I told you about Saturday. Now, I'm going to get in my Delorean and flux myself back to Monday 10/13.

Monday 10/13 marked the first day of Six Sigma Greenbelt training for the first wave of 10 guinea pigs at my company. We traveled to Bellevue Community College - North Campus - from north, south, and west at 7 a.m. We arrived promptly at 7:30 thanks to lighter than usual traffic on Columbus Day. We set up shop and proceeded to listen to the Six Sigma Blackbelt teacher - a former naval officer - drone on about Six Sigma as we collectively attempted to balance the requests coming from our office - on IM and e-mail - and the topics our teacher was covering. We got food from Burger Master, a Northwest fast food place made mostly for drive up. In other words, there were stalls into which cars parked and the servers come out to the cars. A throwback. We returned to the droning and sat. The teacher's a good guy. And an average teacher. I came back to the office thinking that I'd head out to the gym. No luck. We went to Carpet Liquidators instead to see what they could offer as far as carpet goes. We found something we liked but didn't commit (we like to have options for comparison). Then, we went home. And what to our wondering eyes did appear? An Evening to Forget

Tuesday 10/14 marked the second day of Six Sigma training. We arrived a whopping 15 minutes later downtown for the carpool and arrived a whopping 15 minutes later at class. Still rather light traffic. There was more interaction on that day. More questions. More activities. Thank goodness. Most of the group went to Dixie's BBQ. A warehouse and garage where you order southern BBQ. Good stuff too. Waited in line for about 30 minutes (worth the wait) and brought it back to class. Made respective messes of ourselves and proceeded to get droppy-eyed as the teacher spoke. Returned that afternoon knowing that I wasn't going to the gym because we had to get home to meet a guy for a carpet estimate. Lenny, by name. Lenny was a bit sarcastic. And he had no financing. Still we listened, and he gave us a good deal. But no financing. Bye Lenny. Joseph left for volleyball. I worked from home for another two hours and then wrote a tribute to my Grandfather.

Wednesday 10/15, I went back to work. I was immediately pummeled by the 5 active projects for which I am responsible. Most associated with clients, which means hard deadlines. I got myself in order and assessed each project. At 10:30, we had the bStar meeting. A meeting to review the progress of the company and to reward those who deserve a cash award for their hard work. The company? In short, it looks like we'll be opening a second office in Lake Mary, FL to do collections on dismissed accounts as well as mortgages. I won't go into the long version here. But I suggest you re-read Corporation...Continued prior to my next lengthy discussion of where my company's going. We went home - stopping at Safeway along the way - and found a woman from Empire Today in our driveway; Joseph had set up another carpet meet and greet. I let him do the work - which he does so well - and I tried to do work. But I hit a brick wall (mentally) and started looking at youtube. I found Gordon Shumway.

Thursday 10/16, work again. Trying to get a handle on the projects. I felt like I made some headway on each of the projects. But five things at once is too much. I was tired. Joseph started class that evening. I got a ride home from a neighbor by happenstance, and I can't, for the life of me, remember what I did that night. It was my braindead night. Oh, and I did TD's Weekly NFL Picks.

Friday 10/17, was a day of bureaucratic admin. I accomplished almost nothing because I was in meetings all day. Fun. One of those meetings happened to be a two-hour meeting devoted to the project that will be opening a second office in Florida with another line of services foreign to this company (described above). The President of the company (not to be confused with the CEO) was named to head the charge into FLA. And we were all told - there were about 15 of us in the meeting - that we might be assigned to some part of the project. And any one of us might be traveling to FLA. The day ended. I went home. Joseph went out with some friends. I began moving items off the furniture for the Saturday carpeting job. I then picked up Joseph. We bought the most recent Indiana Jones flick and a Papa Murphy's pizza. We settled down at home and enjoyed a quiet night before the storm that would be Saturday 10/18.

That's what I mean by a busy week.

Corporation... Continued

Every so often, I begin getting an increase of calls, letters, e-mails, smoke signals, carrier pigeons, and owls inundating me with questions about work. How's it going? Is your job safe? Have they laid people off? Are they outsourcing? And on and on. With what little I know, I will whet your appetite.

Anyone been hearing about the economy lately? Small thing. Closest to the Depression we've been since the... well... the Depression. A $700 billion bailout for Wall Street. Oh, and Europe and Asia are feeling the heat. Iceland is about to declare bankruptcy, for God's sake. What chapter would that be anyway? It's bad; we all know it. But what, exactly, does that mean for a company that collects on bankrupt debt? And what does that mean for a fund like Lone Star that owns a company that collects on bankrupt debt, not to mention owning God knows how many other types of companies? Alright, already, so many questions...

At first glance, what this means for my company is more bankruptcy. More bankruptcy means more ability to collect on bankruptcy. More ability to collect means more money. Whoa! Not so fast. Just because we might have more bankrupt accounts coming in the door doesn't mean the debtors responsible for those accounts will have any money to pay us. They're broke, remember. So, chapter 7 filings will go up. Even with the new bankruptcy legislation passed three years ago.

In addition, it's tougher for my company to get the loans we need to pay for the accounts. Yes, we get loans to purchase the accounts and then pay the loans off over time while also recognizing at least some profit. So, higher interest rates mean more difficulty finding loans that will allow the company to go after accounts. As you can see, there's good and bad.

But wait, there's a way around the purchasing of accounts. Service them! Instead of acquiring a loan to purchase accounts, we just bring the accounts in-house and keep a fee for dealing with the bankrupt accounts. It allows the owning company to continue to collect, recouping the value while at the same time allowing us to earn money without having to secure a loan. So, why don't we do more of that? There's a whole lot more competition for servicing. And we can't charge a fee that falls off the map just because it's lower than the competitors. At some point, we have to have confidence in our own abilities and tell customers that they get what they pay for. It's worked a few times.

Okay, deep breath, moving onward.

That was my company. Now, how 'bout the company that owns my company, Lone Star. They're accustomed to turning businesses like Ty Pennington does houses. Buy them, make them better or tear them apart, and sell them (or their pieces) within three years of purchase. It's worked well thus far. What has changed? It's the economy, stupid. No, not that you're stupid. It's just a saying. You know. First used in as a slogan in Bill Clinton's '92 campaign. Remember? Ah, never mind. So, anyway, Lone Star can't sell these companies as quickly because there's no one to buy them. What happens next? Some confusion. Some reorganization. Some action.

Lone Star decides they're going to jump in and purchase some bad debt. In Germany. In South Korea. In the good old US of A. Good old Merrill Lynch US of A accounts, to be exact. Among others. To do what with them? Collect, of course. Not through my company. At least not yet.

But there has to be more than that venture. Lone Star has to think differently about their acquisitions. Instead of pumping up or slashing and burning the companies, they have to sustain them. Foreign word, sustain. So, how do you sustain?

Well, there's the one choice. You don't. You make like nothing's happened and you try your old tactics. Bad idea. Another choice, choose to run the company the way a company should be run, i.e. with some kind of operational excellence. What might that be, you ask? Six Sigma. Remember Six Sigma? Ed showed me the books in his bookcase. Used at Motorola and GE, manufacturing companies. Worked well too. Got them close to Six Sigma in many of their lines.

Well, since I've read a bit more about Six Sigma, let me very briefly explain. If you order a warm, fresh hamburger with mustard, ketchup, lettuce, tomato, and no pickle 1,000,000 times from McDonalds, they can get it wrong thrice. That's three times they can forget the pickles. That's it. They have to be spot on the rest of the time. That's the result in a nutshell. How do they get there? Ah, well that's the rub. Increase effectiveness and efficiency using the tools of Six Sigma. BUT - and it's a big but, and I cannot lie - the support and vision MUST. Let me start that again... The support and vision MUST come from the company owners/leaders/decision makers. If it does not, then Six Sigma turns into another quality initiative that will be undermined somewhere in its midst.

Yes, yes. So what about the people at my company? What about me? Interesting question. Six Sigma does not say NOT to outsource. Nor does it say NOT to downsize. Not explicitly, anyway. Instead, it says that a company must do what is efficient and effective. Is it efficient to send the company's IT team somewhere else? If we're talking India, China, Djibouti, Liechtenstein, or Moldova, probably not. If we're talking San Fran, Dallas, or even somewhere else in Seattle, maybe. But that place would have to make up for our knowledge base and internal efficiencies. Could it? Maybe.

And what's the company's vision anyway? Purchasing requires loaned money. Servicing requires competitive rates. Something else entirely means new knowledge acquisition by the workers. Which is it? I don't know. I know that our leaders went to speak to Lone Star last week, but there is still no word about what's next. Still no vision. We are - not stuck - just waiting. And what do we do in the meantime? Well, my team will be taking Six Sigma certification classes at Bellevue Community College. And I'm in the process of completing my Project Management Certification Application. Training. For my company? Or for the future? Dunno... I jus' dunno.

I yield to the blessed St. Ignatius 'If you don't know where you're going, stay where you are.'

More to come...