Part Two · Develop Expertise

Operating Cadence: Learning from Experience

Organizations do not improve because people try harder. They improve because someone built a system for turning experience into learning.

In brief

Organizations do not improve because people try harder. They improve because someone built a system for turning experience into learning. The chapter uses PDCA as a leadership rhythm across weekly, monthly and quarterly cadences.

What the chapter covers

The Difference Between Learning and Improvement
What an Operating Cadence Actually Is
PDCA as a Leadership Rhythm
The Three Cadence Levels
Making Improvement Ordinary
What Owen Built

Learning that lives only in people is not organizational learning. It’s just individual learning that happens to occur inside an organization.

Questions for your team

What lesson has our team learned more than once?
Where does our learning live: in people, or in a standard anyone can use?
Which of our meetings actually checks results against what we expected?
What improvement should become standard work this month?

Field Guide Tool #11

The Learning Loop Design Template

Designs or audits the operating cadence at all three levels: weekly, monthly, and quarterly. Captures the operating standard of structural lessons already learned.

Best used when the organization keeps relearning the same lessons.

Reading as a team?

This chapter is part of Session 4 of the Team Reading Guide.

Team Reading Guide →

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Chapter 12: Strategic Tradeoffs: The Discipline of Saying No