Do top managers still view financial performance as the sole indicator of success, despite mouthing platitudes about dazzled customers and fulfilled employees? Is there a point when reductions are done excessively in the name of squeezing out a few more percentage points of profit, moving companies from their "ideal weight" to a state of near-anorexia?

Shouldn't success include factors of happy customers, more motivated and committed workers, investment in communities and concern for the environment? Is it possible to create a company whose objectives are worth sacrifice by those who work in it and by the society it serves?

Focusing solely on the numbers must be replaced by a philosophy of focusing on what drives the numbers. Happier customers require happier employees. Has today's "bigger... better... faster... more... now!" society come to the point where it is not only ignoring human needs, but demeaning them?

Work has become increasingly cerebral, and companies can't treat new employees the way they treated those who worked with a pick and shovel... people won't let themselves be treated like parts of a machine.

A key challenge in implementing teams, especially self-directed work teams, is eliminating the traditional parent-child management relationship. To be truly empowered, team members should be trained in solving problems, monitoring quality, conducting meetings, and resolving conflict through ongoing developmental sessions, typically one per month. Norms need to be established around the issues of leadership, membership, and processes.

The result of such an environment is to make performance improvement an issue of self-interest rather than management mandate. Otherwise, productivity and quality problems will never be solved. Employee satisfaction is the major factor affecting customer satisfaction. When employees feel valued and find personal satisfaction in their jobs, they will go to extraordinary lengths to exceed customer expectations.

Front-line workers have some message for managers about why quality efforts may not be working quite as well as planned: They feel as if they are languishing in a limbo of unfulfilled promises, inadequate training, and stalled change efforts.

Other front-line observations: Managers speak the language, but don?t behave differently--budgets, schedules, and daily routines never vary. Quality is perceived more as an adjunct program involving more communication than substance. Many mid-level managers perceive it as a lot of quick little fixes that shouldn't require changing the system. If anything, quality objectives tend to get in the way of performance!

"Our VP is the world's greatest cheerleader," said one employee. "He's out there shouting, 'Go, Team!' everyday. Someday I'm going to ask him: 'What makes you think we've got teams here?'"

The front-line employees need specific job training that helps them make real changes to their jobs--not more talk and theory about quality.