The Next Next Common Sense
Tiller explains the reasoning behind this unusual approach:
“The bus ride came from a sense of ‘Somebody’s got to do something here, and we can either wait for them to take care of it, or we can do it ourselves.’ The trip was both a signal to the workers about how serious Tiller considered the problem to be, and a concrete first step toward solving it. ‘We had to figure out how we were going to turn this business around. So we got on a bus and we rode down to the Kitchen and Bath Show in Atlanta. For a lot of them, it was the first time they were together... design engineers and people off the shop floor and so forth. We played some cards, we drank some beer and got people kind of comfortable together,’ says Tiller. Then ‘we went through every product that was offered down there, and we said, ‘Well, we could take this idea, we could take that idea.’’ By the time the trip was over, says Tiller, ‘There was a very clear sense of “We’ve got to do something. We’ve got to do it fast. We don’t have 142 years to do it, and we’re going to do it.”’ And they did.”
The results were remarkable:
“Within eighteen months, the people on the bus had spearheaded an effort that had three new products de- signed, built and delivered to the market. The plant went from a $10 million loss in 1992 to a $35 million profit in 1994. ‘There are two new production lines over there as a result of that bus ride, which is a big deal for the people in that building,’ Tiller told me four years later. ‘It’s the difference between that building staying open and clos- ing.’ Even today, he says, ‘Everybody knows what the bus
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