Cheezhead Recruiting News and Opinion

I just came across an article looking for test subjects and observers of the Red Bead Experiment, a demonstration on the obligations of management that was conducted by Dr. W. Edwards Deming for nearly a decade back in the 80s.

The article reflected on why the experiment remains relevant even in 2008, a quarter of a century later.

Here is how it worked: When the game is played, each player uses a special metal paddle to draw small red and white colored beads from a large bowl.

Each draw of the paddle gets 50 beads. Some are white and some are red. The white beads symbolize the good things that we experience each day as we do our work, and the red beads symbolize the problems or bad things that we experience. As each player draws their paddle full of 50 beads, each player receives a different mix of red and white beads.

Teaching examples are drawn out while the game is played. A player soon discovers that workers have no control over the experiences they encounter. The worker did not make the company; the bosses did, and the workers should not be held responsible for most of the mistakes. Yes, the worker can control about 4 out each 100 problems but not the other 96; they are problems created by the system.

The conclusion that is drawn is if bosses want workers to do better work, they need to employ specialists to ask the workers questions and then design improvements to the system to remove the problems (red beads) that the willing workers find each day. Management must learn to get past the theory and learn to live the talk.

Now the Michael Arthur Johnson Company is seeking test subjects who want to record how playing the game affected their own work ethic. They’ve started a LinkedIn discussion group and community for those who want to share their thoughts on the experiment with the hopes of applying the methodology of the experiment to help retrain workers affected by the current economic crisis.

I can’t say I’ve ever heard of the experiment, but I am interested to see why something that sounds so simple can have a lasting affect on people so many years later.

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