1

Case Study: The Yellow Brick Road to Quality

Team Kuzma, Loeschen, Mao, Michels, Pachel, Price

IT 4880 TQM

Date: November 19, 2010

Case Study: The Yellow Brick Road to Quality

Summary:

The Yellow Brick Road to Quality is a case that uses 5 scene summaries from The

Wizard of Oz as a basis for organizational leaders can use as they go down the performance

excellence journey, organizational and culture change. This is a fictional story that contains

many of the fundamentals and principles required for organizations to be successful with

organizational change and transformation. Below you will find the lessons that organizations

can learn in pursuing change and a performance excellence culture.

Scene A: Dorothy was not happy with the world, as she knew it. A tornado came along

and transported her to the Land of Oz. The tornado dropped Dorothy’s house on the

Wicked Witch of the East, killing the witch. “Ding, dong, the witch is dead!” rang

through-out Munchkin land, but Dorothy only temporarily lost her home support provided

by family back in Kansas. All is not good, however, in the Land of Oz. Dorothy’s problem

is to find her way home to Kansas. Her call to action was precipitated by a crisis – the

tornado that transported her to an alien land.

 2

If organizations want to create change, Senior and Middle Management will need a crisis to

force a change in the way they do business and ensure the organization is changing to the new

vision. When there is a crises such as reacting to competition, people will have to change or

become history. Unfortunately creating change in an organization if very, very tough. In an

organization of 100 employees, at least two-dozen must go beyond the call of duty to produce a

significant change. The organization will have to establish a sense of urgency to create the

right cooperation, behavior and momentum to get people interested in the new vision and

mission, which will prevent complacency. Good actions often create dangerous consequences

elsewhere in the system. Dorothy was a hero for killing the Wicked Witch of the East, but

Dorothy had enraged the dead witch’s sister and faced a journey laced with a revengeful broom-

rider on her tail. Organizations are no different with how they are structured. Functional (silo)

organizations can undermine teams in dozens of ways preventing progress, thus creating

roadblocks, frustration, anxiety, lack luster performance, back-sliding and ultimately failure.

Leadership will have to understand this natural human response and deal with it in a proactive

manner by effectively communicating the vision, mission, values, principles, change is good,

lead by example, go beyond the call of duty to name a few. If we expect to get better results

without changing anything, then we must all be insane. Organizational leaders will need expect

change will never be the same, just like the alien place Dorothy landed is not the same, and

neither should they be satisfied with status quo and want to create change for the better. Once

change is introduced and new processes developed in an organization, people’s expectations and

perceptions change. The organization can never go back to the way it use to be, if they want

better results. This means people, teams and departments will need to create change, but cannot

act effectively on assumptions until the group uncovers and effectively deals with them. They
 3

don’t know, what they don’t know. Leadership will have to use effective communication

methods such as Policy Deployment, Key Performance Indicators and continuous improvement

processes such as Six Sigma or Kaizens that will use problem solving tools to understand the

effects on a process or system such as 5Whys, fish bone diagram, pareto charts to name a few

to uncover the don’t knows, build consensus and determine the right direction for the changes

needed to move the organization forward. (Evans, 2011, p. 416 – 417, 413, 279-280, 415).

(Kotter, 1996, p. 35 – 49, 103 – 104).

Scene B: In the throes of a Kansas tornado, Dorothy is transported to an unfamiliar land.

Immediately, she realized her world is different and the processes and people she

encounters are different, yet bear some similarity to her Kansas existence. She is lost and

confused and uncertain about the next steps to take. She realizes she is in a changed state –

the Land of Oz – and must devise a plan to get home.

Leadership and management will have to recognize the effects change will have on people and

deal with the abnormal conditions when old behaviors surfaces. Leadership will have to be in

tune with every aspect of every changed process to provide the appropriate change management

through training, celebration, mentoring, coaching and discipline. Communication has to be

done hundreds of times after a change to get people to change their behaviors and thought

processes. If leadership and management do not act on the wrong behaviors, then the change

will not sustain and the old behaviors will be back in place stronger than before. (Kotter, 1996,

p. 106 – 109, 112 – 114. 132 – 133)

Scene C: Dorothy is a hero for killing the Wicked Witch of the East. Glinda the Good

Witch sends Dorothy on her way to meet the Wizard of Oz who will help her get back to
 4

Kansas. The Wicked Witch of the West tries to get Dorothy’s newly acquired ruby

slippers, but to no avail. Dorothy and Toto leave for Oz via the Yellow Brick Road. Along

the way, they are joined by the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, and the Lion. Through their

teamwork, they provide mutual support to endure the vexing journey. They overcome

many risks and barriers on the way to Oz, including a field of poppies that puts them to

sleep, flying monkeys, and a haunted forest.

Just like any organizational change or new program, there needs to be direction set for the group

through proper communication such as all employee meetings, town halls, training and other

communication means to set the stage for the new vision, mission, values and principles.

Usually there are a lot of Public Relations or Marketing done initially to get everyone on board

and motivated, provide a means to kick off the program or change and set the stage for the new

vision and mission such as a Lean Enterprise Transformation. Dorothy and Toto started the

journey knowing the path was the brick road with an end goal to get back to Kansas, but they

encountered many problems along the way just as organization do during changes. It took

teamwork to overcome the many interruptions on their journey where they tap into each other’s

strengths to make the whole stronger. This teamwork helped everyone cope and deal with the

higher than normal stresses making everyone stronger in the end from their experiences. They

worked through the problems through mutual support as would people in an organization that

was off track to their stated goals. There would be adjustments made through the determination

of the proper countermeasure through the proper problem solving to close the gap(s). (Evans,

2011, p. 412 – 413, 415, 325 – 326). (Kotter, 1996, p. 67 – 84, 146 - 147).
 5

Scene D: Dorothy and her entourage finally reach Oz and meet the Wizard. Rather than

instantly granting their wishes, the Wizard give them an assignment – to obtain the Wicked

Witch’s broom. They depart for the West.

Leadership, managers and groups will have to realize that goals do change during your journey

and will have to make course corrections to get to your final destination. The final destination

may even change as a result of some unknown information that has come to light during the

journey such as new customer requirements or when projects are not on track and others will

have to change their actions to help the whole. Organizations will have to take time to reflect,

self- assess and determine if there will be any changes in direction needed to keep the strategy in

place or the strategy has changed and the vision and policy deployment will have to change to

get to the new destination. (Evans, 2011, p. 421 – 422) (Kotter, 1996, p. 76)

Scene E: Charged with the task of obtaining the broom, Dorothy and company experience

several encounters with near disaster, including Dorothy’s incarceration in the witch’s

castle while an hourglass counts the time to her death. In a struggle to extinguish the

Scarecrow’s fire (incited by the Wicked Witch), Dorothy tosses a bucket of water, some of

which hits the Witch and melts her. Dorothy is rewarded with the broom-stick, and

returns to Oz.

Organizations going through change will encounter some pretty drastic challenges as Dorothy

did above. Through the teams dedication, thirst to succeed and innovative spirit, they will come

up with some pretty neat solutions to solving problems, even if has to do with some luck as it did

for Dorothy. When you think of past inventions, they typically happen out of luck from trying

and doing. This means teams will have to go into a higher frequency of action and not do
 6

paralysis by analysis. They will learn so much more from trial and error, which in turn will

cause them to grow and become better scientist for the organization. These assets will need to be

rewarded properly for their work such as Dorothy is rewarded with the broomstick. Teams

should be rewarded in many other ways than money such more time to do more continuous

improvement, recognition in front of their peers and allow to participate in more responsible

roles to name a few.

Scene F: returning to Oz, the group talks with the Wizard, expecting him to help Dorothy

return to Kansas. After defrocking the Wizard, they find out he does not know how. The

Wizard tries to use a hot air balloon to return and accidentally leaves Dorothy and Toto

behind upon takeoff. Glinda arrives and helps Dorothy realize she can return to Kansas on

her own with the help of the ruby slippers.

Organizational groups and teams will have to become self-reliant and not depend on the great Oz

to help them every time such as Consultants do for companies. They will have to be able to see

things that are right in front of them, which will only come from a properly engaged and

empowered team (28 – 29) who will have the skills to learn, see, plan and act on their own.

This will facilitate the foundation to support the strategy such as policy deployment (216 – 218)

where the breakthrough objectives are made by the whole, not individuals. If teams are going to

make the needed breakthroughs to compete in a global market, they will have to include enough

talent, skills and resources to be successful and sustain the new processes when the support

structure is no longer there as when the Wizard leaves in the balloon. It will take the appropriate

leadership to guide, mentor, coach and develop people through the change management process

who eventually will be able to be self-directed, engaged and empowered to make the right
 7

decisions as Dorothy who learned this through her experiences and Glinda’s mentoring and

coaching.

Scene: Dorothy awakens from her dream and experiences a new understanding and

appreciation for her home and family in Kansas. “Oh Auntie Em, there’s no place like

home.”

Organizations will still have a place called home as Dorothy did above, but they will go through

changes for the good and feel better for what they have done to help improve their organization

be more successful. Successful companies will have the proper leadership who will tap into their

most important asset to make the appropriate changes based on proper vision, mission, values

and principles where they will create a place that will not compare to anywhere else, if they go

and work for someone else.

Conclusion

The above scenes contain many fundamentals and principles leadership, management and

supervisor will need to successfully guide change in any organization. There are a lot of

pressures on organizations to change and transform their companies into stronger competitors

through total quality management, reengineering, right sizing, restructuring, cultural change, and

turnarounds. Leadership will be the key to making these changes happen where the above scenes

provide many examples for leaders to use and follow. These include having the right

organizational foundation and structure in place to provide the support for the change; knowing

your current and ideal (future) state vision; developing and supporting people to think differently

and take risk to get the breakthroughs with the goal(s) always in mind; self-directed teams are
 8

more powerful than individuals; change is the new way of life for anyone wanting to be

competitive in today’s global markets.

References

Evans, J. R. (2011) Quality and Performance Excellence (6th ed.) Mason: South-Western

Cengage Learning

Kotter, John P. (1996) Leading Change Harvard Business School Press