Interview with Richard Putz
, A Midwest
Bank
Former CEO of Security Federal Bank.
DW: How did you conceive of applying the principles outlined in
The
Goal
to the banking industry?
RP: I was flying back from Los Angeles one night. And I was remembering
my days as a consultant at Coopers & Lybrand, working with the folks who
were handling the manufacturing engagements. That’s where I was first
exposed to
The Goal
. And I began to think that when you look at how a bank
operates—for example, how it moves through the process of putting loans
together—it’s really no different than manufacturing. Why couldn’t I use
something that worked in manufacturing and apply it to a bank? The process
is the same, we just give it different labels. So I started testing that out.
DW: How did that go over with the staff?
RP: In the beginning they were skeptical. I got all of the people who report
directly to me into the board room, we sat down, I passed out copies of
The
Goal
, and I said: “Guys, we’re going to come together every week on Friday.
We’ll have fun, we’ll have food, the whole bit, but we’re going to discuss
how to translate
The Goal
into banking terms.” I’m looking over there at my
CFO, he has this constipated look on his face. I said, “Jim, is there something
wrong?” He says, “Yeah.” I said “What?” He says, “There’s no index in the
back of the book. How do we find anything?” I said, “You read it, it’s a
novel.” He eventually became our biggest advocate. But he was totally
skeptical.
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