Falta a parte dolorosa da transição (Parte V)

Li no JN há dias "Indústrias estratégicas com 90 milhões para formação" e revirei os olhos com a classificação "indústrias estratégicas".

O que são indústrias estratégicas? Estratégicas para quem e estratégicas porquê?

Olho para o esquema clássico dos Flying Geese:

E penso no Japão dos anos 50 a olhar para o sector têxtil como estratégico, ou dos anos 60 a olhar para a metalurgia de base como estratégico e assim por diante.

O WSJ há dias trazia este gráfico:

Como é que Taiwan conseguiu este desempenho? A proteger os incumbentes? Nope!

"According to Taiwan’s Economic Development Performance issued by the National Development Council (NDC) in 2016, the country’s economic development stage is from agriculture to light industry and then heavy industry to high-tech industry. Similarly, factor input also goes from labor to capital, and through knowledge inputs and technology innovation, Taiwan has gradually become a developed country." (Fonte)

Eu sei que este tipo de conversa é tabu em Portugal, e não só. Eu sei que quando escrevo sobre estes temas perco potenciais clientes nestes sectores "estratégicos". Não percebem a diferença entre o Carlos consultor e o Carlos cidadão.

Recordo a série: Falta a parte dolorosa da transição (Parte IV).

Por um lado, no JN lê-se:

"Pedro Cilínio falava aos jornalistas à margem da visita aos 36 expositores de calçado presentes na Micam, em Milão, assegurando que a medida pretende evitar despedimentos, mas também ajudar as empresas a preservarem a sua competitividade e capacidade produtiva."

Por outro lado, falamos em falta de mão de obra para empresas em sectores mais produtivos. Recordo de há dias no FT  "Why don't they just leave then?".

Hoje no JdN, Cristina Casalinho escreve:

"Na sua analise recente da economia portuguesa, a OCDE voltou a referir a evolução da produtividade do trabalho como uma debilidade e obstáculo a crescimentos mais pujantes. A melhoria da qualificação da força de trabalho operada nas últimas décadas deverá promover progressos nesta vertente. [Moi ici: A sério?! Licenciados a produzir melhores ou mais enxadas vão promover o progresso da produtividade do trabalho? Come one. Já leram algum colunista, ou algum comentador nos media tradicionais com coragem para dizer que sem morte das empresas actuais não chegamos lá?] Porém, o efeito do legado ainda é relevante. Remetendo novamente para o relatório da OCDE de junho passado, relevam as baixas qualificações das equipas de gestão nacionais, sendo que 25% das pessoas com responsabilidades de gestão não possuem educação secundária concluída. [Moi ici: E qual a implicação disto? Vão para a universidade? E a universidade tem formadores e cursos preparados para este nível de executivos? Haverá sempre, certamente, um ou outro com vontade de crescer pessoalmente nesta vertente, mas a maioria não quer, nem tem tempo. E são eles que trabalham o numerador da equação da produtividade. Melhor deixar Darwin trabalhar] Certamente que esta realidade reflete o domínio das pequenas e micro empresas no tecido empresarial. Baixas qualificações, acesso a capital limitado e reduzida dimensão [Moi ici: Acham que a fusão de 3 têxteis gera uma empresa mais produtiva mesmo? Perguntem aos japoneses dos anos 50] integram um círculo vicioso que importa quebrar para se almejar maior produtividade, investimento e crescimento."

 

Investir para entrar na mente dos clientes-alvo

"Each area within the circles is strategically important, but A, B, and C are critical to building competitive advantage. The team should ask questions about each. For A: How big and sustainable are our advantages? Are they based on distinctive capabilities? For B: Are we delivering effectively in the area of parity? For C: How can we counter our competitors’ advantages?

The team should form hypotheses about the company’s competitive advantages and test them by asking customers. The process can yield surprising insights, such as how much opportunity for growth exists in the white space (E). Another insight might be what value the company or its competitors create that customers don’t need (D, F, or G).

...

But the biggest surprise is often that area A, envisioned as huge by the company, turns out to be minuscule in the eyes of the customer."

Acredito que muitas empresas apostam em propostas de valor que caem sobretudo na área B porque se focam nos outputs e não nos inputs. Assim, não investem tempo para entrar na mente dos clientes-alvo e perceber como é que o output é usado como input no processo de criação de valor do cliente.

Trechos retirados de "Strategic Insight in Three Circles".  

Keeping optionality

"Successful businesses have always endeavored to satisfy customers. But the customer was traditionally treated as a separate entity whose needs were knowable only partially and episodically. Since physical and informational limitations made it infeasible to address each customer - or each usage episode - individually, companies typically aggregated customers into market segments according to features such as age, social status, gender, and geography. The tastes and interests of each group were averaged:

...

Companies are not competing for theoretical market segments anymore but rather for the attention and expendable cash of the individual consumers or organizations that they target. Doing so means emphasizing personalized and tailored offerings.

...

Business strategy has been predicated on the individual firm as the unit of competition, within relatively stable industry boundaries. Companies made strategies and developed products and services internally, only occasionally and selectively partnering with specific customers and suppliers.

...

But in a more dynamic and uncertain era of competition, owning a proprietary asset can easily turn into a liability; there’s a higher risk of obsolescence, and companies have less flexibility. Therefore, the ability to build or leverage digital platforms and ecosystems is key to achieving high optionality. Firms can multiply their options by complementing their capabilities with those of other ecosystem participants, which means that they can avoid being locked into a specific offering.

...

In a stable context, it is efficient to strive for standardized offerings in order to achieve economies of scale and experience. However, creating optionality for an uncertain future means turning variation from an expensive inconvenience into a valuable source of information, leading to greater optionality and differentiation.

Companies need to treat the execution of routine tasks and customer interactions as opportunities for learning. Standardizing tasks or offerings becomes counterproductive since it suppresses variance, which is the grist for new ideas. [Moi ici: Vejo esta confusão muitas vezes. Escrevem variância (variabilidade) quando deveriam escrever variedade. Variabilidade não é o contrário de variedade] Instead, firms need to leverage their digital presence and use learning algorithms to capture and process lessons from each interaction.

...

Most firms focus on satisfying the immediate and explicit needs of customers. Some go further and try to predict future needs using the techniques detailed above. But few companies interact directly with the customer’s own process of exploration. Serving the exploration needs of customers offers various avenues toward value creation. By facilitating the customer’s search for products or services, companies can learn more about the customer’s needs, which can serve as crucial input for their own search process (akin to Google’s approach). Helping customers find the best solutions to their explicit needs has become the core business for some firms."

Trechos retirados de "Radical Optionality" publicado na HBR de Maio-Junho de 2923. 

"all models are wrong, but some are useful."

Há muitos anos li a frase, “Todos os modelos estão errados, alguns são úteis”, desde então tem-me acompanhado e, de certa forma, ajudado a trabalhar com modelos. Um modelo é uma ferramenta, só isso, uma hipótese de lidar com a realidade. Um modelo não é a realidade, algo que muitos esquecem. Um modelo é, de certa forma, uma ilusão. Talvez por isso, tenha abraçado as ideias de Peter Checkland sobre os ovos estrelados, ou as amibas, em vez dos rectângulos arrogantes e pretensiosos. 

Quem trabalha com sistemas de gestão tem de trabalhar com modelos. Por exemplo, os mapas de processos nos sistemas da qualidade com base na abordagem por processos. Ou seja, quem trabalha com sistemas de gestão tem de trabalhar com ilusões. Recentemente comecei a ler o livro "The Upside of Uncertainty" onde os autores nos despertam para o receio que tanta gente tem da incerteza. Talvez por isso muitos esquecem que um modelo é só uma ferramenta e tratam-no como a descrição perfeita da realidade. 

Por que medimos o desempenho dos processos e o desempenho do sistema de gestão? Porque existe incerteza! Porque a realidade é volúvel e pode alterar o que pensávamos. No entanto, há uma outra razão que muitas vezes esqueço de verbalizar. Temos de medir, analisar e avaliar porque o nosso modelo é só uma rede que lançamos à realidade. A realidade é demasiado complexa para ser descrita por um qualquer modelo. A medição, análise e avaliação permite perceber quando é que o modelo se afasta tanto da realidade que deixa de ser útil.

Por que escrevo isto? Por causa de uma crítica ao livro "Escape From Model Land: How Mathematical Models Can Lead Us Astray and What We Can Do About It" de Erica Thompson, publicada no passado dia 28 de Dezembro no WSJournal.

"We live in an information age, as the cliché has it-really an age of information overload. But “measured quantities do not speak for themselves,” observes Erica Thompson, a statistician and a fellow at the London School of Economics. Data, she notes, are given meaning “only through the context and framing provided by models.” [Moi ici: Tenho uma interpretação um pouco diferente. Medimos. Analisamos, qualquer estagiário faz isso se for ensinado. Ou seja, como trabalhar os dados brutos e transformá-los em algo que possa ser avaliado. Avaliamos, já usamos o modelo para analisar os dados. Agora, usamos o contexto interno e externo para avaliar o desempenho e a continuação da confiança no modelo. Aquele pormenor de saltar do ciclo SDCA para o ciclo PDCA - "Avancemos agora para a Figura 2." Quando decidimos que precisamos de dar o salto é quando percebemos que o modelo que temos já não permite esperar um desempenho aceitável, temos de o melhorar.]

When we want to know how rapidly a new infectious virus is likely to spread, we turn to mathematical models. Models are used by climate scientists to project global warming; by options traders to price contracts; by the Congressional Budget Office to forecast the economic effects of legislation; by meteorologists to warn of approaching storms. Without models, Ms. Thompson says, data "would be only a meaningless stream of numbers."

Ubiquitous and persuasive, models also drive decisions-one reason why, in Ms. Thompson's view, they require our urgent attention. She tells us that, as a graduate student studying North Atlantic storms, she noticed how different models predicted different overall effects and produced contradictory results. She started to reflect on the role of models as metaphors, tools for understanding, and expressions of sociopolitical power. "Escape From Model Land" offers a contemplative, densely encapsulated summary of her reflection and research.

[Moi ici: O parágrafo que se segue é precioso] Models seek to represent the real world, but they live outside it. Indeed, they exist in their own "wonderful place,' what Ms. Thompson dubs "Model Land." In Model Land, the assumptions of a model are considered "literally true," enabling expansive exploration and ambitious predictions. The problem is that Model Land is easy to enter but difficult to escape. Having built "a beautiful internally consistent model," Ms. Thompson writes, it can be "emotionally difficult to acknowledge that the initial assumptions on which the whole thing is built are literally not true."

 ...

There are all sorts of ways that models can lead us astray. A small measurement error on an input can lead to wildly inaccurate forecasts-a phenomenon known as the Butterfly Effect. Fortunately, this type of uncertainty is often manageable. Far more problematic are what Ms. Thompson calls "unquantifiable unknowns" -things that are left out of a model's calculation because they can't be anticipated, such as the unexpected arrival of a transformative technology or the abrupt collapse of a robust market.

...

[Moi ici: Outro parágrafo precioso] Beyond the inherent inability of models to account for the unaccountable, models also reflect the biases of their creators. We may be inclined to regard models as objective expressions of truth, yet they are deliberately constructed interpretations, imbued with the values and viewpoints of the modelers-primarily, as Ms. Thompson notes, well-educated, middle-class individuals. During the pandemic, models "took more account of harms to some groups of people than others," resulting in a "moral case" for lockdowns that was "partial and biased." Modelers who worked from home while others maintained the supply chain often overlooked "all of the possible harms" of the actions their models were suggesting. And even when models try to describe the effects of different courses of action, human beings must ultimately weigh the benefits and harms. "Science cannot tell us how to value things," Ms. Thompson says. "The idea of 'following the science' is meaningless."

...

The statistician George Box once observed that "all models are wrong, but some are useful." For Ms. Thompson, the real utility of models is as a tool for exploration rather than a mechanism to divine the truth or predict the future. "The process of generating a model changes the way that we think about a situation," she writes; it "strengthens some concepts and weakens others." Recalling President Eisenhower's legendary maxim-that "plans are useless, but planning is indispensable"--she argues that relying on models solely for their output misses the indispensable value of the process of model development: of trade-offs, and the agility to adapt if foundational assumptions unexpectedly change.

While acknowledging our "overenthusiasm for mathematical solutions," Ms. Thompson emphatically counsels not abstinence but discipline and humility. Clarity about the purpose of the model matters, she says: An epidemiological model may inform us about viral transmission and hospital pressure but not about the economic effects of closing businesses. Modelers should acknowledge the value judgments implicit in their models, explain what makes a model "good" and describe relevant limitations. But it's up to us to learn from models without being drawn in by their seductive elegance and to ensure that the lessons from Model Land find substantive expression where it actually matters: in our messy, material, magnificent world."

Satisfação dos clientes - inquéritos ou entrevistas?

Há dias, durante este webinar "Measurement, Analysis, and Improvement According to ISO 9001:2015"  recebi uma pergunta mais ou menos deste teor:

“Most companies find it difficult to measure customer satisfaction. Response rates for surveys is poor & does not serve the purpose. Data is scattered here & there in emails and no centralized analysis is done. Any comments?”

A minha resposta andou em torno de: Talvez os inquéritos a clientes não sejam o melhor método para a maioria das situações. Talvez as empresas usem inquéritos a clientes porque é um método fácil, não porque seja a melhor abordagem. A sua empresa tem um software de CRM? Por que não trabalhar com a sua área comercial para aproveitar as informações que lá estão? A sua empresa trabalha nas instalações dos clientes a fazer reparações ou instalações? Por que não usar algum pedido de feedback para essas interacções enquanto o seu pessoal está por lá? Não quero soar ou ser rude, mas acho que a maioria das empresas recebe o que merece pelo pouco investimento que faz (e não falo de dinheiro, mas de qualidade de pensamento) para obter feedback dos seus clientes. Depois, pouco fazem com isso também. A maioria quer ter um número para se satisfazer com ele.

Outra pergunta em torno do mesmo tema mereceu uma resposta do tipo: Por exemplo, recentemente conversei com uma directora da qualidade muito aborrecida porque apenas 30% dos clientes responderam ao inquérito de satisfação. Tive que animá-la e chamar a sua atenção para o facto de que 30% não é nada mal. Mais importante é entender que informações serão extraídas desse inquérito. Não devemos perder a oportunidade de comunicarmos directamente com os clientes sobre a sua experiência.

Entretanto, ontem li:

"For many organizations, surveys like this qualify as “talking to the customer.” They’re ubiquitous – appearing in hotel rooms, after online purchases, and in hospital emergency departments. But do they really qualify as customer consultation? Or are they a symptom of an isolated management just putting on a show of interest? What can be done instead?

The obvious answer is to talk with customers directly.

...

If only they knew just how simple and straightforward a customer interview process can be, and how rich the rewards, if you know how to ask the right questions.

...

If you’re like a lot of people, your initial response might be: “Twelve clients? The sample is too small. It’s not enough to tell you anything useful.”

But in conversations with clients, you’re after quality not quantity. You want to know how they think about issues and how they make decisions. You want to get inside their minds. You want to get a feel for their needs, wants and pain. You can’t get that from a questionnaire.

...

The short answer is: you need enough interviews to get to the point at which you hear nothing new and material is being repeated – so called “saturation”. You can, it turns out, reach this point surprisingly quickly.

...

When it comes to obtaining customer input, executives often think a multiple-choice survey will be the most cost-effective option. They have their place, of course, such as if you want to know the percentage of people who liked or disliked something. But these instruments are shallow and derivative at best, and at their worst they can be annoying and counterproductive. So don’t let them become an excuse for not talking to the customer."

Trechos retirados de "Customer Surveys Are No Substitute for Actually Talking to Customers" 

Lerolero

A propósito de:

• subida na escala de valor;
• aumento da produtividade à custa de trabalhar o numerador;
• the flying geese;
• o exemplo irlandês;
• os macacos não voam;

No último Dinheiro Vivo, o texto do presidente da CIP, "Em busca de um Acordo de Competitividade e Rendimentos" andamos sempre à volta do jogo do gato e do rato:

"Desde logo, porque a associação destes dois vetores - competitividade e rendimentos - pressupõe a necessidade de os conciliar numa dinâmica positiva. Como já assinalei neste espaço, a única forma de o fazer é conseguir que a produtividade aumente. [Moi ici: O jogo do gato e do rato]

...

precisamos de um enquadramento mais favorável ao investimento, desde logo no domínio da fiscalidade, mas também no acesso ao capital. Precisamos de mais emprego qualificado. Precisamos de libertar as empresas do excesso de custos de contexto que absorvem muito do seu tempo e dos seus recursos." [Moi ici: Acham que é por causa dos custos de contexto que as empresas não aumentam a produtividade?]

Entetanto, em "A Simple Theory of Economic Development at the Extensive Industry Margin" de Dario Diodato, Ricardo Hausmann e Ulrich Schetter, leio:

"It is well known that industrialized countries produce a larger variety and more sophisticated goods when compared to developing countries. This naturally raises the question of how countries can enter new industries and climb the ladder of development.

...

Growth at the extensive industry margin is conceptually very different from growth at the intensive margin. [Moi ici: Esta diferença é fundamental. Representa trabalhar o numerador ou o denominador. Representar trabalhar na criação de valor, ou jogar o jogo do gato e do rato] Crudely speaking, growth at the intensive margin involves doing more- or better-of the same, while growth at the extensive margin requires doing something different. To analyze what this implies for economic development, we present a tractable small open economy model that is centered on three core presumptions: First, industries differ in their input requirements of technologies, occupations, or tacit know-how, for example, not just at the intensive, but also at the extensive margin. Second, if an input is currently not used domestically, then an economy needs to build up the capability to provide this input first, and building up this capability is costly. Third, if firms invest in building up the capability to provide a certain input, this will eventually spill over to the rest of the economy. We show that these presumptions imply that countries are more likely to diversify into products that require fewer new inputs, and provide indirect evidence in support of our main mechanism. We then argue that this basic observation about economic diversification has potentially profound consequences for development.

...

[Moi ici: Os macacos não voam!!!] Crudely speaking, developing countries cannot jump from producing textiles to producing airplanes, but need to gradually climb the ladder of development by building up the capability to produce in ever more sophisticated industries. 

... Our set-up thus provides a simple framework that can rationalize (i) that countries diversify along the development path; and (ii) that they do so by preferentially entering industries which are similar to a country's current activities in terms of their occupational inputs."

O salto de produtividade que o país precisa nunca será obtido à custa de jogos do gato e do rato. Se os macacos não voam, uma forma de queimar etapas é atrair know-how e capital estrangeiro que já tem experiência e mercado nas novas áreas.

"Fitness Beats Truth in the Evolution of Perception"

"it is standard in the literature to assume that more accurate percepts are fitter percepts and that, therefore, natural selection drives perception to increasing veridicality-i.e., to correspond increasingly to the "true" state of the objective world. This assumption informs the prevalent view that human percepts are, for the most part, veridical.

Our main message in this paper has been that, contrary to this prevalent view, attempting to estimate the "true" state of the objective world corresponding to a given sensory input confers no evolutionary benefit whatsoever. Specifically: If one assumes that perception involves inference to states of the objective world, then the FBT Theorem shows that a strategy that simply seeks to maximize expected-fitness payoff, with no attempt to estimate the "true" world state, does consistently better (in the precise sense articulated in the statement of the FBT Theorem). In an evolutionary competition, this "Fitness-only" strategy would drive the "Truth" strategy to extinction.

...

In our view, the very idea of attempting to estimate the "true" state of the world is wrong-headed."

Trechos retirados de "Fitness Beats Truth in the Evolution of Perception" 

E Zeihan chega a Mongo!

E Peter Zeihan em "The End of the World is Just the Beginning" chega a Mongo!!!

Mongo é uma metáfora que uso há anos aqui no blogue para ilustrar um mundo económico pós-massificação. Eu cheguei lá por volta de 2007, uma sequência lógica da punção humana para a diversidade. Ele chega lá pela demografia e geopolítica. Ainda assim, penso que ele se fica mais pela dimensão das cadeias de fornecimento, pelas dificuldades da oferta. Eu prefiro adoptar o ponto de vista da procura.

"The longer and more complex the supply chain, the more likely it is to face catastrophic, irrecoverable breakdown.

That single statement contains a lot of angst and disruption.

...

The processes we use to manufacture things will change because the environment will change. Global economies of scale will vanish. Many of the technologies we use to manufacture goods under globalization will not prove applicable to the fractured world emerging.

That means that we, today in 2022, have a lot of industrial plant that just won't be relevant much longer.

...

It is all going to become stranded. Deglobalization-whether triggered by the American withdrawal or demographic collapse-will break the supply links that make most China-centric manufacturing possible, even before consuming nations more jealously protect their home markets.

...

The characteristics of this new industrial plant will reflect a fundamentally different macroeconomic, strategic, financial, and technological environment. It will be a bit different based on where that plant is located, but some common characteristics will exist across them all.

1.Mass-production assembly lines are largely out.

...

2.Reducing economies of scale reduces the opportunities for automation. Applying new technology to any manufacturing system adds cost, and automation is no exception. It will still happen, but only in targeted applications such as textiles and advanced semiconductors.  [Moi ici: Recordo o exemplo da Toyota e da Mercedes, mas o ponto não é o custo, o ponto é o estilhaçar da procura numa multidão de gostos]

...

3.The pace of technological improvement in manufacturing will slow. Let me make that broader: the pace of all technological improvement will slow. [Moi ici: Pelo contrário, acredito que a velocidade da inovação vai aumentar]

...

4. Supply chains will be much shorter. In a disconnected world, any point of exposure is a failure point and any manufacturing system that cannot snuff out its own complexity is one that will not survive. The model of dozens of geographically isolated suppliers feeding into a single, sprawling supply chain will vanish. Instead, successful manufacturing will twist into two new, mutually supportive shapes. ... Machine shops in particular should thrive. They can quickly absorb capital and technology and new designs and new workers, and crank out customized or rapidly changing parts for use in those larger, core facilities.

5. Production will become colocated with consumption. With the global map fracturing, serving a consumer market means producing goods within that market. For smaller and more isolated markets, this suggests extreme production costs due to an utter lack of economies of scale, as well as difficulty sourcing the necessary range of input materials. 

...

6. The new systems will put premiums on simplicity and security just as the old system put premiums on cost and efficiency. The death of just-in-time will force manufacturers to do one of two things.

...

7. The workforce will be very different. Between an alternating emphasis on customization and carrying out multiple manufacturing steps in one location, there isn't much room for people who don't know what they are doing."

O fim da globalização (parte III)

Parte I e parte II. 

Na parte II ilustro como o autor aborda o tema do colapso demográfico. Nesta parte III sublinho os trechos que se seguem:

"More products. More players. Bigger markets. More markets. Easier transport. More interconnectivity. More trade. More capital. More technology. More integration. More financial penetration. More and bigger and bigger and more. A world of more.

Ever since Columbus sailed the ocean blue, human economics have been defined by this concept of more. The world's evolution within the idea of more, this reasonable expectation of more, is ultimately what destroyed the old economies of the pre-deepwater imperial and feudal systems. 

...

Geopolitics tells us the post–World War II and especially the post–Cold War economic booms were artificial and transitory. Going back to something more “normal” by definition requires . . . shrinkage. Demographics tells us that the number and collective volume of mass-consumption-driven economies has already peaked. In 2019 the Earth for the first time in history had more people aged sixty-five and over than five and under. By 2030 there will be twice as many retirees, in relative terms.

...

Combine geopolitics and demographics and we know there will be no new mass consumption systems. Even worse, the pie that is the global economy isn't going to simply shrink; it is being fractured into some very nonintegrated pieces, courtesy of American inaction.

...

We aren't simply looking at a demographically induced economic breakdown; we are looking at the end of a half millennium of economic history.

...

First, everything is going to change. Whatever new economic system or systems the world develops will be something we're unlikely to recognize as being viable today. We will probably need far higher volumes of capital (retirees absorb it like sponges), but we'll have far less of it (fewer workers means fewer taxpayers). That suggests economic growth and technological progress (both of which require capital as an input) will stall out.

...

Second, the process will be the very definition of traumatic. The concept of more has been our guiding light as a species for centuries. From a certain point of view, the past seventy years of globalization have simply been "more" on steroids, a sharp uptake on our long-cherished economic understandings. Between the demographic inversion and the end of globalization, we are not simply ending our long experience with more, or even beginning a terrifying new world of less; we face economic free fall as everything that has underpinned humanity's economic existence since the Renaissance unwinds all at once."

Já repararam que no discurso ambiental este tema não é referido? No cenário central, até 2080 Portugal perde 2 milhões de habitantes. Ao mesmo tempo que o número de idosos crescerá mais um milhão de pessoas e a população em idade ativa (15 a 64 anos) diminuirá de 6,6 para 4,2 milhões de pessoas. O tipo e quantidade de consumo vai cair.

O autor, americano, julgo que vítima da doença anglo-saxónica foca-se muito na produção em massa. Teremos menos produção em massa e mais Mongo. Por isso, este capítulo designado "The end of more". Teremos menos globalização e mais blocos económicos.

Trechos retirados de "The End of the World is Just the Beginning" de Peter Zeihan. 

Uma surpresa boa!

A leitura de "The Root Cause: Rethink Your Approach to Solving Stubborn Enterprise-Wide Problems" de Hans Norden está a ser uma surpresa, por vezes brutal. Toda uma série de hibridações que desenvolvi ao longo dos anos a aparecerem-me, página após página em lingua inglesa.

Já vi muita gente a usar o modelo de cadeia de valor de Porter de muita maneira, mas não assim:

“The value chain is a representation of the process by which input variables are transformed into output variables. Therefore, the value chain’s design, organization or structure, implementation or operation, maintenance, and management are a function of its competitive advantage.

Within the value chain, each business function has its own objective that contributes to and supports the realization of the overall purpose of the value chain.”

O modelo de Porter usado como uso os mapas de processos!

Olhar para as organizações como seres vivos, organismos e não mecanismos:

“Note the difference in perception of a business, and therefore its value chain, as an organism or as a mechanism. The specifications and design of individual component parts that constitute a value chain are less important than their intricately interdependent and synergistic relationships, which determine a business’s character and nature as an organic whole.”

A linguagem que aprendi com Goldratt e Dettmer 

“It makes sense to distinguish between the desired state and the current state when they are misaligned—when the value chain experiences change. The root cause can originate from outperforming the aim or by easing up on the aim, or by changing the benchmark for success.”

A doença do eficientismo, a doença de saltar para soluções sem perceber as causas: 

“Beware of managers with a finance background who are prone to perceive this altered state as a financial problem in need of a financial solution, which usually means increasing operational efficiency. The unfortunate effect of treating symptoms is ignorance about the magnitude of the problem, jumping to conclusions that might even aggravate the problem, and allowing the problem to linger and fester. As a result, problems will persist, recur, or become a latent condition that can wreak havoc when least expected and tend to arrive at a critical moment in the business’s future.”

Definir os resultados (outcomes)

A série inicial aqui:

De "Think “input before output”" até "Think “outcome before output”". 

Depois, " But they matter only as means to the ends that people seek".

Concentremos a atenção nos outcomes:

"The starting point, clearly, is defining "outcome" in the organization. From our perspective, there are four conditions that jointly determine whether a given outcome is suitable as the basis for a revenue model. First, the outcome must be meaningful-and therefore valuable-to customers. This point is obvious, yet many businesses still fall into the tempting trap of focusing on product or service attributes that they have an inherent interest or competitive advantage in, yet these attributes matter little to those who buy. Claims about meaningful outcomes which are the cornerstones of a firm's value proposition-could be objective or highly subjective, such as "enjoyment" in the case of Teatreneu. 

Second, the outcome must be measurable using one or more parameters that are understood and accepted by the organization and its customers. The organization must be able to quantify and express its performance claims in a manner that can form the basis of the exchange with customers. Customers must be able to verify the performance claims. Without these inputs, customers are exposed to possible access, consumption, and performance waste. In business markets, for example, perhaps the most basic outcome is that a particular product or service improves the profitability of customers, either by lowering their costs, increasing their revenue, or a combination of the two. But if profitability cannot be measured directly, then organizations must search for a parameter that can be observed. 

...

Third, the measurement of the outcome must be robust, in the sense that the parameter is a faithful representation of the underlying outcome that interests the organization.

...

Finally, the measurement must be reliable, in the sense that neither customers nor a third party can tamper with it. That is, customers should not have the means to "fake" performance level that is not accurate in order to derive a benefit."

Esta abordagem dos "outcomes" fará confusão a muita gente.

Continua.

" But they matter only as means to the ends that people seek"

O nosso clássico, trabalhar os inputs, em vez dos outputs. Primeiro começamos com:

Think “input before output”

Em vez de ficarmos pelo que produzimos, encaramos como é que o cliente vai tratar o output como um input na sua vida. Para depois fazermos mais uma evolução, perceber que outcome o cliente pretende atingir ao usar o output como um input nos seus processos. Para chegar a:

Think “outcome before output”

Agora encontro um texto sobre o tema em "The “New You” Business": 

"The end goal of people who go to fitness centers isn’t access to the equipment or trainers; it is to get in shape. The overriding reason people go to their doctor or check into a hospital is not to obtain drug prescriptions, a medical examination, or therapeutic procedures; it is to get well. And students’ primary motive for going to college is not to buy a lot of books, have their papers and exams graded by professors, or even have the classroom and all-around college experience; it is to gain skills or expertise and pursue a career.

But all too often fitness centers, medical providers, colleges, and organizations in many other industries seek to distinguish themselves only on the quality, convenience, and experience of what they sell. It’s not that those things aren’t important. But they matter only as means to the ends that people seek. Too many organizations lose sight of this truth. Even when they do promote what they sell in relation to customers’ aspirations, they rarely design solutions that allow people to realize them.

...

Enterprises should recognize the economic opportunity offered by the transformation business, in which they partner with consumers to improve some fundamental aspect of their lives—to achieve a “new you.”

...

The goods, services, and even experiences a company offers matter only in how they help customers achieve their desired results. Each customer’s definition of success must therefore be the North Star that guides what a company does if it wants to compete on transformations."

Uma transição por fazer ...

"The new management innovation are very different. Instead of an industrial-era focus on internal efficiency and outputs, the primary preoccupation in the new age is external: an obsession with creating value and outcomes for customers and users. Instead of starting from what the firm can produce that might be sold to customers, digital firms work backwards from what customers need and then figure out how that might be delivered in a sustainable way. Instead of limiting themselves to what the firm itself can provide, the firm often mobilizes other firms to help meet user needs."

Quem acompanha este blog desde 2004 pode facilmente recordar o quanto estes temas fazem parte da narrativa desde o início.

O que escrevo acerca do eficientismo, da lição de Marn e Rosiello (o burro era eu), do Evangelho do Valor. O que escrevo acerca de começar pelo fim e isso é olhar para a menina do olho dos clientes-alvo e, a partir do que procuram e valorizam, andar para trás e preparar a organização para entrega sistemática desses inputs (recordar input, não output). E o que escrevo sobre os ecossistemas da procura depois da experiência de 2004 em que o tema emergiu naturalmente de um desafio profissional em mãos, antes de começar a ler sobre o tema.

Quantas empresas ainda precisam de fazer esta transição...

Trecho retirado de "Why Management Innovation Is Hiding In Plain Sight" 

Vivemos neste fluido de percepções

Atrai-me esta percepção que vivemos num mundo assente neste fluido de percepções resultantes de interpretações subjectivas que se objectificam através de acções e comportamentos. Abre muito mais alternativas, aliás, há sempre alternativas. Nós é que podemos não querer tentar algumas delas, mesmo quando as outras falham. No caso das empresas, o dinheiro pode acabar antes de termos tentado a que ia transitoriamente resultar. Já não sei se foi com Kahneman ou Gigerenzer que li sobre como dois adeptos de clubes diferentes, de boa-fé, conseguem olhar para a mesma realidade e ver coisas diferentes. Por isso, um deles escreveu: a realidade é o que vemos, nada mais! 

E o que vemos é o que o nosso trajecto de vida nos permite ver. Se estivermos abertos e atentos, podemos intuir novas possibilidades de interpretar a realidade e reformular a actuação.

"In this article we argue that one important link between group-level and firm-level competitive phenomena are the mental models used by key decision makers to interpret the task environment of their organization.

...

material decisions ultimately reflect the intuition and cognitive constructions of decision-makers. At a cognitive level, business competition must be analysed in terms of the mental models of decision-makers and how such mental models lead to a particular interpretation of the competitive milieu.

...

The interpretive approach rests upon four long-standing assumptions. First, activities and structures of organizations are assumed to be determined in part by the micro-momentary actions of their members. Second, such actions are assumed to be based upon an information-processing sequence in which individuals attend to cues in the environment, interpret the meaning of such cues, and then externalize these interpretations via concrete activities. Third, it is assumed that 'meaning' is problematic, and that individuals must construct actively an interpretation by linking received cues with well-learned and/or developing cognitive structures. Finally, individuals are assumed to possess a reflective capability such that they are able to verbalize at least the contents of their interpretations if not the processes through which such interpretations were generated. Taken together, these four assumptions portray human activity as an ongoing input-output cycle in which subjective interpretations of externally situated information become themselves objectified via behaviour.

...

Through processes of induction, problem-solving, and reasoning, decision-makers construct a mental model of the competitive environment which consists minimally of two types of beliefs; beliefs about the identity of the firm, its competitors, suppliers and customers, and causal beliefs about what it takes to compete successfully within the environment which has been identified. 

...

Just as mental models are determined by cues from transactions within the value chain, such transactions are themselves partially determined by the cognitive constructions of organizational decision-makers. Beliefs about the identity of competitors, suppliers, and customers focus the limited attentional resources of decision-makers on some transactional partners to the exclusion of others.

...

the strategic choices of individual firms take place within the context of many shared beliefs about how and with whom to engage in transactions in the marketplace.

...

It is axiomatic that a first step in a firm's formulation of competitive strategy is the identification of its major competitors (e.g., Porter, 1980). [Moi ici: Não penso assim, não sigo este axioma. Tenho receio dos Dick Dastardly desta vida, e dos motards. Prefiro imaginar uma paisagem competitiva cheia de picos. Prefiro começar por determinar quem são os clientes-alvo e qual o ecossistema que deve ser mobilizado para os seduzir, satisfazer e desenvolver]

Trechos retirados de "Competitive Groups as Cognitive Communities: The Case of Scottish Knitwear Manufacturers" publicado no Journal of Management Studies em Julho de 1989.

Aumento de preços

Há dias numa empresa perguntaram-me a opinião acerca do aumento de preços das matérias-primas. 

Entretanto, ontem li "Inflation, made in China":

"The globalisation side has a lot to do with China. Its export machine gives us all cheap stuff and suppresses wages for manufacturing industries worldwide.[Moi ici: Enquanto os tótós culpavam o euro. Nós, desde sempre optamos por "It's not the euro, stupid!"]

Is the China-as-deflation-exporter story over?

...

As the chart makes clear, the exchange rate has a lot to do with whether China exports higher prices to the US. Beijing has allowed the renminbi to strengthen somewhat. 

...

Now the pressure is really on, as reflected in the 9 per cent increase in Chinese producer prices in May. Choyleva argues that passing higher costs on to domestic customers is difficult in China, as evidenced by weak consumer price inflation. Nor is the government likely to provide relief by weakening the renminbi. It is more concerned about things like food price inflation and encouraging capital inflows. So Chinese producers, if they want to protect profits, have little choice but to jack up their export prices in dollars."

Depois, li "Should You Raise Your Prices This Summer?" de Rafi Mohammed na HBR. Um conjunto de tópicos para reflectir quando se pensa em aumentar preços:

"There are compelling reasons for businesses to raise prices this summer. First and foremost, costs are up. Wages in April and May grew at an annualized rate of 7.4%, gas prices have jumped by 49.6% in the last year, and May’s inflation rate leaped to 5%.

...

consider the following strategies to implement:

Be mindful of competitors. If they are raising prices, it’s easier for you to do so too. Don’t forget to evaluate how your customers will react 

...

Provide an explanation. To defuse pushback, provide a data-backed narrative on why prices are increasing. Customers are more amenable when they understand why they are being asked to pay more.

...

Lower other costs. It’s unrealistic for managers to believe that they have carte blanche to pass along any cost increase and that customers will in essence respond “No problem, keep your normal profit and we’ll continue buying the same amount.” Counterbalance increased input costs with savings from elsewhere. 

...

Roll out a “Best” version. The combination of pent-up demand and stimulus money may increase the receptivity of customers to buying a high-end “Best” version of a product. 

...

Provide options to retain price sensitive customers. A price hike may not work for some customers. Instead of writing them off, offer choices to keep them in the family. 

...

Reexamine prices individually. I’ve found it inevitable that examining a company’s prices leads to discovering some that are too low. Properly pricing these products may reduce the pressure to make an across-the-board increase or take unnecessary risks on other products."

"It is amazing how many organizations fall into the trap of not making the required choices on strategy"

"Decisions about strategy are the prerogative of top management and cannot be delegated to employees. For example, deciding what customers to target or what products to sell are strategic decisions and must be made by top management. Similarly, changes to strategy are also the domain of top management. You cannot have employees changing the product offering or the customers being targeted without the direct input of their leaders.

...

Employees can have autonomy to act on operational issues that improve what we are already doing, but not on the strategic choices that the organization has made that define its strategic direction.

Obviously, for employees to tell the difference between operational and strategic issues, they must first know what strategic choices the organization has made. This implies that the most important parameter that will guide employees’ behaviors—and the parameter that will allow us to give autonomy without fear of losing control—is our clearly communicated strategy. 

...

a 2013 academic study reported that even in high-performing companies with clearly articulated strategies, only 29 percent of employees knew what their company’s strategy was. This is not an isolated finding—survey after survey reports that employees seem to be in the dark when it comes to their organization’s strategy, despite claims by senior management that their strategy is clear, well communicated, and understood by their employees.

...

Reason #1: Failure to Make the Difficult Choices That Strategy Requires

Strategy is all about making difficult choices—what the organization will do, and more importantly, what it will not do. The question that immediately arises is: “choices about what?” There is no agreed answer to this question, but at the very least there are three choices about strategy that need to be made—the who, the what, and the how. Specifically:

• Who should we target as customers and who should we not?
• What shall we offer these customers and what shall we not?
• How should we achieve all this—what value chain activities should we undertake and what activities should we not?”

...

The biggest strategic mistake that organizations make is not that they miss one or two choices in their decision making; it is that they do not make choices at all.

...

It is amazing how many organizations fall into the trap of not making the required choices on strategy. One reason for this is the fact that these are not easy choices to make—ex ante, there are many possible answers to each one of the three questions.

...

There may be additional reasons, but the end result is that organizations consistently and predictably fail to make the necessary choices that strategy requires. Faced with uncertainty, they invest some of their resources going after customer X and some going after customer Y—just to be on the safe side. In the process, they do a disservice to both X and Y (by underinvesting in both), but at least they ensure that they do not make a mistake by choosing one that may turn out to be wrong five or ten years down the road. Similarly, faced with the prospect of upsetting some of their colleagues, they allocate their limited resources to projects and regions that do not fit with the organization’s goals or direction. In the process, they underinvest in the things that deserve their attention, but at least they do not upset their colleagues!

Failure to make choices leads to the first key reason why we have lack of clarity in strategy: Instead of being a clear statement of the (difficult) choices that the organization has made, strategy becomes nothing more than a vague and generic statement that lists all the wonderful things that the firm aims to achieve. It says all the right things so that nobody can really disagree with it, but fails to state the one thing that will offer guidance to employees— the choices the organization has made—exactly because no choices have been made. When you read the annual report of any company, what you get is good-sounding motherhood statements masquerading as strategy statements, a point also made by other academics. These offer no guidance or direction to employees. No wonder these people complain that they have no idea what their organization’s strategy is. They do not know it because the organization does not really have a strategy!"

Trechos retirados de “Organizing for the New Normal” de Constantinos Markides.  

Então, o negócio deixava de ser tubagens...

Esta semana, ao passar junto ao estádio da bola em Cesar, vi um atrelado de camião com a seguinte mensagem "[Marca] - SOLUÇÕES INOVADORAS EM TUBAGENS".

Fiquei logo a pensar na frase e em algo que não bate certo...

Foi então que me lembrei da G - "Privilegiar os inputs sobre os outputs (parte IX)". Aquele slogan concentrado em tubagens tem tudo para focar e fixar as pessoas da empresa ao output, ao século XX.

Soluções inovadoras em tubagens deve dar origem a uma gama medonha de tubagens, num negócio que compete pelo preço ... stuck-in-the-middle, com margens de meter medo de tão apertadas ... talvez um dinossauro vermelho...

Especulo. E se em vez de tubagens, (output), pensassem em input. Os clientes usam as tubagens para quê?

Movimentar fluidos! O que é preciso para movimentar fluidos? O que pode correr mal na movimentação de fluidos? Que oportunidades de criar valor para os clientes existem, podem ser desenvolvidas, em torno da movimentação de fluidos?

Então, o negócio deixava de ser tubagens, ou deixava de afunilar em tubagens e começava a abrir em complementos com muito mais potencial para a criação de valor. 

Tudo é serviço, até os produtos são um avatar de serviço.

"why some countries grow faster than others"

Mais uns trechos de "Windows of Opportunity: How Nations Make Wealth".

Recordar Irlanda e João Duque:

• Tamanho, produtividade e a receita irlandesa
• A caminho da Sildávia, portanto.
• Ah! Claro que os macacos não podem faltar. Eles não voam, trepam às árvores. 

"If we want to know why some countries grow faster than others, it is also important to understand that there is a ladder of economic development, the rungs of which represent different types of industry. It is a ladder developing countries have to climb in order to be successful - no developing country tries to start growing by creating a pharmaceutical industry, and no country has ever achieved a high GDP per capita by having a cheap garment industry. 

...

perhaps a more useful way of thinking about the rungs of the ladder of economic development is to see them as representing industries which require increasingly complex organisational and technological capabilities. On the bottom rungs are simple industries involved in, for example, the production of cheap clothes, the assembly of electronic components and the making of simple toys. On the top rungs are industries requiring complex organisational and technological capabilities that can only be acquired experientially, cumulatively and collectively; such as the aerospace, pharmaceutical and semiconductor industries. In simple industries, such as the production of cheap clothes or the assembly of electronic components, it is difficult for any firm to gain a competitive advantage. Consequently, the value-added per capita of firms is low, and the wages and salaries they can pay is also low.

...

Knowledge involves understanding the relationships or linkages between entities, and being able, therefore, to predict the outcome of events without having to act them out. 

...

Knowhow is different, as it involves the capacity to perform tacit actions; that is actions that cannot be explicitly described.

...

Before knowledge and knowhow can be used to make new products and services, they have to be embodied in individuals and organisations. The knowledge and knowhow that a single individual can acquire is limited, as an individual can only absorb so much information. Therefore, the knowledge and knowhow to make complex products and services have to be embodied in a number of different individuals and co-ordinated by a firm's organisation.

...

This point about the difficulty of accumulating the knowledge and knowhow to make products and services is important for two reasons. Firstly, neoclassical economists tend to assume that demand and incentives are enough to stimulate the production of a product or service anywhere in the world, and if they don't it must be because the system of allocating resources is not working efficiently. However, while incentives and demand may be enough to motivate intermediaries and traders, the people who produce goods and services also need to know how to make them.

Secondly, if the ability to accumulate the knowledge and knowhow to make products and services is difficult, it is likely that countries will have accumulated varying levels of knowledge and knowhow on their economic history, and therefore the complexity of the products and services they can produce will vary.

...

products requiring a large input of knowledge and knowhow would tend to be exported from only a few countries. Some of the products exported by a large number of countries include simple garments, such as underwear, shirts and pants; while some of the products exported by a relatively few countries include optical instruments, aircraft and medical imaging devices. Such a simple scan suggests that industries requiring less knowledge and knowhow are present in more places, as one might expect."

How can we use the process approach (part III a)

 Part I and part II.

In the last part, I wrote that this part would be about processes and strategy. However, let me make a small change and first address the modeling of an organization, based on the process approach, before relating processes to strategy.

4. Modelling an organization – mapping processes

ISO 9001:2015 clause 4.4.1 states that an:

Organization shall determine the processes needed for a quality management system. 

How can that be done?

We need to develop a model of how the organization works having as its building blocks what we call processes.

4.1 What is a model?

“A model is an external and explicit representation of part of reality, as seen by people who want to use the model to understand, to change, to manage and control that part of reality”

 Michael Pidd in “Tools for thinking - Modeling in Management Science” 

Remember, we don't draw a model to answer ISO 9001:2015 requirements, and please auditors. We draw them because we want to understand, to change, to manage, and control our organization's present and future.

Models are always a simplification and an approximate representation of some aspects of reality, models reduce complexity, simplify the original or the future to be built, to reduce the noise produced by reality, and thus highlight, distinguish the critical factors, for the object of study concerned. The model does not show all the attributes of the original, it only illustrates those attributes that are relevant, or suitable for the observer/creator/user of the model to manipulate. Models do not need to be accurate to be useful, models are simplifications, and their usefulness lies precisely in that approach.

The task of the observer/creator/user of the model is to collect the visions, the perceptions, even if ill-defined and implicit of reality, and to shape them in a sufficiently well-defined way to be understood and discussed by other people. A model is a representation of reality. 

With Deming I learned:

All models are wrong, some are useful!

The reality is composed of a set of objects that constitute a system, at a conceptual level we design a model capable of illustrating the system, the reality. Armed with the model as a work unit, we can perform simulations to perceive reality and influence it, the simulation uses the model to perceive and anticipate the dynamics and behavior of the system.

4.2 Modeling an organization as a set of processes

To build a model of an organization, it is necessary to have a clear definition of its purpose, now an organization exists only because there are customers, they are its raison d'être! 

An organization, the organization object of our study, is an entity, it is a system, which transforms, that converts “potential customers with needs” into “customers served”. 

4.2.1 Step 1 - Identify the different types of customers 

Customers are not all the same, it is possible to identify and isolate different types of customers, this activity is important because different types of customers may require, different processes and may mobilize different actors, may involve different inputs and different outputs. 

4.2.2 Step 2 - List the inputs and outputs of the model

Distinguish the different states of the customers and identify all interactions (inputs and outputs) between the organization and its customers! How do we get in contact with potential customers? How do we collect information to develop new products and services? How do we receive orders or requests for proposals? How do we deliver our products and services? 

4.2.3 Step 3 – Determine the core, the heart of the model

Let us track the route, from inputs into outputs. Let us zoom in on the organization. Let us open the black box! 

For the purposes of this blogpost, we select a certain type of customers and then start to dive inside the organization  (for someone implementing a quality management system for certification, this could be a management system scope option)

I gather a set of people that know the organization, each from a different perspective and give them sticky notes and markers. Then, I post two sticky notes that represent the responsible for major input in the system and the receiver of the major output of the system.

I ask; what actions, what activities do you do when going from one extreme into the other? People use sticky notes to write things that they remember. I set a rule: one sticky note must have one verb and one noun like “Receive Request For Proposal”, like “Write Proposal”, like “Budget Proposal”, like “Present proposal”, like “Negotiate proposal”.

After that kind of brainstorming one can start to aggregate sticky notes that belong to a flow of activities. For example, I can replace these 5 sticky notes above by saying that they belong to the same process called “Win order”. Repeating the technique for other sticky notes we develop the central sequence of processes.

When designing the road from the inputs into the outputs, do not dive into to much detail! 

Let us look at a high level of abstraction and consider 3 to 6 entities (each entity represents a process, a set of activities) And let's number the processes sequentially! 

We can do a mental exercise: "If we were riding an order, what would we see from the reception to its delivery?" Do not register departments or functions, but state changes, the main tasks! ”

4.2.4 Step 4 – Name each process

 

Designate each entity (each process)! Start with a verb that illustrates the transformation that takes place inside! Avoid references to departments, to avoid confusion remember:

• processes are not departments, 
• the organization chart is not a process map, 
• the vertical and horizontal views of an organization are very different.

I like to designate a process by relating its name to the main output of that process. 

While certain processes seem to be clearly determined, based on a physical flow (production, logistics, distribution, transport) or a flow of information (design/development, closing accounts, invoicing, payment), certain activities of an administrative nature seem difficult to integrate into a “process” view. 

There may then be a strong temptation to group them by function analogy and to baptize these groupings as “human resource process” (in which recruitment, training, communication, payment of wages, contract management will be mixed) work, social dialogue, without the slightest logical link or the tangible outputs that characterize such a process appearing), “accounting and financial process”, etc. Performing more or less arbitrary functional groupings is of no interest from the point of view of process management, because it will be difficult to draw interesting conclusions as to the coordination and chaining modes. 

In the next part, we will continue with the modeling of the public works company as a basis for modeling an organization. 

Tremendamente familiar

"There are always limits to the effectiveness of any unbalanced growth model. 

...

After the global financial crisis, the Chinese government responded to the collapse in external demand for Chinese manufactures by ramping up domestic investment even further. Without a commensurate increase in profitable investment projects, however, the result was simply a sharp increase in the domestic debt burden.

...

In China, the GDP growth rate is an input into the system. It is set early in the year as the GDP growth target for that year and represents the amount of growth needed to accommodate social and political objectives, among which of course is the desire to keep unemployment low.

...

This creates powerful—and dangerous—incentives. China’s provincial and municipal governments control most of the credit creation within the banking system, and Chinese banks rarely have to write down loans for projects that cannot service the debt. The easiest way for officials to hit their targets is therefore to tell the state-run banks to lend to favored companies to invest in as much infrastructure, manufacturing, and real estate as necessary. Whether the investments are worthwhile is irrelevant. [Moi ici: Lembram-se dos arrepios?] All that matters is that the quantity of spending generates enough reported GDP to meet the central government’s objectives."

Trechos retirados de “Trade Wars Are Class Wars” de Matthew C. Klein.