Beer and Ice Cream Diet

As we all know, it takes 1 calorie to heat 1 gram of water 1 degree centigrade. Translated into meaningful terms, this means that if you eat a very cold dessert (generally consisting of water in large part), the natural processes which raise the consumed dessert to body temperature during the digestive cycle literally sucks the calories out of the only available source, your body fat.

For example, a dessert served and eaten at near 0 degrees C (32.2 deg. F) will in a short time be raised to the normal body temperature of 37 degrees C (98.6 deg. F). For each gram of dessert eaten, that process takes approximately 37 calories as stated above. The average dessert portion is 6 oz, or 168 grams. Therefore, by operation of thermodynamic law, 6,216 calories (1 cal./gm/deg. x 37 deg. x 168 gms) are extracted from body fat as the dessert’s temperature is normalized. Allowing for the 1,200 latent calories in the dessert, the net calorie loss is approximately 5,000 calories.

Obviously, the more cold dessert you eat,the better off you are and the faster you will lose weight, if that is your goal. This process works equally well when drinking very cold beer in frosted glasses. Each ounce of beer contains 16 latent calories, but extracts 1,036 calories (6,216 cal. per 6 oz. portion) in the temperature normalizing process. Thus the net calorie loss per ounce of beer is 1,020 calories. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to calculate that 12,240 calories (12 oz. x 1,020 cal./oz.) are extracted from the body in the process of drinking a can of beer.

Frozen desserts, e.g., ice cream, are even more beneficial, since it takes 83 cal./gm to melt them (i.e., raise them to 0 deg. C) and an additional 37 cal./gm to further raise them to body temperature. The results here are really remarkable, and it beats running hands down.

Unfortunately, for those who eat pizza as an excuse to drink beer, pizza (loaded with latent calories and served above body temperature) induces an opposite effect. But, thankfully, as the astute reader should have already reasoned, the obvious solution is to drink a lot of beer with pizza and follow up immediately with large bowls of ice cream.We could all be thin if we were to adhere religiously to a pizza, beer, and ice cream diet.

Happy eating!

School of Physics, University of Sydney

Hey if Berkley can steal it from University of Sydney I can steal it from Berkley.

I wish I knew where that quote came from, if you do let me know in the comments section.  This quote really sums up what makes a good athlete (or business person, or student, or person) into a great athlete.

How does this quote work so well?  It handles defeat in a gracious manner and learns a lesson from it.  It reduces jealousy of success and begins to work on your own.  The quote also lets you be humble and ask for help.

Everyone has setbacks.  We all lose from time to time.  The greatest coach of all time, John Wooden, won 10 NCAA basketball championships.  He went 4 years without a loss, but he did lose from time to time.  He did not get mad, he learned why they lost and made the team better.  He was always looking for the little details that would make the team better.  John Madden was the same way.  Everyone knows him as the NFL commentator and the Video Game producer (which is by the way the most popular all time game now), but did you know he has the best winning percentage of any NFL coach with 10 years or more?  Why did he win so much?  Like John Wooden he learned from his losses and always looked at every small detail to find out why he lost and tried to make his team better.  They did not get bitter, they got better.

Living by this motto helps free yourself from being jealous of success.  There is one sure way to ruin a good run and that is by becoming jealous of others success.  It gets you distracted from your own goals.  Being jealous of others success begins to put negative thoughts in your head.  It begins to make you think that the world is not abundant enough for the both of you.  You begin to think of them as an opponent.  You lose focus on your goals and once you have lost focus on your goals you begin to fail.

In reality the only place with one winner and one loser is in sports.  In real life there is a lot to go around, there are a lot of Win-Win deals out there.  By constantly trying to get better you begin to run into opportunities.  You focus on yourself your goals and how to get to where you want to be.

To get to what you want you have to ask for help.  There has never been a great athlete who has not had a coach.  Everyone needs help.  There is always someone who has some knowledge that will help you.  They have thoughts on how to achieve your goals even if they have not done it before.  Instead of getting bitter from a defeat and focusing on how to get better you begin to realize that you may need some help.  Asking for this help is a huge step.  Let others help you to focus on your goals and you will reach them faster and with less pain than you could have ever done on your own.

So next time life gets you down, and you don’t know what to do, Don’t Get Bitter, Get Better.

Since the Secret stormed out of the Oprah studio and took many of you by storm there has been some debate and some let down to the principles taught in the movie.  There are some interesting factors that people overlooked.  The biggest is the difference between Optimistic Thinking and Positive Thinking.

I think that the reason that the Secret is so powerful and why so many people love to watch it is that it is on some sort of different level, and it is.  The problem that comes with watching the Secret is that too many come away from the secret thinking that all they have to do is think positively and the world will change to their favor.  Fill your world with positive thoughts and positive things will happen to you.  That is correct, but it isn’t at the same time.  Here is the difference

Positive Thinking

With positive thinking people say only good things.  They always look to find the positive meaning in something.  They go out convincing themselves that if they think positively then good things will happen.  Thinking positively usually has people saying it out loud “the economy is down but there is only one way for it to go.”  Positive thinkers often times come on too strong and it puts people off, and pushes them away.

Optimistic Thinkers

With optimistic thinking people they only feel good things.  Everything always has a good side to the optimistic thinker.  No one can ever convince an optimistic thinker that something is negative once the optimistic thinker has made up their mind.  Optimistic thinkers tend to keep their thoughts to themselves, there is no need for them to tell anyone that they are optimistic, people just know.  People tend to follow optimistic thinkers, and optimistic thinkers tend to attract more people to them.

So with that description what is the real difference?  The difference with Positive Thinkers and Optimistic Thinkers is that one just thinks and the other one does.  Do you know the difference?  Can you see the significance now?  Of course the Optimistic Thinkers act on their optimism.  They continually see things in an optimistic mind and are able to see opportunities.  This is what the Secret really tells us.  Once we get our thinking in the right perspective we are able to act on it and manifest what we want.  It starts a domino effect.

Not sure what you are now?  There is an easy way to get started.  Simply be a positive thinker, but don’t tell anyone.  Just be one for yourself.  That is another key that people miss in the Secret.  Be a positive thinker for yourself and you will begin to become an Optimistic thinker.  At first you will have to force yourself to see the positive in something, then suddenly it will come naturally.  You will see more and more positives.  You will become the Optimistic person that has success thrust upon them.

I think that most of this stems from the Bible and other great books.  I am no scholar of the Bible but I can’t imagine that God or anyone else would want us to not have the best life that we could possibly lead.  With all the great things that are on this planet why should we be forced to do without?

I think that we have gotten this bad image of rich people from the media and movies.  The villain is always the rich person who will squash everyone and everything in their way to become richer.  They live posh lives and never share their money.  There may be one or two of these people around but they are certainly not prevalent.  If you work hard for what you want and you get it you should enjoy it.  I do think that we should all share, but how you do that is up to you.

I actually think that it is worse to be a person of without and expect a hand out from someone who has.  There is no reason that anyone should be in this position.  There is no reason that anyone should expect to have a handout.  Sure we have all landed on bad times.  We have all had our setbacks.  That is life and that is what makes life great, but we should all be willing to work our way back to prosperity.  There just is no reason that I can think of to give anyone who just sits around and waits for a handout anything.

But it is these people who think that they deserve something that are the loudest when it comes to the evils of money and wealth.  It is the people who have little and thinks that everyone should be in the same position that moan and complain about those who are successful.  I could go on but I would rather stay positive.

So on the positive side I say this to you.  Don’t let anyone tell you that you don’t deserve something.  You deserve to have your hard work pay off.  You deserve to create your own prosperity.  You deserve to set high goals, and have high standards, and get them.  You deserve to be able to have enough to share with those who you feel are truly deserving.  God knows there are a lot of people out there who are deserving of charity.  It feels very good to be able to share some of your prosperity with those in need.  It feels very good to share some of your prosperity with yourself.  Go ahead and splurge on yourself you deserve it.

Yesterday I outlined what the Toyota Way was.  I also subtly gave you a little homework assignment to go to Wikipedia and see what they have to say about the system.  Now it is my turn.

Base management decisions on long-term philosophy even at the expense of short-term financial goals

Sound like something we could have learned about a year ago? Sound like something that has gotten us into the financial mess?  How does this apply to you? Sometimes we have to take a little hit, a loss, or a setback to achieve our long term goals. These little hiccups are not necessarily a bad thing. They can be a very good thing if we learn from them, they may even be part of the process that our success has to go through. But always keep the long-term goals and philosophy in mind.

Create a continuous process flow to bring problems to the surface

An easier way of saying this is to focus on one task until it is completed. Do not multi-task, a lesson that I have recently learned. Multi-tasking leads to mistakes, time wasting, overprocessing, poor work, over action, and low creativity. Those are taken directly from the definition of the Toyota Way. None of us want to waste time, and that is what most of us get frustrated about in our jobs. My best job ever was mowing fairways at Leland Country Club. Why? Because I could get out on the mower in the early morning, have my cup of coffee and my radio/ear protection and just be in my own little world. All I had to do was mow fairways. I may take me until noon, or until the late afternoon, but that was my one task. I could concentrate on it and do it well. And I did do a good job, Actually I did a great job. I was probably the best fairway mower they had ever had. I could mow a straight line, make any type of pattern and do it in an efficient matter. Concentrate on one task an you will see your quality of work increase, and your creativity get sparked.

Use “pull” systems to avoid overproduction

This may seem to apply only to manufacturing something but it does not. What this tells us is only use the resources that are needed. No matter if you are running a business or writing a blog there is no reason to do more than is needed, and use more than is needed. Make things simple and you will reduce waste. Wasted time, wasted energy, and wasted materials will go right out the door and you will never worry about them again.

Level out the workload (heijunka)

Work like a tortoise not the hare. This does not mean work slowly and inefficiently, it means quite the opposite. Maybe the best way to say it is to take time to do a good job instead of rushing a job to get it done. Trying to rush to get things done simply causes mistakes. Instead manage your time so you have enough to do a good job.

Build a culture of stopping to fix problems, to get quality right the first time

Don’t pass over a problem just to keep working. This is a huge problem for lots of production people and lots of self employed people. But it goes beyond that. Your employees, your co-workers, students, whomever you are in contact with should be praised for finding a problem and pointing it out. They should not be shunned. Finding problems is a good thing, it gets us closer to a high quality of work, production, and success.

Standardized tasks and processes are the foundation for continuous improvement and employee empowerment.

Having a system to work in is great, but if that system is not working it needs to be changed. Having the ability to change a system and continue the process is hugely important. Again anyone who you come in contact with should be encouraged to point out ways of improving systems.

Use visual control so no problems are hidden

Obama likes to call this transparency. There is no real reason to hide most things. Leave work and processes out in the open so that all employees can see what is happening. Let your customers, your loved ones, and anyone else know what is happening. This will only develop trust, cooperation, and greater success.

Use only reliable, thoroughly tested technology that serves your people and processes

Hummm very interesting. A company and a culture that seems to be gadget happy is instead saying don’t use something if you don’t need it. Talk to Timothy Ferris of the 4 Hour Work Week about this. You can certainly have way to many gadgets, fancy equipment, and technology that will hurt production, lead to greater time wasting, and frustration. Make it spartan. Work with the minimum. If the technology is not working don’t keep it around. Be willing to make the change, or to take away things that are not efficient.

Grow leaders who thoroughly understand the work, live the philosophy and teach it to others

This is why MLM companies are so successful. People want to attach themselves to a philosophy (look at the growing number of churches) that lead to success (see MLM and Work from home businesses). Through this philosophy it is clear that leaders can develop. There is a goal that can be achieved. When you have good leaders teaching others it inspires them to do more.

Develop exceptional people and teams who follow your company’s philosophy

The most popular sports are all team sports. Why? Because everyone wants to be a part of something. There are very few and rare individuals who do things for their own good. Develop the team mentality, reward the entire team not the individuals and you will see production increase in all areas.

Respect your extended network of partners and suppliers by challenging them and helping them improve

Everyone needs help. By challenging your helpers and helping them to do a better job you end up getting better. Sometimes you have to give free advice and free help to benefit you in the long run.

Go and see for yourself to thoroughly understand the situation (Genchi Genbutsu)

You can’t know how something works until you get your hands dirty. Get out there and get involved. Do the things that you teach, lead, and want others to do. Suggest things only after you have experienced those suggestions first hand. It is a very important step. You can never know what the other one is experiencing until you experience it yourself.

Make decisions slowly be consensus, thoroughly considering all options; implement decisions rapidly (nemawashi)

Sports teams do a great job at this, Government does a terrible job. Get together with your most trusted people, identify the problem and work together to find the solution. This does not have to take long to happen. Why do you think that football coaches always wear headsets on the sidelines. Is it to have the other coaches point out what is happening? No the coach knows what is happening. It is a way to collaboratively figure out what will work from two different perspectives. Once the options have been weighed and the decision is made what to do next then it happens. This usually happens within 20 seconds each play during a football game. Now take this and do it with whatever you want to be successful. You will see that it becomes easy.

Become a learning organization through relentless reflection (hansei)  and continuous improvement (kaizen)

The only way to get better is to continually learn. There is thousands of years of history to learn from, and many lifetimes could never learn all the lessons that there are. But by continually learning you can continually improve. But taking a little time to reflect on what you have learned and how it can apply to your business, your sport, your success you will be able to implement change and improve. Sounds complicated and simple at the same time. It is neither, it should be something that is done because you like it and because you understand where it can take you.

So there you have it the 14 Principles of the Toyota Way broken down Coach Kip style. I hope that you can take many of these principles and apply them to your life. I know that I will be doing so.

The last post What Happened Detroit started out as this post but I had to get a few things off my chest.

As stated in the previous article the thing that is setting the Asian companies apart from the American companies is that they have taken our system and made it better. They have been doing this for a long time starting with electronics. Remember when Sony was seen as a totally inferior and cheep alternative to anything else? Now it is one of the best and one of the most affordable in the electronics industry. There was a time when something like the iPod would have been made in the United States due to quality control, but now they are made in Taiwan, which by the way produces 80% of the worlds laptops. Now they are doing it with cars, and they have been for a while. If Toyota is not the biggest car company on the planet, it soon will be (there seems to be some debate as to whether they have over taken GM or not).

So how did Toyota do this? Look at the Toyota Way. It is a set of 14 principles that are the management and production system of the Toyota Company. It creates not only a vision of the company that everyone involved can buy into, but it creates a company philosophy. Something that Detroit has been unwilling to do since Lee Iaccoca left.

Here are at the 14 principles

1. Base management decisions on long-term philosophy even at the expense of short-term financial goals
2. Create a continuous process flow to bring problems to the surface
3. Use “pull” systems to avoid overproduction
4. Level out the workload (heijunka)
5. Build a culture of stopping to fix problems, to get quality right the first time
6. Standardized tasks and processes are the foundation for continuous improvement and employee empowerment
7. Use visual control so no problems are hidden
8. Use only reliable, thoroughly tested technology that serves your people and processes
9. Grow leaders who thoroughly understand the work, live the philosophy and teach it to others
10. Develop exceptional people and teams who follow your company’s philosophy
11. Respect your extended network of partners and suppliers by challenging them and helping them improve
12. Go an see for yourself to thoroughly understand the situation (Genchi Genbutsu)
13. Make decisions slowly by consensus, thoroughly considering all options; implement decisions rapidly (Nemawashi)
14. Become a learning organization through relentless reflection (hansei) and continuous improvement (kaizen)

Lets break these down into how these can help you as both workers, managers, and leaders. For more of an explanation of these see the Wikipedia post.  Tomorrow I will break it down Coach Kip style.

Sorry Detroit, my home state, and everyone who is patriotic. I am patriotic, but there comes a time when you have to just move on no matter how hard it is. This may be that time.

I have defended the American Auto industry for a long time. But I have recently conceded that the foreigners may have taken our great industry and made it better. It is not the fault of the Unions, it is not the fault of the Managers, it is not the fault of the CEO and corporate headquarters. It is everyone’s problem, including the consumer.

Lets talk about it in reverse, the easiest way to tell a company that you do not like what they are doing is with your money. Don’t buy their product and they will change until they find out what you want. With the auto industry this has not happened. They have done a tremendous job with their “Buy American” campaign. There is nothing wrong with being patriotic, but if you are buying a product that is consistently getting worse just because of the brand name that is the consumers problem.

Now the “Big Three” have gotten themselves in a bind. They have not changed, instead they have told us what we wanted. That has caused their product to become inferior. Sorry, I am saddened to say, but over all the inexpensive cars of Ford, Chrysler, and GM cannot compete with the inexpensive cars of Toyota, Nissan, and Hyundai. The high end cars of Ford, Chrysler, and GM cannot compete with the high end cars of BMW, Mercedes, and Lexus (which really just is a nice Toyota). The only thing that is saving them is the nice trucks that they produce, but they need to be careful. If they also become complacent with their trucks Nissan and Toyota will overtake them in this category also.

What is the other problem? Henry Ford came up with the best and most efficient model for manufacturing ever. EVER! Now the Japanese and Koreans have made it better. What have the Americans done? I am saddened again to say they have made it worse. The combination of overpaying its employees, acceptance of poor quality standards (I can’t wait to see the comments from the UAW), and the mismanagement of the company leaders has lead the American Auto Industry to where it is at.

I have a huge problem with this. The people who work for the companies, including several of my own family members, are great people. The companies have no reason to be in such pain and sorrow. How did this happen?

We live a great life here. We have a lot of great things in our garage and attics. We have beautiful homes compared to the rest of the World. We have become complacent. We have fallen into the trap of every Championship team except for the UCLA Men’s Basketball team and Lance Armstrong. Every other championship team or person has gotten complacent in their actions. Micheal Jordan the most competitive man on earth other than Lance Armstrong got so board with basketball that he quit and tried baseball. The greatest winning streak of all time…110 years in a row…25 consecutive championships in the America’s Cup Sailing Competition the Americans resorted to a multi-hulled boat challenging the rules finally giving up the title. From 1870 to 1980 Americans ruled the sailing world. Since 1995 we haven’t even made the finals. We simply got complacent.

So how do we change? Just like all great sports teams do, they retool, take a few beatings, but plan for the long run. How does Detroit do this. Reduce, resize, remodel, and reload. Take aim and fire. It can be done and we will do it, but please be patient, everyone from the government to the auto industry needs to just take a deep breath, we will get through this if we plan. If we just shoot randomly we will falter greatly.

Finally I have a new blog, but it is only about 3/4 done.  It has been a long time coming.  I just wanted to make a short post about it to encourage you to let me know how you like it and what I can do to make it look even better.

Sometime in the next two weeks look for a custom header along with some better widgets.

I am also looking for some suggetions on widgets or plugins that will integrate some of my other sites, connecting them all into a little mini web of sites.  Maybe I will call it the WWCK (World Wide Coach Kip ).

Thanks for your support.  Next will be developing online classes aimed at building you up from the inside to achieve whatever it is that you want to achieve.  Not so surprisingly it all starts from the inside and depends on what you have on the inside.

I just knew that there would be more and more companies jumping on the production based business model instead of the time based model.  It just makes more sense in the digital world.  What do I mean?

First check out this article from Business Week (http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_50/b4013001.htm) entitled Smashing the Clock.  It is about how Best Buy lets it managers and corporate employees simply get their work done and then let them have their time, instead of being forced to spend time doing “corporate time wasting”

OK back to the production business model vs. the time business model

Results Only Work Environment

This is what I like to simply call the production business model.  You get rewarded for your production.  You have tasks, goals, or a checklist of items that need to be done.  When you have satisfactorily completed them you are done.  That is it.  Game over, go home and enjoy the day (or like me go to the golf course and enjoy a round).  It is very simple.

Benefits

Reduction in Hours

This is good both for employees and employers.  I think it is obvious for employees; you get to have the rest of the day off for stress free living.  Less stress, more happiness in your job.  Get the things you want done.  For employers there is no need for your employees to stick around and soak up company resources.  Computers and office lights get turned off resulting in savings, paper and other stock items are not forced into use creating tasks that are not needed, and above all people work very efficiently.

Less Stress

This cannot be emphasized enough, and I know I mentioned it above.  Less stress levels create happy employees, happy bosses, and longer retention rates for employees.  Why is this important?  It is expensive to train new employees.  If your employees are happy and not leaving you don’t have to spend the extra money in training new employees.

Creative Environment

Creativity is the driver of all good companies.  Letting people get on with their lives opens up creativity.  People are happy with their job, they are out fishing on a Tuesday afternoon and the next thing they know they come up with a great idea that saves money, or a great way to market a new product, or maybe simply a new product all together.  The office environment is very counterproductive for creativity.

Problems

Self Motivated Employees

This does not seem to be a problem, but in reality it is very difficult to find self motivated employees.  Let’s face it; most of us work for money, not for the job.  It is a difficult mindset to change.  Finding employees who are already motivated are difficult to find, and many times difficult to hold on to as they are usually looking for the best situation all the time.

System of Responsibility

There must be in place a system of responsibility.  This is usually a completely different business model and it must be implemented before employees are put on a performance only evaluation.  Some companies are easily switched over to a responsibility system; others must have massive changes in the structure of the business and management in order for this to happen.

Technology

Although technology is used much more than most people think, many small businesses are not as technical savvy as big businesses.  Technology is the key to production based systems.  Employees will need laptops and blackberries and that costs money.  A system must be created online so that employees can login from anywhere they wish.  This also costs money and creates another thing that people need to be trained on.  But once the growing pains of technology are overcome the benefits can be huge.

That is the simple overview, and of course each business is unique in their needs, but it is possible to break free from the office and live your life in a very balanced way.

I have always loved Winnie the Pooh.  I have been trying to find time to really sit down and reread the Tao of Pooh, it has been many years since I have read it.  What is very strange though is that I ran into an old post on CopyBlogger called The Winnie the Pooh Guide to Blogging.  It is a great article about life and about improving your online skills and your blogging skills.

What I found interesting is how I almost baught the book yesterday at a used book store and then this morining an old post comes to me.  I just find it wonderful how these things come up and appear when you need them.  I guess I am going to go back to that bookstore and get that book.