theorywatch

I was sorry to hear of the untimely death at 63 of custom hot rod builder Boyd Coddington, whom I always enjoyed watching (along with his hard-charging, horseplay-prone crew of mechanics) on American Hot Rod. Now, that was a show that was basically all about KM (in both its positive and negative aspects), as Boyd’s most striking characteristics seemed to be his incredible tacit knowledge of how these cars should be built and his maddening refusal as head of his organization to foster any form of usable codified knowledge (particularly in terms of scheduling!) or learning organization culture (which seemed to be why many of his best employees eventually became so frustrated that they left to join “the competition” as represented by former Coddington employee Chip Foose)….