Lesson number 1: World class businesses finally have learned what W. Edwards Deming was preaching: if you consistently get a bad result, don't blame the people, blame the system. Governor Barnes has consistently blamed the teachers for the ills of the system. That's not the way to total quality education.

Lesson number 2: Successful businesses benchmark, that is they learn from what the best businesses are accomplishing. But benchmarking is much more than just comparing test scores. It requires identifying and comparing process measures (like amount of one-on-one tutoring per student per day), and then looking for best practices (like reducing teacher paperwork) that support best performance. The Governor is looking only at standardized test scores, and giving no consideration to process measures or best practices.

Lesson number 3: Businesses in trouble that successfully recover have one universal response--they refocus on their core business and jettison non-essential products and services. What are we doing in education that distracts from the core business, which is helping students master literacy, numeracy, science, civics, and critical thinking? Is it possible that if we eliminated instruction in political correctness, environmentalism, self-esteem, values clarification, sexuality and other non-academic issues, we could do a better job with reading, writing, and arithmetic? In less time? With fewer resources per student?

Lesson number 4: Businesses in trouble sometimes find that they must "right size." Universally, right-sizing means cutting out layers of bureaucracy and empowering the people who create value. Governor Barnes seems to believe that the way to empower teachers is to create yet more bureaucracy and more constraints in the classroom.

Lesson number 5: Successful businesses work hard to avoid out of control management-labor confrontations or an openly adversarial relationship. Governor Barnes is acting like the best friend of the union movement by driving teachers toward collective bargaining.

Lesson number 6: World class businesses don't fear competition, they relish it. Competition is what makes them improve both their products and their processes. But if there is one innovation the Governor has adamantly refused to consider, it's the competition that would result from real school choice.

The Governor has demonstrated he can talk the talk about education standards, testing, and accountability. But will he walk the walk and really "get down to business" in education?