by The HLH Team
For processes to actually improve in your organization over the long-term, people need to believe that there is a reason why change needs to occur and why it needs to occur now. There must be an informed consent – not a mad rush or a docile acquiescence – that drives action across hierarchies, departments, and projects. And you can structure an environment to help create that consent. Start change by considering these 7 ways to help increase urgency in your organization:*
#1: Focus on financial losses
Trust us: People get interested when they see numbers turning red. If your organization has areas that are losing profitability, share that information with employees in a way that they will be able to understand it. They need to see how those losses have the potential to impact them personally and how they personally have the ability to impact those losses. By tying the relationship between losses and people together in a direct way, the simplicity of process improvement becomes an easy “yes.”
#2: Initiate Kaizen Events to identify inefficiencies
If Kaizen Events are new to you, all they are is a tool that gathers employees, managers, and owners of a process in one place to map existing processes and collectively determine ways to improve on that process. They can extend over a couple of hours or over weeks depending on the level of organization need, and there are several checklists available to help you run a successful Kaizen Event (try HERE and HERE).
#3: Identify unpopular programs or processes
People are often intrinsically motivated to change what’s “bugging” them about their workplace. By providing time and space to discuss what isn’t working in the organization, employees can often identify and solve problems that are detrimental to company health.
#4: Increase or decrease membership in the organization
Whether from mass recruitment, layoffs, loss of customer accounts, or bringing in new clients, any time organizations experience a substantial enough shift in stakeholder numbers, people recognize the accompanying change as an inevitability and are more open to process improvement as part of that change process.
#5: Hold employees accountable for their actions
People will do what’s working for them (or what they think is working for them). If your employees aren’t actively working to improve processes and nothing is said or done, that’s a problem. Further, if they’re actively working on process improvement and nothing is said or done, that’s a bigger problem. By holding people accountable and rewarding desired behaviour, you set a clear precedent about what is expected in your organization – what will be tolerated and what won’t.
#6: Restructure leadership
Shaking up management structures across the company sends a clear message to those in charge that the status quo will not continue and invites an opportunity for employees to re-evaluate their contributions to their departments or to the organization as a whole. New objectives and targets can be set that can help accelerate process improvements across the board.
#7: Bombard people with aspirations for the future
Martin Luther King’s “I Have A Dream” speech is a great example of this. In giving people a clear picture of what could be, he helped motivate commitment to an ideal that had not yet materialized. You can do the same for your staff. Help them see so clearly what your company can become and, more importantly, why achieving that ideal matters beyond a financial logic, and you can create an urgency for change that did not exist previously.
By giving people the information and experiences they need to understand and appreciate why the change needs to occur – the sense of urgency behind process improvement – you create the kind of informed consent that can internally motivate and sustain long-term change in your organization.
“There are only two ways to influence human behavior: you can manipulate it or you can inspire it…People don’t buy WHAT you do, they buy WHY you do it.”
– Simon Sinek
* Suggestions adapted from: Bowhay, Vincent & McCracken, Edie (Mar 2017). Leading Change: Helping Transformational Efforts Succeed. Campus Activities Programming, Vol. 49 Issue: 7, 4-5. ISSN 0746-2328
by The HLH Team
Ever argued with someone about the best way to make it to a destination on time? It’s common: two people in a car each insisting that their way is the best way to go. They each have their reasons, and chances are good that either would get them to their destination in good time.
It’s the same for organizations who turn toward process improvement. The way you implement Lean and the way I implement Lean may look different. And there’s power in that.
Understanding how different change processes look can help you decide what method best supports process improvement in your company. There are 4 paths toward process improvement:
Path #1: Radical Change
Radical change is about fundamentally changing the way your organization operates. It’s breaking away from a template and starting fresh. These changes are usually driven by a catalyst such as a new CEO or a change in the external market. They are fast-paced and big-scope, both high risk and high return. Investing in a workspace with LEAN infrastructure could be a radical change for your organization. Job redesigns, department reorganizations, or management restructuring could constitute radical process improvement changes.
Path #2: Convergent Change
When something converges, it means it comes closer together. It becomes more unified and aligned. Convergent change is about keeping the same organizational template you have and improving on what’s already there.
In process improvement, convergent change is useful when LEAN practices have already been adopted. It’s for those working on fine-tuning and streamlining what they already do well. These changes are subtle, valuable, and easy to maintain because the foundational work is already done. Convergent change happens best when LEAN is already part of an organization’s culture.
Path #3: Planned Change
As the label suggests, planned change is deliberate. It’s about moving the organization from one state to another. Investing in a new workspace with LEAN infrastructure could be a planned change for your organization, rather than a radical one. Well-planned changes tend to run smoother, last longer, and provide more meaningful learning than do other forms. In the context of process improvement, their results can be concretely measured to drive greater efficiency.
Path #4: Emergent Change
Emergent change relies on experimentation and adaptation to create process improvement. It provides venues for knowledge to be filtered through the organization, built upon, and then re-built. The goal is to work on constant progress until improvement is no longer possible. Emergent change is difficult to measure. Its effects may be readily apparent but must be actively championed to get the most from its progress. This change path can be incredibly valuable in organizations with cultures focused on innovation.
You’ll probably need to use all of these paths at some point. Your knowledge about your people, organization, and process improvement journey will help you decide on the most effective path for you.
“We have to continually be jumping off cliffs
and developing our wings on the way down.”
― Kurt Vonnegut
* Change paths loosely adapted from Barbara Senior and Stephen Swailes’ Organizational Change. 4th ed. Harlow, Essex, England: Financial Times Prentice Hall/Pearson, 2010.
by The HLH Team
“Lean is a way of thinking, not a list of things to do.”
-Shigeo Shingo
Working on a big project can waste resources in so many ways. Endless email chains, departments that don’t know how to work with each other, and a general inability to focus on a project over and above the daily whirlwind all cost us dearly.
Toyota’s Answer:
Developing a new car isn’t easy. In fact, it’s one of the most complex tasks a car company undertakes and can be a project-management nightmare of manufacturing, engineering, and safety issues. It’s a process that takes most car companies 36 months; Toyota does it in 20.
A pioneering champion of Lean, Toyota employs Obeya as one of the pillars of its production system. It’s a simple project-management method that saves time and money by adding one crucial element: dedicated space.
Room for Collaboration:
In Japanese, Obeya translates to “large room” or “war room.” It’s exactly that. An Obeya is a room dedicated to a project. It’s where important meetings happen, progress is posted, and all key decisions are made.
If you’re a Star Trek fan, think of it as the bridge. If you like military history, it’s your war room. Toyota calls in their brain, the center of the nervous system that is the Toyota Production System. It’s a space dedicated to focused communication about the project: information pours in, gets synthesized and digested, and then decisions are made and priorities selected from there.
Project over Silos:
Companies specialize in different things. Whether you want them to or not, silos emerge around those specialities so that each department can function at its best.
Silos function well when each is designed to contribute autonomously from the others. But when a project emerges that requires them to work together towards a common goal, the system can easily break down. Departmental priorities conflict with the project’s priorities and inefficiency runs rampant.
In the Obeya, the project rules. Silo politics are checked at the door, and in that space every stakeholder contributes their expertise to the overarching goal. It’s a simple, elegant, and difficult goal.
The Power of Visuals:
Visual aids like Kanban boards play a key role in Lean. When walking into the Obeya, you’ll get an instant idea, via the graphs and boards around you, of where the project is at. Plaster your walls with everything that shows your team what’s happening.
Obeyas eliminate the need for constant email updates, or hunting for status updates, or trying to get hold of other departments to find out where they’re at. Hours of time-waste get eliminated by making it visual for all.
Emerging Trend:
Obeyas have started to catch on, with big companies like Nike now employing it successfully. Business blogs and pinterest boards are full of ideas on how to assemble agendas and build visual walls to create the perfect collaborative space.
The kind of non-siloed communication fostered in an Obeya can be the gateway and driving force to implementing Process Improvement across your business. Keep it collaborative, set the silos and egos aside, and your Obeya can be what you need to get high-level buy-in for your Lean ambitions.
by The HLH Team
“The essense of the Kaizen strategy is that not a day should go by without some kind of improvement being made somewhere in the company.”
-Masaaki Imai
The majority of business leaders who try to embrace Lean will fail. They won’t fail because they aren’t motivated or committed, but because they weren’t able to change the culture of the workplace.
Process Improvement can’t come from the corner office, and it can’t be driven via email. It needs to percolate into how your team thinks and feels about their daily routines. That culture is a unique combination of philosophy and action called Kaizen.
What is Kaizen:
Kaizen is Japanese for “change for the better.” As a Lean tool, it focuses on creating a workplace culture wherein everyone, from Janitor to CEO, is empowered to think about small changes that they can make to eliminate waste and simplify overly complex processes.
It’s not about big changes. It’s about making sure everyone knows where the stapler is (and puts it back after). It’s about re-delegating so that a file passes across one less desk on its way to being finalized. It’s about changes so small you wouldn’t notice them, until they accumulate and become real profitability.
Philosophy from Action:
There are 2 elements to Kaizen – the goal oriented actions and the culture-building philosophy. You can’t implement a cultural shift, but you can get everyone involved in its daily actions. Those actions, over time, build the culture.
Kaizen isn’t abstract theory. It’s an apparatus of actions, each designed to make one small change. Here’s what a specific Kaizen action looks like:
- Set a goal to make a small improvement in one department
- Bring in people familiar with that department’s processes and access what improvement can be made
- Implement the improvements
- Review anything that’s working with the change
- Have a plan to make sure the improvement is long term sustainable
Repeat this action, department after department. Give ownership to the departmental team for identifying and fixing, and provide them them the resources to do it.
Don’t go for the giant complex changes. Improve slowly, step by step. 50 small improvements, made consistently over time, will make a larger cultural change than 5 big ones.
The actions will build the culture. People will start to look for improvements in their departments, and as the improvements accumulate and they start seeing real progress they’ll feel proud of what they’ve done. With that pride, they’ll want more, and that is the heart of the cultural shift you need.
The Power of a Collective:
It’s impossible for you, as leader, to identify, eliminate and protect against the waste that’s engrained into everyday processes across your company. It won’t work unless everyone has bought in, and a culture of Kaizen, developed from the actions you’re taking, becomes the true driving force.
The key to building the culture is consistency of action. If it’s sporadic, exhausting, forced, or half-ass, it won’t build culture. But once a culture of Kaizen has taken hold in your business, every team member will come to you with ideas to improve.
Further Reading (our first introduction to Kaizen): 3 Qualities of A Leader
by The HLH Team
“The most dangerous kind of waste is the waste we do not recognize.”
-Shigeo Shingo
Lean applies to every industry, not just manufacturing. Working in an office doesn’t mean you aren’t probably surrounded by waste.
In the last article (Waste In The Office Part 1) I introduced how 4 of the 8 deadly wastes reared their heads in office spaces. Let’s look at the other 4.
Bottom line: just because you’re in an office, don’t be fooled. You’re surrounded by waste. Let’s talk about how:
Motion:
How many times do you walk to the printer every day? When was the last time the stapler was where you left it? In an office, wasted motion is counted in steps. Whether it’s to the coffee maker or the mail slot, the less people are milling around an office space the better the productivity tends to be.
If you want to get a feel for how much motion you waste, make a Spaghetti Chart. Every journey becomes a line and it repeats all day. At day’s end, how many trips have you made where?
Waiting:
On an assembly line, we measure waiting in the seconds a worker spends idle until the next widget arrives. In an office, it’s subtler but essentially the same thing.
When a file or email goes up the chain for approval, how long before it’s sent back? Does the boss clear the logjam as it builds or wait until people’s jobs are put on hold before signing off to get them moving again.
If you’re the boss, think about how many things you’re needed to sign off on. Can you reduce this number, delegating more decision making to the team you trust? Having to sign-off fewer items will not only cut waiting waste, it will reduce the steps involved in your process considerably.
Overprocessing:
Your clients hired you to do a, b, and c. Whether a contract or a handshake, they expect a certain level of service. It’s your job to deliver the a, b, and c. Your customer isn’t expecting “d”. If you deliver it, it will cost you real money and you’ll get little in return. That’s waste.
The ironic thing is that when we “go the extra mile,” our clients often don’t even notice. You wouldn’t give a grocery cashier more than the bill requires, so don’t do more than your contract requires. It will strengthen your firm in the long run by giving you the flexibility of a better bottom line.
Overproduction:
Overproduction waste happens when you produce too much, too quickly. It’s counterintuitive, but having more work done than is needed is actually more wasteful than doing it on time.
Every office has processes that move at a certain pace. When we do our work faster than those processes, it piles up waiting for the next step. This can lead to broken momentum and cost more time overall.
