Posts tagged process improvement

Culture, most important aspect of establishing continuous improvement

Meandering Genius Process Improvement

We talk about “culture” all the time and there is often a misconception of what culture is.  According to Gallup, 30% of the US workforce is can be considered engaged in their work.  A Continuous Improvement Culture depends on an employee based that is engaged.  Building and Sustaining and Quality Culture had over twice as many sessions as three of the other theme and focus areas at the recent ASQ Conference, which presents it as one of the most important aspects in quality today.  Continue on my journey with National Graduate School as we explore my Continuous Improvement Culture Model and discuss ways to drive this culture into your organization.

http://ngs.edu/2014/05/08/building-culture-continuous-improvement-culture-building/

Blogging Weekly with National Graduate School

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john knottsHappy Cinco de Mayo!

I am now a weekly guest blogger with National Graduate School.  Please check out my blog there.

Follow us as we explore how to build a culture of continuous improvement.

Building a culture of continuous improvement isn’t easy and can take a considerable amount of time.  However, it’s very possible and results can be felt within weeks of embarking on the journey.  Over John’s 25 plus years of experience, he’s developed a model rooted in strategy and designed to build this culture in any organization.  Join John and National Graduate School as we weekly explore this model and ways to drive this type of culture.  We look forward to your thoughts and inputs along this journey, so join us and watch for our future blogs about once a week with the tag line “CIC.”

http://ngs.edu/2014/05/01/building-culture-continuous-improvement/

First step in process improvement

Meandering Genius Process Improvement

The first step, I often see missed, in any process improvement activity is alignment of the process to the strategy.

In any process improvement, the first thing you need to do is ask yourself, “Why is this process important in the first place and how does it support the mission?”

This is often not done. People take for granted that everything you do is in support of the mission and aligned to your strategy. However, having this discussion with yourself up front might eliminate not only the need for the process improvement, but you might remove the process all together.

When I was working in Intel, they had done away with a certain type of operation…people listening into communications over a specific channel. However, during a visit, by a senior commander, to a unit, he discovered a team that was still performing that operation several years later.

People ask, “How is that possible?” Well, in large organizations, operations become very diversified and if you aren’t constantly validating your role, you might find it to become obsolete.

However, the tendency is to say, “We’ve always done it, so it’s obviously required.”

That is a severe example above, but I have seen processes where something was produced that people had always produced and other people in the process were not even aware that there was someone producing something. Every day people would come to work and produce a product in relation to a large process that spanned an organization and they would file their results as they always had. All the while, the people in charge of the process were not even aware of what was going on. Essentially, that entire process step was a waste of effort and the final product they were creating wasn’t even being looked at.

How do these things happen?

We validate process needs at the beginning of the stand-up of a process, but then the years go by and we just keep working the way we’ve always done it. Meanwhile, people change out, the process changes, and maybe the process gets automated. Suddenly the need for one of the steps goes away.

However, no one told the people performing that step in the process, because no one knows that that part of the process even exists. Unfortunately, that part of the process is still accessing the system, on the email distribution for workflow, etc. and they’re happily working away at a process that someone already made obsolete.

So, when you are in the initial phase of your process improvement whether it be Plan, Define, or something else, ensure the relevancy of the process you are looking to improve. Research that stakeholder list using the SIPOC and go talk to the people in the process to ensure your work is still aligned and valid.

To solve this problem, before it gets this far, any process that spans multiple areas, as most processes do, it is best that that process meet regularly to discuss changes and impacts, validate expectations, and ensure relevancy in the process. This is the reason that people are ‘missing the memo’ that the process has changed, because the process is so siloed that no one knows what the other hand is doing.

However, even if you are meeting with the parts of the process regularly, ensure the relevancy and alignment of your process before you go through the effort of improving it.

What’s best for who…Lean, Six Sigma, Design for Six Sigma

Meandering Genius Process Improvement

Lately this item has come up for discussion. What is the best approach to process improvement, should we teach all, how much of each should you employ?

From a practitioner’s point of view, this matters, but in reality, out on the floor, managers and workers need Common Process Sense. Recently, one of the managers I work with went through Lean Six Sigma Yellow Belt training which is much more Six Sigma than Lean. She had already taken Green Belt because that was all that was available, but that course overwhelmed her.

What she came back talking about we’re tools. That’s great, but I realized that she’s not going to be a practitioner, she needed real world ideas that she could apply immediately when she returned to her office.

I believe that true Lean has more common sense approaches, but they can be just as confusing, especially when they use odd names and such, like Huddleboards, Gemba Walks, Ohno Circle, 5S, A3, Hoshin Planning, etc. Let’s face it, true Lean requires a Rosetta Stone course to fully understand.

Long ago, the Air Force created the Air Force Quality Program. They had some very basic courses that focused on Awareness of the program, how to manage Teams and use Basic Tools. The Air Force program was around from about 1990 to 2000–about 10 years. The basic common sense training that I started with is what really got me involved. I understood it and was able to apply it every day.

These are the basic skills that people working on the front lines need to know…they need to be taught and then mentored through application.

Process Mapping. Everyone needs to know how to write down their step-by-step process so that anyone can pick it up and follow it. I’ve said it before that leaders tend to say “Map to X level,” but that’s based on a belief that process improvement practitioners are doing the mapping…no. Everyone that works in a repetitive process should have a process map that outlines every single step of the process written in narrative form and if it uses a computer, the narrative should include screen shots and file locations. If there are physical steps that need to occur, then photos of those physical activities should be included. In Lean you would call that Visual Work. No one can tell me that this is a waste of time for the person doing the work. Additionally’ no one but the people doing the work and the managers that manage the work need these process maps. You don’t need any special software to do this…you can write it down with paper and pencil or use a simple word editor.

Basic Workload Data. Now that I know exactly what I do, I can actually identify key workload data that I would like to capture. There are three things that I want to know…they never vary from process to process.

Time: What is the average time it takes to perform this process from start to finish. Every cell phone today has a stop watch, use it. Here is the very simple way that I recommend you time your process. Assign an individual that will time an individual that will perform the process. Don’t change these people until you’re done. Every day the process is performed, take three timings of the process every hour that the process is performed. Unless only one person does the process, collect timings from at least two people and a maximum of four if a lot of people perform the same process. Make sure the person timing is the same every time. This seems like a lot of work, but it really isn’t and if you don’t know the true average time it takes to do the process, you really have no idea what is happening. Add up all the timings and divide by the number of timings you have…simple average. Find someone that knows how to analyze data, preferably with Minitab, and have them analyze the data–they will provide you a great deal more information that you can use.

Volume: You need a way to collect the number of times that the process is completed. Also, you need to know by individual the number of times they performed the process if more then one person performs the process. Truly you want to know how many times the process is performed and the actual volume of the finished product that left the work center. The reason is to know how much rework occurred–in other words, they performed the process more times because of errors than the number of finished products that went out. But, for basics, you need to know how many times the process was performed or the total number of finished products from the process that went out. If you don’t know how much work you do every day, well, I really don’t know what to tell you. By combining the amount of work every day and the average time it takes to perform the process, you now know the productivity of your process. If you perform the process 1000 times in the day and it takes 1 minute to perform the process, then it takes 1000 minutes to perform that process. That’s 16.66 hours of work, which equates to just over 2 full time positions working 8 hours a day. If on Monday’s the volume doubles, then you know you need staffing that equates to about five people.

Defects: When you write down every single step in the process, you will probably run into this situation where there is an “if then” statement. If the product received is incomplete, then send it back; if the the paper printed is blank, reprint; if the expected block isn’t filled out, call so and so; etc. Normally, we just treat those things…those if thens…as part of the process. They are not. Those are “exceptions,” which are better known as defects. As you write down the steps, document these exceptions to your “clean” process and then create a way to collect the number of times that these exceptions occur. By simply looking at the totals for the various process defects over a period of time–maybe a month–you identify which ones are the most frequent. Common sense can tell you how much time each of these defects actually takes or how much impact these defects cause in your process. This gives you enough data to determine what you want to work on to improve your process. Otherwise, you might work on improving the wrong thing just because it’s easy or more glaring/visible.

Just think if everyone at the lowest level were doing this? Problems would be identified and solved at the lowest levels. Work would constantly be improved and everything would operate smoother in the work center.

Those experts in Lean and Six Sigma are there to help you analyze all this data you’ve collected around your process. They can help you build key charts to examine and analyze and they can recommend some just in time methods. If you run into a major process issue that spans multiple parts of the organization, they can develop a full blown process improvement effort and can facilitate everyone to solve the problem.

Bottom line, process improvement is simply business common sense with a fair amount of elbow grease thrown in. It’s the way you should act every day and you’ll take these basics to every job from here forward.

The proof is in the pudding

Meandering Genius

Two years ago, the organization I work for set about on a journey of developing a culture of continuous improvement…what I now have come to realize is a culture of operational excellence.

The first primary ingredient was the right leader…yes, they clearly make all the difference in the world.

Second was having the right bus, as Good to Great would tell you. Every manager and director in the organization is motivated and ready to do the right thing. Like many organizations, getting people off the bus is easier said than done, so Don’t Fire Em, Fire Em Up, right?

The journey was clear in my mind, I just didn’t know how long it would take…since we’re still on it, it takes more than two years. However, it’s like many efforts that I’ve seen in nonprofit turnarounds, once it gets going, it’s like a snowball.

This last month has been one of, “Careful what you wish for,” type activity and I think that 2014 is going to prove to be a whole year of that.

Step one: Evaluate the current situation. Non-union, manufacturing-like, heavy reliance on strategic partnerships, excessive redundancy in non-operational processes taking up leaders time, and core process that provides the most value to the overall mission not well understood or controlled.

Step two: Fix the core process–completely map (four phases), provide a full narrative, develop templates and tracking tools, establish formal governance around process, and pilot–pilot big! First pilot returned 16 FTEs worth of man hours back to the supported business for reinvestment!

Step three: Reorganize to support key process. Demonstrated to everyone the redundancy in administrative processes that were sucking up vital time of everyone and all being done differently. Leadership discussed and reorganized to deliver on key process–eliminated siloed operations and redundant processes. Result: leaders in operations were back in the shop and the important, yet administrative processes operate perfectly now for the last two years!

Step three: Engagement! As a whole, engagement is high across the company–very high. However, engagement was not as high in this organization and it was dropping. Engagement score was 4.22 out of 5. Participation in engagement survey was 70%. Developed and implemented “Engagement Program.” Didn’t focus on the score–focused on communications, development, and quality. Next year, participation was 100% and score jumped to 4.61–even with a reorganization. Gallup interviewed my boss. We are still on our engagement journey and always will be.

Step five: Build continuous improvement discipline. Looked end-to-end at the process we were part of. Took ownership of the end-to-end problems and applied a disciplined approach to solving the problems associated with the process–given five FTEs by leadership to work on it. Focused on process excellence in work centers–all managers, most directors, and some other employees Green Belt trained. Top three strategic partners established trained and certified Green and Black Belts to drive process improvement. Held monthly lunch and learns for large portion of exempt staff. Now instituting 5S and Visual Controls. Developing operational daily metrics that provide leading forecasting insight. Looking at ways to automate and improve now. Developed a recognition program that recognizes all improvements, no matter the size, equally.

Step six: Share the bigger plan. I am moving onto another project for at least three months. I laid out the 2014 plan that was in my head for my boss. Press forward with that plan and this journey will continue.

It’s exciting times!

Breaking the traditional approach to process improvement

Meandering Genius Process Improvement

Two years ago I started a journey with my new job and with my boss as his strategic business advisor. Recently I’ve been reading Start With Why; it’s one of my resolutions to read one business book a month, and I had already started this one in December. The book talks about how you need a Why and a How person to be really effective.

Well, I’ve been the How guy to his Why for the past two years. See, he was looking for organizational effectiveness and he was used to the normal approach to hire someone to provide it through process improvement. The thing is there never is enough of one person to go around, so you end up prioritizing your process prove kent to a point where it’s not effective.

Breaking that approach, we instead focused on building process improvement skills in the employees starting with his leadership. Now we’re driving those skills deeper to the employees.

We’ve done many things like reorganize to match the process, create the key process on how we do work, focus on employee engagement daily, work on constant development, and reinforce the culture.

In two years, the effort has been very successful and I think the model is exactly what organizations need over large process improvement teams “doing process improvement” and prioritizing projects.

High Performing Organizations

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I’ve been working in some way or fashion in the field of quality consulting since about 1990 when I attended one of my first Total Quality Management courses at Carswell AFB in Ft Worth TX. Since then I have worked in the areas of strategic planning, strategic communication, performance management, process management, human capital planning, resource management, and education and training. I’ve been in the lowest tactical to the highest CEO positions of military, non-profits, and companies and seen many things both doing and consulting in these areas.

So what?

Over the last several years I’ve been really thinking about what makes companies successful. My upcoming book, Overcoming Organizational Myopia is based on a lot of that thought. What I see too much of is organizations looking for that silver bullet. I was in a recent meeting, where a leader said he was looking for that one single metric that when tugged upon it unravelled everything else going on in the organization. My answer would be really simple, that doesn’t exist. Being a top performing (you fill in the blank) takes a lot of work and it’s constant work.

The group I work for now has been extremely successful over the last two years. My boss is even going to be interviewed by Gallup because of their employee engagement success in their last UCount survey. One of the managers in the team commented that now we have to sustain it. My response was, no, now we have to make it better next year. In today’s day and age, sustaining is the death of a company. You have to get better. When I started with them in January of 2012, they had just won The Keepers of Quality award for their major organization. That was great, but there was a lot more they could do. This month, we share part of our two-year continuous improvement story with that sMe audience to discuss how we are building and encouraging an environment of continuous improvement–quality.

What is all this mean?

High performing organizations don’t just “happen.” It takes. Lot of hard work and it’s a constant journey. If you read business books like I do, you probably heard many ways to become that high performing organization. They tell you what it is, they tell you what you should do, and they tell you why. They fill your head with fantastic stores of Apple and Dell, turn arounds like IBM and Harley Davidson, etc. trust me, I have read them all–well a lot of them. The thing they don’t tell you is HOW.

Funny, there are so many How To and Self Help books on the shelf, but none give away the secrets to becoming a great organization. How To books sell too–my speech writing instructor and mentor, Joan Detz taught me that in 2005.

So, how does an organization really improve? That’s the thoughts that have been on my mind of late. My soon to be released book focuses on part of the story, overcoming the “silo effect” that plagues every business in the world. You know what I’m talking about…sand boxes, camps, teams…the way we organize and the way we group as human beings lead us to form silos–we become myopic in business. They problem is that it will ALWAYS happen–you can’t avoid it. Leaders and managers alike might recognize it and try to break it down, but it happens to all of us. Overcoming Organizational Myopia is a true how to book focused on the nine things that suffer in siloed organizations and how to overcome it–not solve it, but to overcome it.

But the key, I think is the “Golden Egg,” as James Farhat would say. That is how does any organization that wants to be high performing make it happen? If they were a car, how do they get their engine firing on all cylinders? That is my journey this year. My effort in 2014 is to not only define it, but to lay out the roadmap and provide holistic training to all, at whatever level they are at, to help them become better and grow.

A guy I worked with in Booz Allen used to comment about how the different teams in our office would fight over the pieces of the “pie.” He was talking about this perceived limited amount of money that was available to all of Booz Allen that we would fight to get a piece of. He believed that believing that the pie was a certain size was limiting our ability to go for more and this we had to take more of someone else’s pie to grow our own silo–back to the myopia view again.

In America today, I think many business look at the perceived pie and think they have to take from others to get a bigger share. That leads us to disruptive innovation, aggressive marketing, and like tactics to win over the market share pie. What if I told you that the pie doesn’t exist. The better you are as a high performing organization, the more people will buy your whatever? I believe that doing good work gets more work–it’s not about pies, but about becoming the best at what you do. This is true both of an organization and as an individual.

So, I leave you with these thoughts on this Tuesday morning. Myopia, pies, and high performing organizations. Let me know what you think. Tell me it can’t be done…that I don’t know what I’m talking about. I look forward to the debate.

For those interested, what does a high performing organization mean to you?