Here are our upcoming public training courses for February:
February 16 – Statistical Process Control – Knowledge Park at Penn State Erie, Erie, PA
February 22 – Root Cause Analysis – B3C at Linden Pointe, Hermitage, PA
Also, we will be holding a public Lean Six Sigma Green Belt course in Pittsburgh. Week #1 March 26 – 30, Week #2 April 30 – May 4.
Click on the links for more information or to register.
Operations Strategy Consulting, in partnership with the Northwest Industrial Resource Center, is holding several public offering courses in December. For more information or to register, please contact JoAnn.
December 1: Root Cause Analysis – Penn State Behrend’s Knowledge Park, Erie, PA
December 8: Failure Modes & Effects Analysis (FMEA) – Penn State Behrend’s Knowledge Park, Erie, PA
December 9: Root Cause Analysis – B3C at LindenPointe, Hermitage, PA
December 14: Statistical Process Control – Penn State Behrend’s Knowledge Park, Erie, PA
Lean, Six Sigma, TQM, TPS, Agile and ISO are just a few of the initiatives companies embark upon to improve their performance and reduce costs. Unfortunately, many of these companies fail to achieve all the benefits from their efforts.
The reason most improvement efforts fail is not because the company chose the wrong program or initiative, they just got tripped up in the execution. Here are the eight most common mistakes I have seen companies make with their improvement programs and how to avoid them.
1. Flavor of the Month: In an effort to be on top of the latest and greatest, you launch three different continuous improvement programs in eight years. Employees fail to take the newest initiative seriously, because they know it will change in a couple years. The best way to avoid this mistake is to pick a program and stick with it – don’t chase the trends. Consistency is key with change programs.
2. Focus on Everything: Once you have a continuous program in place, it’s important to link those efforts to the business’ strategy. Prioritize those efforts, you can’t have 78 key strategic initiatives. Your continuous improvement efforts will be much more successful if the company prioritizes its initiatives and goals and you focus on just the top two or three.
3. Project Cure Cancer:A common mistake I see is defining the initial project scope too broadly. The project owner and team quickly become mired in all the processes and data and are overwhelmed. As a result, the project either stalls or dies and the underlying problems are never resolved. When scoping a project, focus on narrowing down the project scope to something that can be completed in four months.
4. Project Scope Creep: Closely related to poor project scope is project scope creep. What may begin as an innocent-sounding request to modify a project can spell doom to your company’s improvement initiative. By expanding the project’s scope, you add time and rework to the project, eventually, the project may never be finished – frustrating all involved. To avoid this, establish a formal sign-off of the project scope by the project owner and the champion.
5. “The Problem is We Don’t Have A Database.”: Frequently when a manager or executive wants to fix a problem, they define the problem by what they perceive the solution to be. This is natural to them, because they are paid to solve problems. The mistake is the project then addressed just the symptoms and not the root cause of the problem. You need to define the problem based on how it is manifesting itself, not the perceived cause or solution.
6. Not Committing Resources:All too often, I’ve seen managers assign people to projects aimed at solving major problems, then pull those people off the project to do firefighting! Just commit the resources to the improvement efforts and don’t give in ot the temptation to pull them back off the project to to the urgent.
7. Committing Poor Performers: The corollary to not committing resources is committing the wrong resources. If you can assign those who can be spared, are you really assigning the people who can make a difference? By assigning your high performers and those with authority or influence, your improvement efforts will have a greater effect than just committing resources that can be spared.
8. Lack of CEO and Leadership Commitment:This is the number one reason why continuous improvement efforts fail. If your company’s CEO and executive leadership are not committed to your improvement program, it will never succeed. Support is notsufficient – support is often just lip-service. The CEO needs to hold the executive team accountable for improvement efforts and results, be involved in project reviews and progress, and be trained himself. Similarly, the executive team must hold their own staffs accountable for the improvement efforts and results.
By avoiding these pitfalls, your company will see greater results quicker than your competition who fall into these traps.
I’m starting to get tired of listening to people talk about efficiency. That may sound strange for someone in my position, but hear me out on this. We read things all the time about how to be more efficient. People talk about being more cost-efficient, more efficient with their time, and tracking employee efficiency. Merriam-Webster defines efficient as productive without waste. In other words: doing things the right way.
But, I think we’re missing the other half of the equation. I can be very efficient at, say, photocopying documents and filing them in filing cabinets. But that is not the best way to make the information on those documents more organized and accessible. In addition to being efficient, we also need to be looking at effectiveness. Merriam-Webster defines effective as producing a decided, decisive, or desired effect. In other words: doing the right things. Back to my earlier example, if I want to make the information more organized and accessible, a more effective approach may be to scan the documents into a searchable database. Another option is to change the process so the information is entered electronically the first time instead of generating paper documents.
Too often, businesses are looking at “how do I take waste out of the process” and forget to ask “Is this the best process to achieve the desired output.” When you consider that everything we do is a process, from brushing your teeth, to writing a blog, to manufacturing a locomotive, the question becomes what is the desired output of that process. Why are we performing this process? What do we hope to accomplish by following this process? By doing this, you may discover that some processes can or should be eliminated.
After you’ve identified what the desired output is, then you need to decide: what is the best way to achieve that output? Guess what? It may not be the way you’ve been doing it. Sometimes, we can just optimize the existing process, but don’t be surprised if you need to create an entirely new process. Look at others within your industry and see how they are doing things. Then look at other industries that excel at that particular area. Whatever you learn from others, remember you cannot just copy the process. Each company has its own culture and a process that works in one will not produce the exact same results in another company. So learn from others, but be able to adapt.
Once you’ve identified the most effective process, make sure it is as efficient as possible. Look for any rework, complexity, or repetition and eliminate and simplify the process.
Now, test out your process. Did it work as you had planned or envisioned? Do you need to make any tweaks or adjustments? Once you have an efficient and effective process, you can implement it.
With that success under your belt, go out and tackle another part of your business so you can be just as effective as your new process!
It doesn’t matter what you call it: Quality, Reengineering, TQM, Operational Excellence, Kaizen, Lean, Six Sigma, or Agile – the entire process is worthless as most companies are approaching it today.
Quality, in many instances, has become just a word – and a rather empty word at that. It’s a term companies throw about and promote to customers. Initiatives are begun and eventually die off. Meetings are held espousing the fabulous gains that will be realized from the latest continuous improvement program.
On the other hand, some companies are too worried about their sales to even look at, let alone focus on, continuous improvement or quality programs. They are out there selling their services and products to customers and dropping their prices to win the oh-so-needed business.
Neither organization has got it right. Continuous improvement for its own sake is a complete waste of time, money and resources. Yet, ignoring an organization’s operational processes is surely a quick way to put a company out of business.
So what should you do?
First, realize that business is about people. The people that work for you, that buy products or services from you, and that provide materials and information to you. Business don’t do business with each other, people do. Even large corporations have people in them determining which vendors to use, who to hire, and how to sell their products and services.
Second, your processes determine your success. Every time you interact with someone, your business processes affect the experience they have with your company. From placing an order, developing specs, processing an invoice, or calling customer service, your operational processes can make people love or hate doing business with you. (For more on this see Ted Coine’s post Apathy: The Kiss of Death)
Third, determine how you can use the many tools and methodologies out there to transform your company into a great company. Don’t focus on “how do I cut costs?” think about “How can I make it easier for people to do their jobs?” If it’s easier, there’s less rework. “How can I free up my people?” If it takes them less time to complete a task, they have more time to innovate, to come up with new ideas and ways to serve customers. This is what will give you a competitive edge: engaged, passionate employees who care about the customer.
Finally, find someone who has already done this. It could be another business owner, consultant, coach, mentor, or leader, but find someone. This transformation is not easy, it’s hard work, it takes time, and it helps to have someone walking along side you encouraging/prodding you and keeping you accountable.
