In the last year, there are few companies who’ve not had to react in some way to the recent turbulent economic events.  In fact, many still are operating from their heels.  Perhaps your organization is still in a reactionary mode.

At what point do you and your employees realize it’s time to look for different ways of doing the work — and getting back into a proactive stance?  Maybe the time is now to start implementing a Continuous Improvement (CI) initiative to help your people get back on their toes again.

Other than the obvious financial reasons to implement such a program (e.g., cost savings — by doing more with less) there are a few other factors to consider.  1st – awareness will never be higher among your employees for why change is needed.  Today employees are thankful to still have a job; they’re also looking for new ideas and resources to do their jobs more effectively and efficiently.

2nd – the economic crisis is providing the prefect motivation for all parts of the company to work together towards a common goal.

3rd – everyone in the organization is aware of the need to add value to your customer to ensure that the customer continues to do business with your company.   Whatever the reason, based on my experience implementing improvement initiatives (both as a business owner and as a consultant) — there is no better time than right now.

So, where do you start?

Assess – you must start to see how your organization adds value to the customer and where the waste exists.  We’re not used to thinking this way – we do our jobs everyday and don’t always think about the little things that can add up quickly.  Assess which functional areas are most critical at the moment – those that can add the most value to the customer or that are your biggest risks.

Train — provide tools, resources and training to all your employees.  That may simply be accomplished by providing articles and blogs like this.  Or you may choose to utilize outside resources such as consultants or facilitators.  Whichever way you go – your employees will need to gain knowledge that effectively implements changes in your company.

Plan – Next, plan out your CI initiative.  Start with small improvements that will help to get your people up to speed.  If the improvement seems too big to bite off at one time, then break it down into smaller pieces.  Also, start with a smaller group of talented people who come from diverse parts of the business rather than with bigger groups.  In my experience, trying to implement CI programs company-wide is a recipe for disaster.  Once the initial group gains experience and confidence, then expand the size and number of CI teams.

Implement – This is where you try a lot of different things.  Just like anything else – it takes failing to find success.  As someone once told me — fail fast because that means you’re close to success.  Also, be sure to to identify the specific targeted improvement metrics (e.g., 30% reduction/improvement) you would like to get.  If you don’t put a number down, then it’ll be difficult to gauge your success level with the improvement initiative once it’s completed.

Validate – Verify your results.  Did you gain the improvement you expected?  If not, why?  Don’t give up on the work even if you’ve gained some benefit but not your target.   There’s always room for more – so don’t stop until you find the additional corrective measures that get you to your goal.

Standardize – Once you’re satisfied with your improvements, then memorialize them and make them your new standard.  This includes building in systems to verify that all employees are trained on the new standard and that you take the time to spot check each other’s work.  Improvements are difficult means to create new habits, so building systems into your CI program will help new improvements stick over time.  Don’t let the old ways of doing the work creep back into your organization.

The bottom line is this: there is no end point.  CI programs are iterative processes of assessing, training, planning, implementing, validating, standardizing your activities.   Now is the perfect time.  Start making improvements now – you’ll be impressed with how much opportunity exists inside your businesses today.

It always seemed that change never happens as quickly as we would like.  In fact, I would say that most of the people I know or associate with are all people I would consider to be open to change.  Yet, I would also say they struggle with how slowly change actually happens.  Does this mean we all, in fact, are not open to change?

Here are a few things I’ve learned over the years about change – specifically in the context of organizational change:

• Change is slow and tends to be frustrating for most people involved.
• It’s often hard to tell how “change” is going.
• There seems to always be more people against change than are for it.
• Factions in the organization try to kill change before it takes hold.
• Feedback frequently comes from why “change” won’t work.
• It always feels like the change is failing right up to the point when it starts to take hold.

I would imagine that this list seems quite familiar to many of you.  So, what?  Maybe these ideas will help everyone embrace change:

• It’s the journey not the destination that counts.  There will always be opportunities for change.
• We all are responsible for making improvements.
• Before coming up with solutions try asking “why” five or more times.  You are likely to be surprised as to what the root cause actually might be.
• Encourage involvement from everyone when brainstorming solutions.
• Don’t waste time explaining why an improvement won’t work.
• Focus on improving existing processes without “buying” solutions (if we just had this software, this tool, this…).
• Don’t waste time trying to implement “prefect” solutions, just make incremental improvements.
• Think immediate implementation – if it will take a year to implement it’s less likely to happen.

Now more than ever our orgainzations are in need of change.  In many cases it’s a matter of survival.  Share these ideas with the people you work with and start making improvements today.

Over the years, I’ve discovered that what makes LEAN so illusive isn’t that it’s a complex idea, but that it’s a simple idea that happens to be hard to implement.

LEAN – the name commonly used to describe the Toyota Production System -  is the systematic removal of waste from any system on a constant and never ending basis.   When I first started to study the Toyota philosophy, I struggled to see where I could find the kind of improvements that would generate the kinds of results I had read about.  That’s where I went wrong.  LEAN is about creating a rhythm where everyone in the organization is trained to see the small things.  Small things, when observed alone, seem insignificant – but when compounded over time and across many people — small things add up fast.

Here’s a a perfect “real world” example:

In my last company, we operated call centers where we conducted primary research studies for organizations.  On any given shift, an agent would work on an average of 3 different projects.  Because of how the software was originally developed, in order to change to another project, an agent would need to alert a floor supervisor to be “moved” to the next program.   This required the agent to get up and walk to the end of the floor to alert the supervisor.   For 12 years this was “standard procedure.”  No one ever stopped to think about what the cumulative “cost” of having the agent get up and request a change actually was.

When we started our LEAN journey, we began to look for small things that were simple to correct.  We started to measure everything we could.  Eventually someone decided to measure the average time it took an agent to “change” projects.   It was an average of 1.2 minutes.  Not all that significant, right?  But when seen in the context of the entire organization and over the entire year, the numbers began to add up very fast.

Average # of Agents per Day – 250

Average # of Study Changes – 3

Number of Working Days per Year – 350

Average Time per Study Change – 1.2 min

Average Cost per Agent ($11.20 loaded) – $0.1867/min

Total Cost to Change Studies each Year = 250 X 3 X 350 X 1.2 X $0.1867 = $58,810.50

The solution was simple.  We made cardboard “signals” that agents would raise when ready to change studies.  These “signals” alerted the floor supervisor, who then changed them over on the system.   In 24 hours, we were able to reduce the average change over time from 1.2 minutes to just .23 minutes.   That simple solution resulted in a net savings of $47,538 a year.  It only cost us a few dollars in card stock and a 15 minute training for every employee.

LEAN is not about BIG improvements.  LEAN is about seeing the business in a different way and constantly making small changes that overtime create significant savings for the business.   Now more than ever, we all should be thinking LEAN.

Example #1 – Makin’ Bac’n

How do you take something as simple as bacon and turn it into a business? I’d like you to meet Scott Kventon – the biggest fan of bacon I’ve ever met.  This week, Scott shared his story of the fast track start to his first business that went from concept to revenue in less than two months.  It’s the epitome of what a small group of passionate entrepreneurs can accomplish.

Scott’s the founder and inspiration behind the coolest site about bacon I’ve ever seen… http://bacn.com/.  In fact, it’s the first website about bacon I’ve ever seen.  Scott’s passion for the pig, coupled with his knowledge and endless energy, have resulted in a sustainable business that started from his garage.

So, what did I learn?  First, I learned more than I could have hoped about bacon.  He had me at “hello,” as I’ve been a fan of the pig for quite some time now.  More importantly, what I learned was that if you’re not passionate about what you’re doing, you’d better watch out because there will be someone who is — and it’s likely they will kick your ass.

The next generation of entrepreneurs is a unique group of individuals.  They talk fast, they think fast, and they ACT fast!  On top of it all, they’re having fun.  If you can’t see this from BACN.COM, then you should unsubscribe from this blog and never come here again.  If it’s as clear as the nose on your face, then you get it.

Example #2 – Energizer Bunny

Take an empty office building, add a dose of brilliance — and you have NedSpace.  Josh Friedman and his partners are onto something big.

NedSpace is a new concept to me — providing rented desk space for young start-ups on the cheap.  The thing makes this such a value is not the $175/month desk but the ENERGY that you feel by being around other driven entrepreneurs.  By renting offices and desks to serial entrepreneurs, they provide an atmosphere that can’t be replicated by working from home.   NedSpace is a great concept which takes advantage of the glut of office space that’s out there, while creating a great environment for start-ups to work and collaborate.  My only question is — why don’t I have my office here?  Nicely done, Josh!

What does your employee feedback program look like?  Do you have one of these boxes in your office?  How do you gauge the mood of the employees in your organization?  Do you know what’s getting in the way of your people’s performance?  How do you know?   Let’s start over – why should you care? 

First, I’ll start with why some  employee feedback programs don’t work:

• Feedback systems are black boxes.  Ideas and suggestions either never get seen or fall on deaf ears.    If you aren’t willing to take action, then DON’T ASK FOR SUGGESTIONS.
• Feedback isn’t timely.  If the system is designed to gather information, but it’s not noticed or acted on immediately, then the problem either already did its damage or has grown into a bigger problem. 
• Suggestions are poorly defined.  Too often, employee feedback systems are only used to vent personal issues about peers, managers and customers and don’t identify the core operation or process that is broken.  
• Lack of accountability.  Most systems don’t provide any feedback loops to ensure corrective measures are identified, implemented and standardized.
• Feedback is ad hoc, not systematic.  If you don’t make it a priority everyday, or every week – then feedback systems won’t stick long-term.

If you’re still unsure as to the benefit of good feedback systems – then perhaps you can read a bit more about world-class organizations that implement feedback systems that produce results (Thanks, Verne!).  

Now the good news.  This doesn’t have to be rocket science – here are  a few tips to get you started:

• Make it a habit.
• Keep it anonymous.
• Make it about what, not about who.
• Good systems ask for feedback on corrective measures that will work; good systems are not just looking for complaints.
• Don’t shoot the messenger – if you aren’t ready to hear the brutal facts, then go to another website.
• Make sure the issues are visible so EVERYONE can weigh-in on what issues need addressing first.
• Never, ever stop!  It’s continuous improvement.
• Offer rewards when improvements save the company time, energy and money.  It only works if everyone has a stake in the outcome.
• When you listen – don’t defend but keep an open ear and mind to what your people have to say.

Today more than ever we all need to work together to identify and solve the issues that are holding our performance back.   Employees and owners can no longer look to the other for the answers - we need to work together to make our organizations and ourselves stronger, better and more effective.

Hill wrote this in 1937 – Think and Grow Rich.   As much as we may want to believe that we’ve made progress as a society I can’t help but think we really haven’t.  We seem to be struggling with the same problems, and if we really believe that using the same solutions will result in different outcomes, we’re just kidding ourselves.  Maybe it’s time to use a different approach.  Maybe it’s time to use a different model. 

Teamwork is when someone must subordinate personal aspirations and the leader wins.

Teamwork is a joint action by 2 or more persons or a group, in which each subordinates his or her individual interests and opinions to the unity and efficiency of the group.  This does not mean that the individual is no longer important; however, it does mean that effective and efficient teamwork goes beyond individual accomplishments.  The most effective teamwork is produced when all the individuals involved harmonize their contributions and work towards a common goal.  In order for teamwork to succeed, one must be a team-player.  A team-player is one who subordinates personal aspirations and works in a coordinated effort with other members of a group, or a team, to strive for a common goal.   Businesses and other organizations often go to the effort of coordinating team building events in an attempt to get people to work as a team rather than as individuals.

Collaboration – there are no leaders.  Everyone wins.

Collaboration is a recursive process where two or more people or organizations work together toward an intersection of common goals — e.g., sharing knowledge, learning, and building consensus is an intellectual endeavor that is creative in nature.  Collaboration does not require leadership, and can sometimes bring better results through decentralization and egalitarism. 

This is an image of a structure that was used to create a philanthropic organization based on the idea of collaboration.  Project Red Dot (www.projectreddot.org) was established in 2008 as a way for individuals to work towards a common goal – in this case, to help people in Ghana, Africa connect to the world.  It has produced incredible results while using a minimal amount of resources because the model is based on collaboration.

I’ve recently reconnected with Doug Mendel and I’m attempting to set up a similar structure to help his orgainzation (www.dougmendel.com).  By combining the right combination of talented, motivated and resourceful people, a tremendous amount of progress can be made while using little or no resources.  In the case of Project Red Dot, they’ve been able to re-deploy laptops that would have ended up in a landfill.  In Doug Mendel’s case, he moved a fire truck from Colorado to Cambodia.  Both used the same model.  Both yielded amazing results.

My question is – how can YOU use this model to reach your goals and aspirations?

Panasonic Mood Phone

What if there were a way to systematically gather feedback from people within your organization that would provide you with immediate information on their mood – specifically, the level of energy they are exhibiting, their trust in the company and their peers, and how focused they are on their work at the moment?  Think of it as the ultimate feedback loop for organizations.   

Say you were able to walk into someone’s office and immediately know their mood (based on physiological functions), and then adapt your approach to fit their current state.  Does that seem like a far fetched idea?  Maybe it’s not so far off.

In late 2006, Panasonic and NTT DoCoMo designed a cell phone called the “Feel Talk.