The story goes something like this…

A couple is at home preparing a dinner of  beef roast together.  As  he starts to prepare the roast for the oven, he takes a knife and proceeds to cut both ends off.  Perplexed by his action his wife asks, “Why in the world are you wasting that meat?”  To which he replies, “This is how my father taught me to cook beef roast.”

Certain that something didn’t seem right, she calls his father to ask why.   The father’s response?  ”That’s how my mother prepared beef roast when I was young.”  They then called his grandmother.  They asked her why she  cut both ends of the roast off before putting it into the oven.   She calmly replied that it was ”…because my pan wasn’t big enough.”

This story illustrates how easy it is to take what happens in your organization as making sense.  At one time it may have, but chances are that it may not now make sense to keep doing it.  In my own experience, I estimated that 20% of what people did no longer made sense - it was just wasteful.  Reports were generated and distributed, which no one ever read, and procedures and processes were still followed diligently but no longer served a need.

The moral of this story?  Everyday – make a part of your daily rhythm an exercise where everyone stops to ask — why are we doing this? And is it adding value to our customers? I guarantee that if this hasn’t been a regular routine in your organization, then you’ll be shocked at how much “waste” just keeps happening.

Visual Management is any system, process or tool that provides real-time information and feedback about the status of the organization, departments and job functions.  Think of it as the organizational nervous system that connects employees to the critical activities needed to achieve the goals of the business.   It’s also what many refer to as KPI’s (Key Performance Indicators).  Visual Management systems can take on a number of different forms from sophisticated database applications to simple white boards mounted on a conference room wall.  Over the years, I’ve learned a tremendous amount through trial and error as to what seems to work best and what doesn’t.  Here are a few tips that might help.

Think of a visual management system as the scoreboard for your business.  At a minimum it should communicate:

• What are the goals the organization, department or job function is trying to achieve?
• What are the key measures or units of work?
• How are we performing in relation to our goals?
• What prevents us from reaching our goals?
• And, most importantly…what are we doing to contribute to reaching our goals?

It sounds a lot easier than it really is.  Here’s an example of what I would consider a better than average visual management example.  I took this photo when I was on a “Junction Tour” at the headquarters of 1800GotJunk in Vancouver, BC.  They’ve done a tremendous job of integrating a number of parts of the business into the area where they hold their daily huddles.  They’ve included information and metrics related to the long-term goals of the business, as well as operational information about the day-to-day activities by department that are critical to the success of the business.   

Now, here are a few things to consider when you are either add or modify your huddle boards within your business (see example below).

•  First, make sure your visual management board is broken down into three specific sections – “how”, “why” and “what”. The “HOW” should illustrate the performance (daily) with daily metrics that are critical to your business.  This could include things such as “number of calls”, “conversion rates”, etc.  They are the activities that matter to your financial or customer service performance.  Be sure to include the “goal” rate for performance within the graph (see example below). 
• The “WHY” should be a metric that is related to the “HOW.”  e.g., if you were tracking your turn-over, the “WHY” metric would be results from the exit interviews you conducted as to why the employee was leaving the company. 
• Finally, the “WHAT” should chart what corrective “actions” need to be taken, who is responsible, when it will be done, and what resources will be needed. 
• Use graphs, pictures and diagrams whenever possible.  There’s a reason for the saying “a picture’s worth a thousand words.” 
• Display “expected” performance levels whenever possible.
• Don’t sweat it if your board doesn’t look polished.  It needs to be adaptable to your market and industry’s changing environment. 
• Require your people interact with the data.  A simple way to do this is to NOT use computer programs to generate fancy graphs (e.g., Excel) but rather to make them draw the results on a white board.  When they interact manually with the data they will have to “think” about it – which in turn will help them see when something needs their attention.
• Include as many employees in the process whenever possible – this includes the design on your boards, deciding where to post them, and how to communicate the information.

Good luck!  And please share you ideas and examples with us.