• Meet with business leaders for introduction and business fit
• Gain clarity on what the organization wants to achieve: its Vision
• Complete a current state Business Performance assessment
• Identify focus area improvements needed to achieve vision
• Provide training to build a common language of Business and Continuous Improvement
• Apply appropriate tools to close gaps between the desired vision and current state conditions
• Provide daily coaching to teach the improvement techniques and build problem solving skills
• Meet regularly with organization sponsor(s) to address issues and concerns, as well as assess work impacts

Approach Breakdown Detail:

Meet with business leaders for introduction and business fit

Generally, the meeting with business leaders last (60-90) minutes and is an opportunity to: assess organizational readiness and commitment to make needed changes, understand driving motives and reasons for the engagement, and determine fit with active participants in both organizations.  This is a no-charge activity.

Gain clarity on what the organization wants to achieve: its Vision

Gaining clarity of an organization’s vision requires several meetings of discussion around vision, mission, culture, performance, and market with top organization leaders.  This activity will require several meetings to exchange ideas and concerns and may require working with a broader group of leaders.  It can take from 8-16 hours over a period of a week or two.

Complete a current state Business Performance assessment

Completing a performance assessment provides important current state data to measure against while verifying desired impacts are achieved.  This confidential assessment also provides clients with an outsider’s look at the business structure, culture, performance, and areas needing improvement.  The assessment requires support from client personnel (2-4 hours) to gather needed information and (8-10 hours) of gathering, analysis, and reporting for a consultant.

Identify focus area improvements needed to achieve vision

Identifying focus improvement areas is more about agreeing on prioritization of the possible areas after the assessment is complete.  This step is used to identify the area, team members, roles, timelines and specific improvements targeted during the next activity.  The choice of the focus area may be very intuitive, or perhaps require further discussion to vet several competing priorities.  The time required here can take from 1-3 hours depending on the prioritization approach.

Provide training to build a common language of Business and Continuous Improvement

The training activity can be considered a standalone activity for organizations wanting to introduce their people to Lean concepts, methods, and systems.  We provide specific training on any of the Lean tools/methods, as well as creating leadership vision, developing and deploying strategy, leadership practices, and overall system design.  A full list of training offerings is available upon request.

Apply appropriate tools to close gaps between the desired vision and current state conditions

Closing the gaps identified between the developed vision and current state is where the real work begins.  This activity represents most of an engagement and applies the specific tools necessary to achieve the desired operating pattern and business goals.  Generally, the work begins with the identified team reviewing the vision, understanding the gap, discussing possible approaches, and then, working as a team to make the improvement.  A typical sequence of activities following the steps just listed are: Value-Stream Mapping the targeted process flow of information and materials, identifying major product or service quality issues, learning and applying appropriate improvement tools, and working in a team structure to learn and change the process pattern and activities.  These activities are generally represented in months and the time needed is based on the scope of the actual work.

Provide daily coaching to teach the improvement techniques and build problem solving skills

Keeping team members and activities focused on the new path, (Lean Thinking approach), is the role of the coach/consultant assigned to the client.  Project management, daily coaching, weekly meetings, and regular and frequent phone/email communication is required.  Our preferred method of teaching others how to problem solve is the Pattern for Daily Improvement (PDI) or, Improvement Kata & Coaching Kata. This approach begins with “The Challenge” and brings a Learner and Coach together daily by phone or in person for a (30) minute coaching session.  This approach takes small specific steps each day demonstrating the pattern for improvement using PDCA cycles.  The Learner is responsible for learning the pattern and the Coach for the needed result.

Meet regularly with organization sponsor(s) to address issues and concerns, as well as assess work impacts

Keeping the engagement sponsor updated and involved with the activities is a key to our success.  Short, weekly status check-ins are important to address common change management issues.  Those issues are generally communication based, personnel centric, and require messaging and intervention from leadership to keep the work on target.  When considering that all change and improvement activities involve human beings that are attempting to change legacy systems and practices, occasional conflicts are expected.  How we address those conflicts as leaders changes the game and models the power of leadership.