The Journey is Long

After five years as Lean Champion, my voice wasn’t being heard so well. Sure, I was able to promote and facilitate Kaizen events and help people solve problems, but I was unable to move the leadership team to take the next steps in our Lean journey. Any time I spoke to our leaders about strategy, they were too busy to consider anything that deviated from their current operating approach.

I realized that I needed to engage an outside voice. Someone with credibility, who could say the difficult things I was saying with different words. Someone who could influence our leadership team to change their behavior in a way that would support our Lean transformation.

You’re Never Too Good for Growth

Two years into our Lean transformation we had undertaken a Lean assessment to see where we were and where the opportunities existed. Looking back, it was more tactical than strategic, but was appropriate for our maturity.

Now, I had an idea. What if we tried another Lean assessment, this time focusing on the leadership and strategic aspect of our efforts? When presented to our four Value Stream Directors, they seemed satisfied with their efforts and indicated they had this “Lean thing” down. I knew right then we were in trouble!

I met with my manager, the Executive VP of Technology, and convinced him that we needed something to open our eyes to the possibilities for the next steps in our transformation. But, if we used our internal resources to conduct the assessment, we would rate ourselves too highly. We had become complacent and overconfident. Our results were impressive. The product portfolio had doubled and time to market had been reduced from eighteen to ten months.

After receiving approval, I reached out to Mike, a consultant from Shingijutsu, who I had met four years before. He taught me that no matter how good you think you are, there are always ways to improve and grow. He agreed to join us at no cost. He was interested in how we were doing and had the freedom to do what he wanted. He flew in from Seattle and I joined him for breakfast on the first day of his visit. We talked about the current situation. He assured me that he had seen this many times before. He knew he could help.

Our first meeting was with the Leadership team. As they introduced themselves, most of them talked proudly about their team’s accomplishments and how they incorporated Lean into their processes. Each time, Mike asked them probing questions about their progress and approach. He exposed gaps in their efforts and understanding of Lean in a way that was respectful, but eye-opening. Team members took many notes during the discussion.

The Beginning of Breakthrough Thinking

For the rest of the week, Mike and the assessment team participated in many meetings and activities and identified huge opportunities in our Lean journey. Mostly aligned with my prior efforts, Mike had a way of communicating to the organization that had credibility beyond any internal resource.

At the review of findings, we presented four recommendations:

1.      Learning starts at the top – leaders must demonstrate the behaviors of the change they want to make

2.      Linkage – become in lockstep with customers and suppliers to ensure that everyone gets only what they need, when they need it

3.      Stability – level the flow of work to drive the production system stress level down

4.      Cycle time and quality – deliver only what the customer wants, when they want it, at the appropriate level of quality

Although these were not new ideas, the leadership team saw them as breakthrough thinking and instantly committed to them. One Director admitted that prior to the assessment he thought he knew Lean very well. Now, he was sure that he had much learning to do to become competent.

Following the assessment, there was a renewed commitment to Lean in the organization and many breakthroughs were made over the next year. For my part, I was extremely appreciative of the time Mike gave us and the renewed interest that was generated by his visit.