Lean Quote of the Day, April 2, 2010

On Fridays I will post a Lean related Quote. Throughout our lifetimes many people touch our lives and leave us with words of wisdom. These can both be a source of new learning and also a point to pause and reflect upon lessons we have learned. Within Lean active learning is an important aspect on this journey because without learning we can not improve.

Feel free to share some of your favorites here as well.

“Create your own visual style... let it be unique for yourself and yet identifiable for others.”  - Orson Welles

The goal within a Visual Factory is to create a “status at a glance” in the workplace. This refers to an operating environment where anyone can enter the workplace and:
     See the current situation (Self-explaining)
     See the work process (Self-ordering)
     See if you are ahead, behind or on schedule (Self-regulating) and
     See when there is an abnormality (Self-improving)

This post entitled "You Won't Get Lean, Until You Get Visual" will remind you of the importance of creating a visual factory.  A visual factory is the language of the Lean production system.

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Expert Advice for Getting Things Done

While I was writing the post "3 steps to get things done" an interesting feed came through on productivity tips to add more time to your work day.  The article was published on the American Express Open Forum and entitled" 80 Ways to Steal Valuable Minutes for Your Work Day."  The author is Glen Stansberry, a web developer, writer and small business owner. He co-founded the popular blog network LifeRemix in 2007 and currently writes at LifeDev on empowering creative people.

Glen asked some of the top small business, productivity bloggers, and consultants to share some of their best tips on how they add more time to their days.  I thought I would share some I found particularly noteworthy.

Liz Strauss, Successful Blog

"Establish an early morning no interruption time. Use the first hour or two of work to work on things that require focus. You'll get more done. Email, phone calls, and interruptions have a way of expanding to fit the time we allow them."

Jonathan Fields, JonathanFields.com

"Batch & Focus - Multitasking kills time. Again, sounds counter-intuitive. But, every time you switch your attention, there's a cognitive ramp up time. It can range from a few seconds to a few minutes. So, if you constantly cycle between checking email, IM, twitter, texts, voicemail, calendars, blackberries, apps, scores, stock quotes, news, current projects and more, then respond to each, the time you lose to incessant ramp-up becomes substantial. Instead, minimize time lost to nonstop cognitive ramping by batching your time and focusing on individual categories of tasks with intense, yet discrete bursts of attention."  

"Call - We've become so accustomed to doing everything digitally, trading flurries of emails, IMs and texts, we sometimes forget that we can get the same thing done in a fraction of the time with one or two quick phone calls."

Dominic Basulto, Endless Innovation

"Use Evernote as a digital organizer - Finally get rid of all the scraps of paper, sticky notes and newspaper clippings that find their way into your bag, wallet or pocket. Using Evernote, you can snap photos of anything, take voice notes, clip text from the Web and then sort all of this content either online or using a mobile device. All of this multimedia content then has a home within Evernote, where you can easily search for content when you need it."  

Becky McCray, Small Biz Survival

"Use checklists. Make and use checklists of daily tasks. This saves you time in two ways: you will work more efficiently with a checklist in front of you, and you will spend less time trying to remember what still needs to be done. You can read more of my explanation of a social media marketing checklist here."

Rich Brooks, Flyte Blog

"Write up tomorrow's to-do's before I leave the office today. I find that if I have a clean lined paper (physical or digital) of the most important to-dos for the next day, I can hit the ground running when I get into work the next day."

Glen Stansberry, Wise Bread

Develop a routine to your day and stick with it. Routines give us a feeling of control over our day and help put us on "autopilot", keeping us from worrying about the little details of the day.

Start tracking your time with RescueTime. It really is an eye-opening experience. RescueTime will show you exactly where you're spending your time and how much. It shows you trends that you probably hadn't considered, like when you're most likely to visit Facebook. Knowing when you're vulnerable to distractions is incredibly valuable to your productivity.

All these tips may not work for you but I am sure you will find some advice in this article valuable.  Many of the resources from these industry leaders were new to me and you may find their sites helpful like I have. 

If someone was to ask you your secrets to productivity what would your share? Share your thoughts here or on this AME Linkedin Discussion Group.

Lean Quote of the Day, March 26, 2010

On Fridays I will post a Lean related Quote. Throughout our lifetimes many people touch our lives and leave us with words of wisdom. These can both be a source of new learning and also a point to pause and reflect upon lessons we have learned. Within Lean active learning is an important aspect on this journey because without learning we can not improve.

Feel free to share some of your favorites here as well.

"In motivating people, you've got to engage their minds and their hearts. It is good business to have an employee feel part of the entire effort . . . ; I motivate people, I hope, by example—and perhaps by excitement, by having provocative ideas to make others feel involved."  — Rupert Murdoch

Motivating employees toward a common goals is an important strategic advantage in any organization.  People are the engine of the organization and positive motivation is the fuel to drive the car of excellence.  To improve your effectiveness in motivating your team avoid these top 5 motivational myths.   Instead, try the following 10 quick ways to motivate your employees:

1. Praise the employee for a job well done--or even partially well done.
2. If an employee is bored, involve that individual in a discussion about ways to create a more satisfying career path, including promotions based on concrete outcomes.
3. State your clear expectations for task accomplishment.
4. Ensure that the job description involves a variety of tasks.
5. Ensure that the employee sees that what she’s doing impacts the whole process or task that others will also be part of.
6. Make sure that the employee feels that what he/she is doing is meaningful.
7. Provide feedback along the way, pointing out both positive and negative aspects.
8. Allow for an appropriate amount of autonomy for the employee based on previous and anticipated accomplishment.
9. Increase the depth and breadth of what the employee is currently doing.
10.Provide the employee with adequate opportunity to succeed.


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3 Steps to Get Things Done

In today's busy world, many people have difficulty managing their time and getting everything done. Some people are very busy, but they never manage to achieve the things they really want.  So the question is "How can you improve your time management to increase your productivity?" 

While doing some research online about time management techniques I came across this ClarityMap.

This time management process follows these 3 simple steps to get things done.

1. Create a list of actions.  Write down all the things you want to get done for the day. Everything from writing, creating content, or planning your next project to answering your email and balancing your checkbook.

2. Assign each action a time.  Pick a specific time to each task or group of tasks. Anything from 15 minutes to 2 hours. Chunks of 30 minutes or less work best.

3. Do the action! Select a task, start a timer (like an egg time), and focus on nothing but accomplishing that task. This means you don't answer the phone, you don't get up for a drink, you don't log onto computer - none of that. You remain focused on the task-at-hand!

 

Derek Franklin is the creator of this ClarityMap and The Action Machine, a visual time management software based on the above steps.  The goal behind The Action Machine is simple: To give you a way to visually structure your day in a way that you feel absolutely compelled to take action and get things done, once and for all!

 

This ClarityMap offers 16 ways to take more action on your tasks.  They include declutter techniques, use of checklists, and ways to avoid procrastination and distractions.  Take an action item and plan time to review these methods.

 

 

Five Reasons to be Honest with Your Employees

A recent interview by The New York Times with Kip Tindell, chief executive of the Container Store, highlighted several leadership lessons.  "Don't keep secrets from your staff" was one of foundational principles Tindell shared.

 

Good leadership is all about communication, and the best leaders are completely transparent with their staff, says Container Store CEO Kip Tindell. Tindell shares his private boardroom presentations with all his company's employees, from top to bottom. "There's never a reason, we believe, to keep the information from an employee," he says. "I know that occasionally some of that information falls into the wrong hands, but that's a small price to pay."

 

I believe that with knowledge comes power and the more information we share the quicker with can improve.  Creating a culture of openness and free-flowing information can be a competitive advantage.  Here are five reasons you should embrace transparency:

 

1. People assume the worst when they don't hear from leaders. Silence from the executive office causes a lot of fear and resentment, which certainly doesn't contribute to a productive culture. Maybe the news is bad, but maybe it's not as bad as they are imagining. And even if it is, once they know the truth they can plan and act accordingly.

 

2. Transparency helps employees connect to the why. When employees are working in a vacuum, they can't see the financial "big picture," and decisions leaders make may seem ill-advised or unfair or simply inexplicable. Transparency connects them to the why—and that understanding propels them to act. You can ask people to change their work habits and established processes all day long. But if they don't know why they're being asked to change, they won't change—at least not for long.

 

3. Transparency allows for consistent messaging across the organization. When you commit to transparency, people don't have to get their (speculative, distorted) news through the company grapevine. They hear what's really going on, in a controlled and consistent way, from their managers. This, in turn, creates organizational consistency. When everyone is hearing the same messages from their leaders, everyone is motivated to respond in similar ways. And this consistency trickles down to the customers, who get the same basic experience regardless of who they're dealing with.

 

4. Transparency leads to faster, more efficient execution. When times are tough, execution is everything. And the ticket to good execution is good alignment: All sectors of an organization must understand exactly what's required so they act in a coordinated and collaborative fashion. Transparency is what facilitates that kind of alignment. It's all about a shared sense of urgency.

 

5. Transparency facilitates the best possible solutions. In transparent cultures, leaders encourage employees to solve problems themselves. And because those employees are the people closest to a problem, and because they must live with the outcome, they almost always design the most effective, efficient solution.  And, of course, they'll also have instant buy-in.

 

Do your employees really know what's going on with your company?  Be honest with your employees they can handle the truth.  Remember, sharing information with employees is good for a couple of reasons: one, it's the right thing to do, and two, it's good for business. 

 

As we have learned from Lean Thinking, this too can not be a flavor of the month.  Being open and honest with your employees requires long term commitment if your want your organization to continuously improve.

 

If you enjoy this post you may want to connect with me on Linkedin or follow me on Twitter.  You can also subscribe to this feed or email to stay updated on all posts. For those Facebook fans join A Lean Journey on our
facebook fan page.

 

Lean Quote of the Day, March 19, 2010

On Fridays I will post a Lean related Quote. Throughout our lifetimes many people touch our lives and leave us with words of wisdom. These can both be a source of new learning and also a point to pause and reflect upon lessons we have learned. Within Lean active learning is an important aspect on this journey because without learning we can not improve.

Feel free to share some of your favorites here as well.

"Systems thinking is a discipline for seeing wholes. It is a framework for seeing interrelationships rather than things, for seeing patterns of change rather than static "snapshots". It is a set of general principles- distilled over the course of the twentieth century, spanning fields as diverse as the physical and social sciences, engineering, and management. ...During the last thirty years, these tools have been applied to understand a wide range of corporate, urban, regional, economic, political, ecological, and even psychological systems. And systems thinking is a sensibility- for the subtle interconnectedness that gives living systems their unique character." - Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline

I chose this quote because Quality Digest Magazine asked to reprint my post on systems thinking to avoid pitfalls in lean management. Quality Digest is the largest source for Quality-related articles and news in the U.S., covering metrology, quality management, standards, compliance, and more. 

Review this newly updated Quality Digest article titled "11 Pointers Toward Systems Thinking in Lean Management. 


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Podcast on Gotta Go Lean Blog

I recently had the opportunity to do a podcast with Jeff Hajek.  Jeff Hajek is a Lean consultant, award-winning author of Whaddaya Mean I Gotta Be Lean, and the founder of Velaction Continuous Improvement.  Jeff also publishes the blog Gotta Go Lean.

The Gotta Go Lean Blog focuses on Lean at the front line--helping managers and employees work together to make Lean more productive for the company, and jobs more satisfying for employees. And committed, engaged, satisfied employees are good for business.

Jeff asked me to do a podcast with him regarding frontline leadership at the supervisor level.  Below is a brief introduction to this subject from Jeff:

Because Lean requires a great deal of autonomy from frontline employees, it also requires frontline Lean leadership with a unique skill set. Supervisors in a Lean company have to be able to do it all. They must be coaches, mentors, trainers, and still deliver results. It’s a fine line to walk. Too directive, and they stifle creativity. To ‘hands off’ and their teams don’t get better. We dive into the details about what we think Lean supervisors need to do to be successful when their company is focused on continuous improvement.

To listen to my interview along with Jeff click here.  The podcast is about 21 minutes in length.  I hope you enjoy and I thank Jeff for the opportunity to share with others.