Daily Lean Tips Edition #12

For my Facebook fans you already know about this great feature. But for those of you that are not connected to A Lean Journey on Facebook or Twitter I post daily a feature I call Lean Tips.  It is meant to be advice, things I learned from experience, and some knowledge tidbits about Lean to help you along your journey.  Another great reason to like A Lean Journey on Facebook.

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Here is the next addition of tips from the Facebook page:

Lean Tip #166 - Employees should use a standard format to ask problem-solving questions.

Employees should use a standard format to ask problem-solving questions. Try this format below to ensure the quickest response and the most learning.

1. Describe the problem in a sentence or two.
2. Where is the problem located?
3. What may have caused the problem?
4. How long has the been going on?
5. How have you tried to fix it?
6. Who else is working on it and what are they doing?
7. What do you suggest?

Lean Tip#167 - Use a demonstration worksheet when you want to show someone how to do something.

A demonstration worksheet will force you to spend a little more time in the demonstration, but it'll guarantee more predictable results. Use this technique for your demonstration:

• Provide a reason for the demonstration.
• Talk through the steps.
• Demonstrate at a normal pace.
• Demonstrate again and explain the logic behind each step.
• Have your apprentice talk you through the steps.
• Provide a practice.

I suggest that you let your apprentice know that you're going to use this technique so they don't get nervous along the way.

Lean Tip #168 - Don't trust body language when transferring knowledge, use open-ended questions.

Instead of trusting body language, trust something much more predictable. Use open-ended assessment questions. Ask questions at the:

• Beginining: What do you already know about the topic?
• Middle: What did your hear me say?
• End: What are you going to do when you leave my side?

Lean Tip #169 - Teach what you know in 5 simple steps.

Teach people what you know with these 5 methodical steps:

1. Start with a time-bound learning goal and a warning to your apprentice as such, " By the end of the shift you're going to be able to ..."
2. Deliver content for no more than 10 minutes.
3. Stop and ask your question, like "Why don't you tell me what you heard me say?"
4. Listen to the answer and offer suggestions if there is anything missing or incorrectly stated.
5. Repeat Steps 2, 3, and 4 three times.

Lean Tip #170 - When teaching people it is important to define the big picture.

Defining the big picture will help provide your apprentices with a context through which they can find their own way, and make good choices as they progress on learning. Take a little time to ask and answer these questions:

1. What is your team's mission or purpose?
2. How does our work fit with the organization's mission?
3. Who are our internal and external customers? How do we prioritize our work for them?
4. Who are our competitors?
5. What are the specific products or services we provide?
6. Where are we in the product or service value stream?
7. How does the work flow for your job?

Lean Tip #171 - Keep papers from accumulating with clutter questions.

When you find paper cluttering your desk, hold the paper in your hand and ask the paper clutter questions:

C Copy or original?

L Likely I'll need it?

U Understandable and/or quotable?

T Timely, timeless, or dated?

T Time to read it?

E Elsewhere available?

R Relevant to my work or life?

Lean Tip #172 - Find a balance between personalizing your work area and minimizing distractions.

Personalizing your work space is nothing more than making the space look like you work there. Distractions can increase exponentially according to the number of doodads sitting around in you work area.

To find out whether you've struck a balance between personalizing your work area and minimizing diestractions, examine each item on or in your work area and ask yourself these questions:

• Is it too large or does it take up too much space?
• Is it so small it gets lost or swept off surfaces?
• Is it too fragile? Are you afraid it might get broken?
• Is it distracting? Do you find yourself playing with it, working around it, or otherwise fussing with it?
• Am I happier if I have this item near me?

Lean Tip #173 - Take Control of your time by knowing when to stop working on a task.

Know when to stop working on a task. Sometime good is good enough. When you feel yourself in a "perfectionistic" mood, ask yourself these questions:

• Will the results be substantially better if I put in more effort?
• Will I get paid more?
• Would anyone else notice the improvements? (Or would anyone else care?)
• Have I gone as far as I can without getting help?
• Have I already done more than is expected of me?

Your answer is the key to whether you should keep at the task, or just STOP!

Lean Tip #174 - Increase your productivity by budgeting time the way you budget your money.

Allow a certain amount of time for completing each task. Set a timer when you start. The alarm saves you from tasks you don't like to do and pulls you from jobs you like and would spend too much time on.

Lean Tip #175 - Don't contribute to e-mail clutter yourself.

Sometimes it's just too easy to send a message on e-mail, so people send and send and send some more. That results in e-mail clutter for your friends, colleagues, and others. Here are some general guidelines for keeping e-mail simple:

• Keep each message to one topic.
• Keep your message brief, but do include all the details necessary for the recipient to properly respond.
• Clearly define the topic in the message header or subject line. Don't leave blank.
• Stifle the desire to send everyone you know a copy.
• Avoid the one word reply and the unnecessary reply to all.

Lean Tip #176 - Improve your meetings with the seven step process called "RE-7"

These measures can be summarized in the seven step "RE-7" approach to meetings. Followed carefully, it will facilitate your meeting planning and help you measure the effectiveness of your meetings. The mnemonic device will help you to better remember each measure.

1. Required?
2. Readiness
3. Restraints
4. Record
5. Regulate
6. Review
7. Results

Lean Tip #177 - Efficient meetings are the result of careful planning by the meeting planner.

The meeting planner must attend to these details to ensure the meeting will be effecient including:

• Defining the meeting's purpose
• Selecting the participants
• Appointing monitors
• Choosing a time and place
• Preparing an agenda
• Rehearsing
• Attending to physical arrangements
• Sending out notices

Lean Tip #178 - Thinking about how to resolve restraints before a meeting will make the outcome successful.

Before the meeting begins, consider and find solutions to restraints that might prevent a successful outcome:

• Time
• Money
• Self-restraint
• Room size
• Materials

A good meeting organizer will be prepared to deal with these before they become a barrier in the meeting.

Lean Tip #179 - Use a checklist to standardize the meeting process for effective and efficient meetings.

Meetings are part of business in most organizations. Common complaints about meetings center around their ineffective and inefficient process. That is right the meeting is a process and can be improved as such. Creating a standard format and checklist for meeting preparation can aid in making your meetings add value to the organization and the participants.

Lean Tip #180 - Appointing monitors for your meeting can ensure everyone stays on topic within the time frame.

As long as people attend meetings, there will be temptation to disregard topics and times and get caught up in a particular point of contention or special interest. Select a person to monitor the time and another person as the topic monitor. There two individuals will be responsible for ensuring that everyone adheres to the topics on the agenda within the recommended time frames.

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The Stages of High Performance Teams

Teams have become an essential part of work in organizations, but as you'll know from the teams you have led or belonged to, you can't expect a new team to perform exceptionally from the very outset. Team formation takes time, and usually follows some easily recognizable stages, as the team journeys from being a group of strangers to becoming a united team with a common goal.

Psychologist Bruce Tuckman first came up with the memorable phrase "forming, storming, norming and performing" back in 1965. He used it to describe the path to high-performance that most teams follow. Later, he added a fifth stage that he called "adjourning".

The first stage, forming, is characterized by a great deal of uncertainty about the group’s purpose, structure, and leadership. Members are testing the waters to determine what types of behaviors are acceptable. This stage is complete when members have begun to think of themselves as part of a team.

The storming stage is one of intragroup conflict. Members accept the existence of the team but resist the control that the group imposes on individuality. Further, there is conflict over who will control the team. When the storming stage is complete, there will be relatively clear leadership within the team.

The third stage is one in which close relationships develop and members begin to demonstrate cohesiveness. There is now a stronger sense of team identity and camaraderie. This norming stage is complete when the team structure solidifies and members have assimilated a common set of expectations of appropriate work behavior.

Performing is the fourth stage. The structure is fully functional and accepted by team members. Their energy is diverted from getting to know and understand each other to performing the necessary tasks.

For permanent teams, performing is the last stage of their development. For temporary teams – those who have a limited task to perform – there is an adjourning stage. In this stage the team prepares for its disbandment. A high level of task performance is no longer the members’ top priority. Instead, their attention is directed toward wrapping-up activities.

Tuckman's model explains that as the team develops maturity and ability, relationships establish, and the leader changes leadership style. Beginning with a directing style, moving through coaching, then participating, finishing delegating and almost detached.

Lean Quote: Common Complaints About Meetings

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.

"A manager spending more than 25 percent of time in meetings is a sign of malorganization." — Peter Drucker

Some of the most common complaints about meetings as well as some of the major reasons for their costliness revolve around the meeting process itself - it is a process, after all, one that can be examined and improved. Below are some common complaints about meetings:

• Leader too conciliatory
•  My presence not needed
• Held just because it's the usual time
• No advance notice: could not prepare
• Too long
• Side conversations going on
• Too many people
• Purpose of meeting not clear
• Too much on agenda
• No visuals
• Women always assigned to take notes
• Leader had predetermined solution
• Room too hot or too cold
• Trivial matters discussed: irrelevant digressions
• No priority regarding how to spend time
• Leader defensive
• No tangible outcome
• Not everyone was committed
• No time for brainstorming
• Don't know other participants: no introductions
• Leader read to us (from visuals or from materials)

If complaints can be identified and reduced or eliminated, then it naturally follows that your meetings will be less costly.  A successful and efficiently conducted meeting can produce measurable, as well as immeasurable, savings in terms of improved morale and motivation.  The goal of all meetings is to ensure that all who attend feel their time is well spent.

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Radio Lean - Your Lean Implementation Information Station

I recently came across a good resource online for learning about Lean.  RadioLean is an internet broadcast website.  The mission of RadioLean is to promote operational excellence in all types and sizes of organizations by providing Lean content, education, resources, and networking opportunities for our listeners.

Mike Wall, started and hosts RadioLean is a Lean Practitioner, Educator, and Advisor with nearly 30 years practical experience throughout the public and private sectors. He began his Lean journey at The Boeing Company – Wichita Division where he served as Total Quality Manager, Lean Implementation Manger, Air Force One Production Manager, and 737/757 Product Line Manager.

Mike answers the question why RadioLean by wanting to draw more people and organizations across North America into the Lean fold.  He contends that even though Lean as been around for a couple decades in the US many leaders still don't see the value of or understand how full inculcation of Lean principles across their organization could help.  From my experience I think Mke is right which is why I started my blog sometime ago.

Currently, on RadioLean is an interview with Mark Graban, of Lean Blog and author of Lean Hospitals, on Lean Healthcare. In the vault there is a great an interview with Pascal Dennis the author of "The Remedy – Bringing Lean Thinking Out of the Factory to Transform the Entire Organization” and Getting the Right Things Done.  Also, on the vault you will find interviews with Dr. Jeffrey Liker, the author of  "The Toyota Way"; Ralph Keller, past president of AME; Bob Miller, executive director of Shingo Prize; and Jake Stiles, President of Stiles Associates and fellow AME Northeast Board of Director.  I particularly enjoyed the interview with Cliff Ransom, a Wall street guy, who talks about the early adoption of Lean in th 1990's.


This is a great way to spend your lunch time in the office learning from true practitioners.

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Keep The Rope Tight

Sustaining Lean in my mind requires constant gentle pressure. Something Paul Akers calls "keeping the rope tight." In this video Paul analyzes a failure to sustain an area at FastCap.  There is no blaming just more Kaizen.  Paul says there are 3 elements to sustaining a Lean culture he refers to as EIR:

Expectation - set clear expectations
Inspection - inspect the actual condition
Reinforcement - reinforce by showing people what can happen.

All organizations struggle with sustaining over time.  Hopefully, this example and Paul's advice will help you use those opportunities to keep learning.




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Dealing with Change

Photo: http://jumpthecurve.net

Change is difficult.  People commonly resist change for a variety of reasons.  Although you intend for the change to result in a positive outcome, change is often viewed as negative.  For your plan to be accepted, you must anticipate and overcome any negativity, anxiety and/or resistance.

First, it's important to remember the simple but effective formula:

           More = Less

More employee participation equals less resistance to the change.  You'll see this formula at work in each of the following suggestions: 

Suggestion 1: Empower employees to become part of the change.  There are several reasons people resist change, one of which is fear.  Many people play "Gee, what if" scenarios over and over when a new idea is proposed.  When you begin to implement your plan of action, it's essential that you invite those around you to identify how the change will influence them, benefit them, and improve their present situations.

Suggestion 2: Keep your employees informed.  Communicate as much as you know about what is happening as a result of the change.  One of the major reasons people resist change is fear of the unknown.  If you communicate with employees and keep them informed, you put this fear to rest.

Suggestion 3: Break the change down into digestible chunks.  If it makes it easier for employees, introduce the change gradually.  You can give employees encouragement and help them focus on small steps they can take to move toward the future.  Celebrate their small successes.

Suggestion 4: Answer the "What's in it for Me?" question.  This suggestion is similar to Suggestion 1.  Generally people will accept change when they see a personal benefit.  Employees who are involved in determining the benefits of change are less likely to resist it.  Assist employees in identifying what the change will do for them.

Suggestion 5: Give employees some control over change.  As employees begin to focus on the benefits of the desired change, provide them with the opportunity to control the steps to the change.  Participants in change workshops have revealed that having control reduces the anxiety and stress associated with the change implementation and increases their motivation to make the change.

Suggestion 6: Help employees assimilate the change.  Once employees begin to experience change, help them assimilate it by reinforcing the personal benefits they're gaining.

As employees begin to demonstrate a willingness to assimilate change into their daily routine, they develop a commitment to the change, a willingness to stick to the plan of action.  The change actually becomes integrated into the work environment, and employees begin to feel a sense of satisfaction in accomplishment.  They readily see the payoffs associated with the change.  They enjoy, and may even take credit for, their participation in the process.  Employees can view their efforts to bring about change with personal respect and pride. The change becomes a part of their routine, and any lingering concerns vanish.


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Lean Quote: Combating De-Motivation in the Workplace

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.

"There are no hopeless situations; there are only men who have grown hopeless about them." — Clare Boothe Luce

The choices you make everyday influence the motivational climate of your company. As a manager you want to create a motivated workplace. It is equally important to know what actions to avoid so you don't de-motivate. Managers and other organizational leaders often make the following crucial mistakes, which lead to low morale and workplace de-motivation:

• Criticizing in front of others
• Being dishonest
• Taking credit for others' work
• Being inaccessible
• Showing favoritism
• Delegating without giving authority, or delegating to the wrong person
• Communicating poorly or failing to communicate at all
• Failing to train employees for job responsibilities
• Exhibiting wishy-washy behavior
• Failing to emphasize teamwork
• Giving the impression that you're concerned only about your own well-being
• Displaying poor personal work habits such as disorganization and procrastination
• Tolerating poor performance
• Over supervising
• Imposing impossible workloads
• Focusing only on negatives 

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