Daily Lean Tips Edition #32

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.

Click this link for A Lean Journey's Facebook Page Notes Feed.

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

Lean Tip #466 - Talk to Your Employees about Your Mission

From time to time, you need to talk with your employees about your mission and the plans for the future of the business. When you communicate your goals with your employees, they will know about the changes that you’re planning to make in the upcoming coming months/years. This will better let them know what their roles and contributions to the growth of the business are.

Lean Tip #467 - Always Maintain a Positive Attitude

Positive attitude has power in more ways than one. As a business leader, you should exude optimism which will help your staff avoid patterns of negativity. When the economic climate is unstable, businesses will face continual challenges. If you are not optimistic about your ways of conducting business, it can negatively affect the mindset and productivity of those who work for you.

Lean Tip #468 - Be Approachable and Listen to Your Staff

Leaders are approachable. Your business will neither grow nor become successful if you have a bunch of people who are unhappy or disgruntled. Your leadership style should be such that people should be able to talk to you freely about their work issues. Inculcating good listening skills is mandatory to becoming a good leader. A good listener will convey empathy and show they are genuinely interested. Leaders will want to find out what’s behind the conversation.

Lean Tip #469 - Appreciate and Compliment Good Work

Recognize and encourage talent. Take time out to compliment and praise your team and staff if they have achieved something remarkable. More than incentives and certificates, these things matter. They will be motivated to have a higher level of performance. It will also cultivate a positive mindset and work culture.

Lean Tip #470 - Share Responsibility by Holding Yourself Accountable

When your staff or team fall short of their performance, ask yourself a few questions such as “Where have I gone wrong?” “What could I have done differently to deliver a positive outcome?” and so on. When you are passionate and enthusiastic about what you do, you would be willing to take the responsibility of failure. If your employees love and respect you, they will be more than willing to share your sorrows and failures.

Lean Tip #471 - Focus on result-oriented activities.

Pareto’s law states that 80% of the outputs result from 20% of the inputs. This means that 20% of our actions result in 80% of the results. We must find the 20% that is creating the 80% of our desired outcomes and focus solely on those activities.

Lean Tip #472 - Make the work visual

One of the problems with working in an office as opposed to a factory environment is that work becomes less visual. One of the lean principles we use is visual management, and you can do that a few different ways.

Lean Tip #473 - Keep a project list – and focus on it at least an hour a day.

We all have a lot of projects that we’d like to work on – projects that aren’t really essential to what we’re doing, but would go a long way towards making life or work easier once they’re complete.

Lean Tip #474 - Never, never ever multi-task!

It will decrease your effectiveness and make you feel overwhelmed. It is bad for your mental health, in particular your creative being. You don't need to multi-task anyway if you are using a personal productivity system.

Lean Tip #475 – Want to be productive in the office learn to prioritize all interruptions.

In a perfect world, every phone call or meeting would be properly scheduled in advance - but we all know this doesn’t happen. However, most of the time you can decide on when to actually have the conversation. Within the first two minutes of the phone call or meeting, make a decision as to whether it is an urgent issue or if you need to schedule a meeting for a later date and time.

Lean Tip #476 – Save your inbox by SORTING your email and getting rid of what you don’t need.

First things first, it’s time to get rid of all of the messages that are old and obsolete. Be aggressive in this step. Don’t keep messages that you know will never be returned. If there are attachments that need to be saved or printed, do so now. Get rid of as much as you can.

Lean Tip #477 - STRAIGTHEN the inbox, as in "a place for everything and everything in its place."

Find a place for all of your e-mails. The easiest and most obvious way is to create folders based on tasks or other buckets of work where emails can be neatly filed for future use. Put e-mails you need to act on in the proper folder. The goal is to remove as much from your inbox as possible.

Lean Tip #478 - E-mail 5S SHINE is to get rid of e-mails and prevent them coming back.

Since we’re talking about computer applications, there really isn’t the necessary cleaning activities that would be required in a physical workspace. Shine in 5S is cleaning to prevent future cleaning. E-mail 5S shine is to get rid of e-mails and prevent them coming back. Block spammers who make it into your inbox to prevent repeat offenders. Unsubscribe to newsgroups or other e-mail marketing rather than deleting them. Don’t reply to informational e-mails with "Thanks" and certainly don't CC everyone.

Lean Tip #479 - STANDARDIZE how you handle e-mail.

This step is critically important as you will need to set rules for yourself to keep your e-mail account clean. Some rules you may consider:

• Set a maximum number of e-mails in your inbox and once that number is exceeded, complete another sorting and sifting cycle.
• Check e-mail at certain times of day rather than playing whack-a-mole with every new "you've got mail".
• Spend a set amount of time on e-mail checking.
• Agree to limit who is Carbon Copied (CC) so that extra inbox material is not created.

The key is to set rules for yourself to keep things organized.

Lean Tip #480 – SUSTAIN your inbox by auditing to ensure you are following the rules.

The final step in the process is setting up a quick audit process to make certain your rules are being followed and your account is staying in good shape. In the beginning, this audit may need to be more frequent to force the discipline to adhere. Overtime, it will become a learned way of working and you will be the envy of all your coworkers.

Checking Your Lean Progress Replayed

Jeff Hajek  and I joined up once agan to discuss ways to measure the progress of your Lean journey. We covered how to evaluate Lean training, continuous improvement culture, Lean leadership, and more.



If you would like to review the slides from this webinar you can find them below:

Checking Progress On Your Lean Journey

View more presentations from Tim McMahon.

I hope you enjoy this webinar.  You can check out some others Jeff and I have done together here.

Lean Quote: Want Something New Try Something New

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.

"If you want something you've never had, you must be willing to do something you've never done." — Thomas Jefferson

Culture can be defined as the sum of individuals' work habits within an organization. Culture is often invisible to the members within the group because it is "the way we do things around here." One implication of culture as a collection of habits and practices is that it has incredible inertia and momentum. Cultural inertia is like a body in motion tending to stay in motion in the same direction unless acted on by an external force.

When it comes to habits David Mann tells the story of Smokey the Bear's campfire rules. Douse the fire with water, stir the coals and turn them over, then douse again. Not following the rules of Smokey the Bear you risk the fire restarting itself from the live embers that remain. Cultural habits are very much the same way.

A simple model for improvement could include unhook, change, and re-hook. Where the 3 steps of the process are defined:

Unhook – is the process of learning to change the activities in an organization. Create a situation whereby change is allowed to occur.
Change – this is where the actual improvement is implemented.
Re-hook – is about sustaining the new system by making new connections. Use techniques like standard work, visual control, and visits to the Gemba build new ways of doing things.

Without unhooking the old system we leave live embers that can be restarted at the first sign of difficulty. Change is hard and there will be challenges. To be successful and ensure the old fire doesn't restart we must learn to improve. When you face a new problem in your new system don't break the rules or revert back to old thinking. Use your Lean thinking to solve this new problem and improve your system. And whatever you do don't run two systems in parallel. Sometimes in an attempt to be cautious we are really just confusing the situation. Be brave and embrace the change if you want to improve.

Meet-up: Beyond Lean's Matt Wrye

Matt Wrye is the creator and prominent voice behind the blog Beyond Lean.  He is frequently highlighted in the monthly round-up and has been a frequent guest blogger. Now you can learn more about Matt from our Meet-up.

The goal of Meet-up is provide you an opportunity to meet some other influential voices in the Lean community. I have asked the following series of questions to which he has responded:

Who are you and what do you do?
My name is Matt Wrye. I am a internal lean consultant for a large consumer goods company. I am part of a group that is responsible for driving results for the company through lean thinking while transforming other areas of the business to lean thinking.

How and when did you learn Lean?
I started learning about lean in 1996 when I was doing an internship during college. My manager had me read "SMED" by Shigeo Shingo. My degree is in Industrial Engineering so there was a lot of lean concepts and tools I began to use. In 2001, I started working for an automotive supplier. The company's new President declared we were going to be lean. Three of us started reading and learning as much as we could and then went to the floor to try it. We made a ton of mistakes but had the opportunity to correct them. In 2007, when I switched jobs and was responsible for starting the lean initiative at a new company. At that time, I met Jamie Flinchbaugh. Jamie has been my coach for the last 5 years and during that time my understanding of the principles and thinking have developed to go along with the understanding of tools and concepts. It has been a long road.

How and why did you start blogging or writing about Lean?
I had two purposes when I started the blog. 1) Help get the message of lean out through the eyes of an implementer and 2) Improve my writing skills. I started by writing 3 or 4 guest blogs for Mark Graban at the Lean Blog. I couldn't stick to it though, so I took the plunge and started Beyond Lean to give more rigor to achieving the two purposes I outlined. I have found I really enjoy helping others learn. I hope I can provide them with information so they won't have to make the same mistakes I did.

What does Lean mean to you?
What a tough question. Lean is so big it is hard to capture what it really is or means, but here is my best shot about putting it into words. Lean is a way of thinking. It isn't about tools or concepts. It is about doing the right thing to add value for the customer in the least wasteful way while developing and respecting people.

What is the biggest myth or misconception of Lean?
Lean is not about eliminating waste. It is about adding value for the customer in order to grow revenue. In order to grow revenue and remain profitable though you want to eliminate waste so you can free up resources to use for new opportunities without having to add more resources/capital.

What is your current Lean passion, project, or initiative?
My passion is developing others' lean thinking. I really enjoy seeing others start to understand things through a lean lens.

Meet-up: 6 Questions to Learn of Those in Our Community

One of the things I am so found of in the Lean community is the general wiliness to share with each other. I have learned some much from my very experienced colleagues since I have been an active contributor. Every month I roundup the best Lean related posts and articles I found particularly valuable from these fellow bloggers. Each one has their own story and opinions and I want to share those with you in a new series I am calling the Meet-up.

The goal of Meet-up is provide you an opportunity to meet some other influential voices in the Lean community. I will ask these authors a series of questions:

1. Who are you and what do you do?
2. How and when did you learn Lean?
3. How and why did you start blogging or writing about Lean?
4. What does Lean mean to you?
5. What is the biggest myth or misconception of Lean?
6. What is your current Lean passion, project, or initiative?

Through the answers to these questions hopefully you will get a sense of the thinking behind those that are shaping the Lean landscape. I continue to keep learning and thankfully with the wiliness of these bloggers to share I am positive you will, too.

Stay tuned for the first Meet-up tomorrow.

Memorial Day is a Time for Remembrance

Memorial Day is a time to remember the men and women who died while serving in the United States Armed Forces. It is a day to celebrate former and present service members who protect our freedom .

“If you will not fight for right when you can easily win without bloodshed; if you will not fight when your victory is sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves.” -Winston Churchill

A special thanks to all those men and women who have so bravely and honorably served this country. The courage and sacrifice of all who died in military service will not be forgotten.

Hopefully, everybody can spend some quality time with their families and the people they love and remember what this holiday is truly about.

Lean Quote: Change Leaders Create Constancy of Purpose

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.

"Create constancy of purpose toward improvement of product and service, with the aim to become competitive and to stay in business and to provide jobs." — Deming

Lean leaders and those who manage change realize well that change is the only constant. Creating constancy of purpose towards improving work product and service levels is the basis of continual improvement.

Here are six strategies that Lean leaders should use to create a constancy of purpose and a constancy of change.

1. Embrace change, It’s inevitable. Be first, demonstrate personal commitment to serve.
2. Assume nothing and question everything. Challenge status quo, take action, and drive for results.
3. Get down in the trenches. Go to the Gemba, use teamwork, and learn see the whole situation.
4. Show integrity, always. Do the right things and be courageous in the face of challenge
5. Be transparent. Communicate well and get involved.
6. Inspire and recognize leadership in others. Great leaders know their primary role is to develop and motivate people.

It is our role as leaders to reinforce this cultural transformation in the workers perception of their work roles, to create structures for empowered workers to be accountable and successful, to communicate, support, reward and model this culture of engaged workers, helping to identify and resolve defects and eliminate waste. Leaders must be engaged and lead from "the shop floor" to use the manufacturing analogy. It is from this perspective that opportunities for improvement become evident daily, at a very granular level. This leader engagement is more than just taking a walk-around to ask how things are going.

Successful organizations require customer-centric purpose and continuous improvement around safety, quality, and innovation. And the catalysts for this are great leaders who understand the mechanism of change well.