Who holds the key to sustainment?- Practical Leadership Tips

In every class I teach, sustainment is always a concern.  Folks want to know how to sustain improvement activities, usually focusing on techniques.

A better first question might be, “Who holds the key to sustainment?”  Many researchers found a lack of management commitment to be the primary cause of lean implementation failures.  So, do we blame managers?  What did they do wrong?

Power (2011) provides insight into this problem, reminding us that the concepts of push and pull apply to more than just inventory control.  If managers try to push improvements, they may not be well received.

Instead, Power describes how Toyota pulls improvements from the front line using three key elements:

Context- Everyone in the culture needs to understand the importance of improvement and its effect on the organization.  Of course, this requires managers to create an environment of mutual trust and respect.  Out of this environment of mutual benefit, employees will make suggestions out of a sense of pride and a desire to create a better work environment.

Management Process- Improvement ideas don’t magically happen.    The two most common suggestion system failures are Lack of Response and Lack of Timely Response.  Leaders must explicitly create a process where ideas come up from the bottom and are implemented in a timely manner.  The suggestions also need to tie into the overall organizational goals. For example, a suggestion might address a productivity idea for installing a bolt two seconds faster.  The improvement process should track how this two second improvement will result in one more shippable unit per day with the associated revenue gain.

People-  By developing people’s knowledge, skills, and abilities, they are more prepared and capable to offer improvement suggestions.  Their ability to solve problems is based in their knowledge of the process, commitment to standards, and supervisor support.

The challenge for most companies is create an intentional system that addresses context, management process, and people development.  Changing your organization will required management to understand and value front line contributions.  If you value their suggestions, it will require commitment to provide resources and to listen to their inputs.  The core of any successful improvement process begins with developing the knowledge, skills, and abilities of the team members so they are ready to face the challenges within the workplace.

How are you doing with pulling ideas from the front line?  Do you have a plan for how you will use the three elements to gradually improve your improvement culture?

david

Power, B. (2011, June 24). How Toyota pulls improvement from the front line. Retrieved 9/6/11 from: http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/06/how_toyota_pulls_improvement_f.html