Raising The Bar

A long time ago there was a discussion that left a mark on me. As a freshly graduated engineer, I was visiting a plant with a friend when suddenly he approached an associate and started asking questions related to the work method he was employing. After arguing over the pertinence of that method, the associate replied “I know better, I have been working this way for 20 years!”. The answer surprised the associate and I: “It’s been 20 years you are doing it the wrong way”. I never imagined I could find myself in the awkward position the associate was in, until…

… many years later, it was the end of October. The company I was working for was undergoing a Lean Transformation and as a member of the Kaizen Promotion Office, I was helping a new colleague to perform observations and time studies on our most complex product family. We did this for some time, as the volumes were pretty low and the products were built from several subassemblies with long cycle times. The effort paid off – lots of good data, lots of opportunities identified.

I worked hard to figure out what the new cell should look like (I even remember scissor-cutting scaled mock-ups) because it required synchronization between more than half dozen operators. Once I finished, I showed it to my new colleague. With his help, we put the findings and the solution on paper and then the two of us presented to the plant manager. Everything was there: layout, required equipment, number of operators, material and operator movement – all backed up with data. I remember the plant manager being extremely impressed with our work, congratulating us and talking about the implementation plan. Before starting the implementation, we had a visit from my Lean teacher.

 I could feel something was not right when I showed my Lean teacher “the solution” with the implementation plan. The tone of the voice and the facial expression were icy: “Well, why do you think it’s not a good idea to do it this way?”. My brain struggled a bit over the lack of enthusiasm I was facing, but the answer was quick: “because people will not engage into something coming from someone else …”. Close enough - this saved me from being torn apart. What I must admit though, my answer came out automatically, from an intellectual perspective (we all know the right answers, right?) rather than from deep, practical belief. I was really not trusting the team’s ability to come up with an effective solution, so I found myself in the awkward position of performing the work they should have performed. Ouch! That was the instant I realized I was practicing the wrong method and I needed, professionally, to raise the bar.

 So, how to avoid going down the wrong path?

•  Seek feedback from someone who knows better. There’s no substitute for having a real Lean teacher - period. Now, that being said, we can still find good reference points in books, for instance this one, which nails the teachings of probably the greatest Lean teacher alive.
•  Apply Lean fundamentals to how you work. Don’t forget - Respect for people is not just for management to pursue. We, Lean proponents, need to embrace it too - this will greatly improve our ability to facilitate and coach. In my case, not trusting people’s ability to improve went against this fundamental.
•  Be open to challenge your current method. This is of out-most importance. When trying to cope with leadership’s desire for fast action, Lean proponents can find themselves in an uncomfortable position, where Lean fundamentals get compromised. For example, doing time studies on someone else’s work, designing someone else’s work space or putting in place pull signals for someone else …. Serious self-questioning is recommended.

 Epilogue

I started making changes in my approach right after the “aha” moment. The week long improvement effort for our most complex product family was held in December and from my perspective, it was the most successful during the period I stayed with the company, as the new cell worked very close to Takt Time from day one, better than all the other cells. All this time, I kept the October documentation locked in my drawer, so no one can see it… The team proved me wrong.

To learn more on what it takes to have a Lean Transformation delivering sustained business benefits please visit: