Some Thoughts on Time

Links Section CICS is holding?Live LSS Green Belt 80 hour with coaching and projects training in the Greater Philadelphia, PA area starting Feb 8-9, 2024. Online Live Yellow Belt 16-hour training course starts March 12, 2024.

Learn how we build practitioners with our hands-on learning approach. Check out the CICS advantage today!

Visit the CICS LSS learning kits webstore to browse the kits we use in training. See why our kits are "Designed by trainers, for trainers." And, save during our January sale! Check it out today!

Start Here

The band, Chicago , famously asked the question, "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is? " and then proceeded to answer it with "25 or 6 to 4. " Check out the lyrics and guess the subject.

On Training Session Length

There's lots of debate about the best length of time for focused training topics, like Yellow Belt, Root Cause Analysis, or kaizen. The real choice for your training class is if it's?less than 4 hours, 8 hours or 16 hours long.

• 4 hours or less - "Overview so you can join a cocktail party conversation."
• 8 hours - "Here is the info and we'll review theory in class" vs
• 16 hours "Plus the addition of a project and homework between sessions"??

We all want to make training as short as possible. Make sure you understand the outcomes and why a "low-and-slow" approach is best for continuous improvement.

There's never enough time to do it right the first time but there's always time to do it over again.

On Lead Times

Why does Manufacturing have to make up for lead time slippage in the design cycle and customer approval ? The end date never seems to change even though there are delays throughout the process.

Some kinds of time:

• Lead time = cycle time + the sum of all delays in the process. It is the time that an internal (or external) customer waits after placing an order until receiving the item.
• Cycle time = Value-Added time + Non-Value-Added time (waste) (Pro tip: start counting at cycle start and continue counting until the next cycle start. Don't stop when the current cycle ends. All the things needed to be able to start the cycle again are included in cycle time.)
• Setup time = Time between the last product of the previous run and the first "known" good product of the next run. The setup person might get lucky on the first piece, and more often the 2nd, 3rd, (or 4th) pieces. That doesn't count. When they push the button knowing they'll get a good part, then the setup time clock is satisfied.

Non-value-added time is pure waste in the customers eyes. Think of the wasted effort in "re-doing" anything. We can remember the 8 wastes with the help of Tim P Wood .

(Pro tip: Download the poster and hang it anywhere you want to start a conversation about the way people work)

Why do we, as leaders, focus on items that "stop" the process and ignore issues that "slow down" the process? These issues are like "friction" in a machine, making it harder to get things done properly.

“Lost Time is never found again.” - Poor Richard’s Almanack, 1747

Time Spent in Training Online

People can focus in online training sessions for up to 4 hours if they have the following items:

• Frequent breaks
• Engaging content
• Methods to engage learners

An interesting instructor is nice to have, but is not a substitute for any of the above items.

Learning New Skills

The best way to learn a new skill and integrate it into your skillset is to practice it. After many years of experience, we've concluded that the best approach to is "Crawl, Walk, Run " to learn new skills.

If we're developing a new CI leader, after the classroom training, the prospective leader would be a participant in an event, the "Crawl." We debrief after the event and answer any questions they have.

The "Walk" occurs when the new leader takes a more active role in events and starts leading portions of the event. We coach improvements to performance and results throughout.

In the "Run" phase, the roles are reversed. The new leader takes the primary role in the event with the experienced facilitator providing guidance and answering questions during and after the event.

It may take fewer or more than 3 events to achieve competency, depending on the learner and the skills. Taking this approach to learning helps build practitioners who think and act like owners with confidence.

Q: Is there a bigger waste of time than "update" meetings? A: "Re-doing" any task comes to mind as a candidate

Measuring Time on the Fly

When starting my career an old time-study practitioner suggested that I learn how to count off 10 seconds accurately in my head (one-one thousand, two-one thousand, etc.) That way I could watch an operation and know how long it took, especially if I didn't have a stopwatch handy.

He was right as I've used that trick thousands of times in my career and personal life to know how long activities really take. (Pro tip: After a 20-count (20 seconds), start over from zero and add it up at the end for total time.)

Final Thoughts

Mick Jagger insisted that "Time is on My Side ," when singing about his lover and her ways. For most other people, it's more like Morpheus in "The Matrix" when he says "Time is always against us " and that's the way I feel about the topic.

Links Section CICS is holding?Live LSS Green Belt Training in the Greater Philadelphia, PA area starting Feb 8-9, 2024. Online Live Yellow Belt 16-hour training course starts March 12, 2024.

Learn how we build practitioners with our hands-on learning approach. Check out the CICS advantage today!

Visit the CICS LSS learning kits webstore to browse the kits we use in training. All have Quick Start Guides and most have exercise workbooks. See why our kits are "Designed by trainers, for trainers." And, save during our January sale! Check it out today!