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POLL: What is the source of improvement activity in your company?

POLL QUESTION: What is the source of improvement activity in your company?

For most companies, the pull for improvement activity and the source of ideas comes from a variety of sources. As a company becomes more sophisticated, Lean efforts originate from an increasingly diverse range of systems and stakeholders.

From the list below, please check all the sources that act as meaningful originators of improvement activity in your company. Please do not check a block if the source only contributes on rare occasions or if it provides ideas without resolution.

By Jeff Hajek, ago

What is the best way to teach your team about Lean?

What is the best way to teach your team about Lean? Because our website provides such a wide range of Lean training materials, this is one of the most common questions that I am asked. The flexibility of our training modules means that instructors have to make more decisions about how to put all the materials to use. I tend to answer this question with a question. In response, I ask, “What are you trying to Read more…

By Jeff Hajek, ago

Team

In its purest form, the definition of a team is “a group of people associated with each other for some form of joint action or activity.” The word choice for this definition is very deliberate. Some definitions add in verbiage that implies effectiveness. Examples include “common goal”, “working together”, “organized”, “focused”, etc. That terminology is misleading, as not all teams agree on common goals, and there may be teams that are unfocused. Of course, teams Read more…

By Jeff Hajek, ago

Volunteers

Volunteering plays a big role in continuous improvement. In many organizations, training is provided, but may not be mandatory. Prospective students may have to sign up for a “Corporate University” rather than be directed to attend by their supervisor. Projects are also often filled first with willing participants. Efforts to improve one’s job may be appreciated by leaders, but might not be required. There is a big benefit to using volunteers to drive your continuous Read more…

By Jeff Hajek, ago

Supervision

Supervision is the act of providing oversight to people or processes. The amount of direct supervision required is generally inversely proportionate to the structure of the operation. What that means is simply this: if you have strong processes, people have less of a need for supervisors telling them what to do next. That’s not to say a strong process eliminates the need for supervision. You still need leaders who are present to help deal with Read more…

By Jeff Hajek, ago

Time Management

Time management is the act of consciously planning out how one spends the hours and minutes of a day. For structured, repetitive production work, most people tend to be fairly good at managing their time. When the demand is not so consistent, though, people tend to squander a lot more of this precious resource. Time management has two basic aspects to it. The first is that you have to be selective in what you do. Read more…

By Jeff Hajek, ago

Pareto, Vilfredo

Vilfredo Pareto (July 15, 1848 – August 19, 1923) was an Italian thinker who practiced many disciplines. He was an engineer and philosopher, but he is most well-known for his work in economics. It was his work in that field that led to the development of one of the most commonly used tools in continuous improvement. In his study on the distribution of land ownership, he observed that a small percentage of people owned the Read more…

By Jeff Hajek, ago

Where should we start our Lean effort?

Where should we start our Lean effort? There are two basic ways to approach this question. The first is functional, as in which department is the best location to start with. The other is hierarchical, meaning the level within the organization. The short answer is that the best approach I have seen is one of opportunity. For the area to start in, let me begin by saying I am an advocate of starting out by piloting Read more…

By Jeff Hajek, ago

Vacations

Vacations and holidays are an important part of job satisfaction and employee retention. They provide employees an opportunity to recharge their batteries and to live their lives outside of work. Managing vacations can be difficult in any company, but the challenge can be amplified in a Lean organization where there is very little excess capacity and very structured work. With a good strategy, though, the impact can be reduced substantially. First of all, let’s look Read more…

By Jeff Hajek, ago

Staffing

Staffing in a Lean organization is a bit different than it would be in most other companies. First of all, in general, a Lean organization will need fewer people to do the same amount of work that is done in a non-Lean company. But there is more to it than just that. You cannot just harvest all of the gains that you make with your improvements. There are some additional requirements that come from focusing Read more…

By Jeff Hajek, ago