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The Blue Yarn

October 8, 2018 by Chris Scherer Leave a Comment

 


So, the blue yarn. What does it mean?

The best way to understand the blue yarn is to follow it. That’s exactly what Dr. Gary Kaplan did. In 1998, he was CEO of Virginia Mason Medical Center, which was losing money. As he searched for a better system to manage the hospital, he ‘wound up’ at a Toyota factory in Japan where he spoke to a sensei familiar with the Toyota Production System.

What he found was something very simple that, at the time, had been around for nearly 100 years. Sakichi Toyoda developed a self-correcting loom that could stop when thread was broken or defective. They ultimately automated the process and made it mistake-proof. This process is called Jidoka, or autonomation, and means automation with human intelligence.

Why Jidoka?

Jidoka is important because it stops a process immediately when a problem first occurs. Not only does it fix the condition, but it ultimately eliminates the root cause of the problem or defect. In an automated Jidoka process, equipment monitors its output (products) independently from operators, thereby enabling operators to operate multiple pieces of equipment and improve productivity.

Why the blue yarn?

Back to the hospital. The sensei used the blue yarn to map the path a patient would follow in a visit through cancer treatment. What they found was a mess. Cancer patients were already low on time and energy, but this ‘process’ had them winding all over the building in a seemingly needless pattern: a waste of time and energy.

When they ‘re-mapped’ the process, the savings from insurance expense alone were 37% and they were able to increase the number of patients without additional staff. Ultimately, they reduced patient receive treatment time by 50%. Dozens of hospitals have since adopted the Virginia Mason Production System. Based on a recent study of US hospitals, for two years Virginia Mason has placed in the top one percent in safety and efficiency.

Clearly, the flow of the process is one piece of the puzzle. Of equal importance is the decision to enable employees to: monitor a process, identify defects, stop the process, fix the problem, identify the root cause, and, ultimately, help eliminate the root cause of defects.

Imagine following a blue yarn through every step of one of your processes, including mistakes, corrections, delays, handoffs, miscommunications, etc. Recurring mistakes building on other recurring mistakes will create a big mess. Now imagine every person in that process having the ability to address those gaps and improve the process. Addressing the root cause will build a mistake-free and efficient process that is much cleaner and direct.

There is a method to achieve this. It starts with:

  • Clarity around your dream or whatever it is you want from your business (i.e., ultimate business outcome and whatever ‘freedom’ means to you)
  • Your mindset to achieve your dream
  • Your decision to use a methodology and management system to bring your dream to life.

 

Ready to achieve your dream?

  • Email me so that we can learn more about your business: chrisscherer@ceofocusmi.com
  • Join our Facebook group for key insights: https://www.facebook.com/groups/StressfulToSuccessful/

 

Listen to the original story

Here: 99% Invisible – The Blue Yarn

Filed Under: 0 Organizational Profile, 0.2 Organizational Situation, 0.2c Performance Improvement System, 3 Customers, 3.1 Voice of the Customer, 3.2 Customer Engagement, 3.2a Product Offerings and Customer Support, 3.2a.(1) Product Offerings, 3.2a.(2) Customer Support, 3.2b Customer Relationships, 3.2b.(1) Relationship Management, 3.2b.(2) Complaint Management, 4 Measurement, Analysis, and Knowledge Management, 4.1 Measurement, Analysis, and Improvement of Organizational Performance, 4.1a Performance Measurement, 4.1b Performance Analysis and Review, 4.1c Performance Improvement, 4.1c(1) Best Practices, 4.1c(3) Continuous Improvement and Innovation, 4.2 Knowledge Management, Information, and Information Technology, 4.2a Organizational Knowledge, 5 Workforce, 5.1 Workforce Environment, 5.2 Workforce Engagement, 6 Operations, 6.1 Work Processes, 6.1a Product and Process Design, 6.1b Process Management, 6.1c Innovation Management, 6.2 Operational Effectiveness, 7 Results, 7.1 Product and Process Results, 7.2 Customer-Focused Results, 7.2a Customer Satisfaction, A Core Values and Concepts, A.01 Systems Perspective, A.03 Customer-Focused Excellence, A.04 Valuing People, A.05 Organizational Learning and Agility, A.06 Focus on Success, A.07 Managing for Innovation, A.11 Delivering Value and Results, Uncategorized

Will Your Business Be Sold Or Will It Fold?

January 17, 2018 by Chris Scherer Leave a Comment

Did you know?

  • Approximately 50% of businesses fail within five years
  • Over 70% of businesses are owned by Baby Boomers who are nearing retirement and most will never find a buyer
  • Over 80% of these Baby Boomer Businesses are not “transaction ready”.
  • Only 4-5% of businesses listed are actually sold in any one quarter (BizBuySell.com).
  • Over 70% of businesses sold fail to meet the expectations of the buyer.

Filed Under: 2 Strategy, 3 Customers, 4.2b Data, Information, and Information Technology, 5 Workforce, 6 Operations, 7 Results, 7.5 Financial and Market Results, A.08 Managing by Fact

Are You Vulnerable

October 17, 2017 by Chris Scherer Leave a Comment

The primary goal of leadership is to have influence. Leaders should have the answers. They don’t need help. Right?

Wrong. Attaining leadership is more complicated than it might seem. How about leading through power and authority? Lead the way. This, too, has inherent limitations.

Why? What if he doesn’t know the way? What if this (whatever-it-is) has never been done? Power and authority only get you so far. They have a limited sphere of influence. They can maintain the status quo and strengthen boundaries. They might even extend borders, build strong walls, control or mitigate bad outcomes, contain and constrain you-name-it. A leader who wields power and authority to get stuff done inherently imposes his ‘way’, which is, by definition, limited.

On the other hand, the leader who has the courage to be vulnerable immediately creates opportunity for all possibilities. She opens the door to the unknown. She invites change, collaboration, discovery, evolution, growth, innovation, invention, questioning, transformation, and transparency.

The leader’s job is to enable this environment and provide a framework within which her team can influence reaching whatever goal lies ahead.

Are you courageous enough to be vulnerable?

Courtesy: Glenn Lopis at Entrepreneur

Filed Under: 0.1a Organizational Environment, 1 Leadership, 1.1 Senior Leadership, 2 Strategy, 4.1c Performance Improvement, 4.1c(1) Best Practices, 4.1c(2) Future Performance, 4.1c(3) Continuous Improvement and Innovation, 4.2 Knowledge Management, Information, and Information Technology, 4.2a Organizational Knowledge, 5 Workforce, 5.1 Workforce Environment, 5.2 Workforce Engagement, 6.1c Innovation Management, 7.4 Leadership and Governance Results, A Core Values and Concepts, A.01 Systems Perspective, A.02 Visionary Leadership, A.04 Valuing People, A.05 Organizational Learning and Agility, A.06 Focus on Success, A.07 Managing for Innovation, A.10 Ethics and Transparency, A.11 Delivering Value and Results

Who’s In Charge – Taking Ownership

August 16, 2017 by Richard Doyle Leave a Comment

There was a disruption in your business recently and now it is time to do an analysis and report to your Board about the incident. This is your chance to be a Leader or demonstrate that you may not be in charge of your business.

I was working with a client recently and, during a break, I was having a quick conversation with their Director of Finance. He told me how much respect he had for the CEO, and I asked why. He told me that each month he attends the Board Meetings with the CEO to cover off the financial aspects of the business.

He told me that anytime the CEO needed to advise the Board on any recent challenges, he never once pointed the finger at any of the employees. The CEO’s only comment, when asked who had the problem, was that he is in charge and the buck stops here. The Director of Finance also told me that when there was a great accomplishment to discuss, the CEO always gave credit to the employee or employees involved.

After a few meetings, the Director of Finance mentioned what he was observing and hearing to his peers on the management team. They were stunned, they had never worked for a person who was quite like this CEO.

What a great example of a Leader!! Take a look in the mirror and ask yourself if you could be compared to that CEO.

If you are the CEO, President, Owner or Founder, you are in charge. Do you act like it? Do you have the kind of respect and trust that this CEO’s team and Board obviously have of him?

If not, then Who’s in Charge?

Filed Under: 1 Leadership, 1.1 Senior Leadership, 5 Workforce, 5.1 Workforce Environment, 7 Results, 7.4 Leadership and Governance Results, A Core Values and Concepts, A.04 Valuing People

Soft Skills in Leadership

July 24, 2017 by Jim Adkins Leave a Comment

Throughout my career I’ve focused on practical and objective business skills as I transitioned from an engineer to a program manager to a Six Sigma champion to a sourcing professional. However, as an executive leading from a strategic vantage point, I find that soft skills contribute more to success than reams of results and objective data. Aligning functions and establishing partnerships create an atmosphere for better communication, greater teamwork and, ultimately, greater success for supply management and the overall company.

Create a Positive Environment

However, coupling soft skills with transparency, alignment, partnership and accountability can be transformative for any organization. Following is an examination of the importance of those elements and the roles they play in successful leadership.

Transparency. Fear often is created by a simple lack of information. When direct reports are unaware of your goals or how those goals may affect them, the tendency is to “fill in the gaps,” which fuels worry and uncertainty in an organization. A leader should effectively and frequently communicate the goals and objectives of a change initiative, explaining how the change will affect and improve the organization. Transparency also has the added benefit of creating a better understanding of the need for change.

Alignment. Alignment speaks to the “what’s-in-it-for-me” thought process that most people share. Consider how large troop movements are conducted during warfare. The troops are aligned and move in a coordinated and synchronized manner. This concept can carry over to the business world. Aligning separate, functional elements throughout a company requires that each group understands how their contributions support the company and advance their own careers. There is a greater chance for success by finding and creating this “skin-in-the-game” perspective.

I have used the concept of “servant leadership” to help me meet this element. How to first meet the most important needs of others. When I joined a company with a highly engineered product line, I knew that engineering support was critical to our success in supply chain and cost reduction. In my first meeting with the VP of Engineering, I simply asked, “What can Sourcing do for you?” He responded with, “Please improve the turnaround time on quotes, it is way too high.” I employed transparency, tracked and reported on each and every buyer and their individual time to respond to quotes. Over the next three weeks, we went from an average of 60 days to nine days for response. When I recalibrated with him after a month, he was happy and excited and said, “That is the first time Sourcing has ever come to ask Engineering what we can do for you, and I like it.” Our relationship and our results have continued to grow using the same philosophy.

Partnership. True partnerships can only occur when the internal business units are informed and synchronized. For example, when a highly engineered product goes through a cost-reduction initiative, the project can’t be successful unless the engineering, operations, marketing and procurement teams work as partners. Several years ago, I was in charge of a project to reduce costs of a product line. More than 2,000 ideas were generated from staff, but were considered because a partnership among various functions had not been formed. Marketing, for example, rejected many ideas claiming that customers would never accept some of the suggested changes. The engineering department, which had to approve any proposed changes, became defensive about changing the original design plans.

Thus, the project was relaunched for greater success — only this time we changed the approach. Support from senior level management and all functional leaders was conveyed throughout the company. Functional leaders met weekly with their staffs, which kept visibility high and allowed for transparency and alignment. A clearly communicated mandate for cost reduction was issued by senior management. It also was decided the results would be scored by the finance department, which other business units considered an impartial function. We required that all ideas be judged objectively, and found that previously unacceptable ideas were harder to criticize. The result was a high approval rate of the same or similar ideas generated during our first attempt. There also was a better acceleration of results due to partnering and alignment of resources across all functions.

Accountability. Accountability, which includes tracking, monitoring and reporting successes and failures, is an area where many companies fall short. Too often, there is a lack of clear ownership of a task, project or initiative. We all know that “when everyone is responsible, no one is responsible.” That’s why I believe holding others accountable also requires us, as supply chain leaders, to hold ourselves accountable. Without accountability, it is difficult to achieve true success. In the cost reduction example discussed previously, a senior executive was selected to champion each project to be certain that someone owned the end result.

Trust Holds It Together. Transparency, alignment, partnership and accountability are important to successful strategic leadership, but the glue that holds them all together is trust. If a leader at any level in the organization has a hidden agenda or fails to be a true partner, none of the four elements will be effective because trust will have been lost. Ethical behavior and demonstrated consistency is critical for effective leadership.

I recall an incident when a senior procurement leader at a decentralized organization rolled out a purchasing card program to nine separate business unit presidents. He failed to mention the program included a 2% surcharge on the card’s use that would help fund the creation of a centralized procurement organization. When the business leaders realized they had not been consulted or given the option to approve the use of money from their operating budgets, the establishment of a centralized procurement department ceased and ultimately reversed. Because of a hidden agenda and an ethical lapse, trust was lost.

Strong, successful leadership involves many skill sets, and when those skills combine with a leader’s commitment to transparency, alignment, partnership and accountability, amazing results can follow.

Filed Under: 1 Leadership, 1.1 Senior Leadership, 2 Strategy, 2.2 Strategy Implementation, 5 Workforce, 5.2 Workforce Engagement, 6 Operations, 6.1 Work Processes, 6.1a Product and Process Design, 6.1b Process Management, 6.1c Innovation Management, 6.2 Operational Effectiveness, A Core Values and Concepts, A.01 Systems Perspective, A.04 Valuing People, A.05 Organizational Learning and Agility, A.06 Focus on Success, A.08 Managing by Fact, A.11 Delivering Value and Results

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Categories

  • 0 Organizational Profile
  • 0.1 Organizational Description
  • 0.1a Organizational Environment
  • 0.1a.(2) Mission, Vision, and Values
  • 0.1a.(3) Workforce Profile
  • 0.1b Organizational Relationships
  • 0.1b.(1) Organizational Structure
  • 0.1b.(2) Customers and Stakeholders
  • 0.1b.(3) Suppliers and Partners
  • 0.2 Organizational Situation
  • 0.2a Competitive Environment
  • 0.2c Performance Improvement System
  • 1 Leadership
  • 1.1 Senior Leadership
  • 1.2 Governance and Societal Responsibilities
  • 2 Strategy
  • 2.2 Strategy Implementation
  • 3 Customers
  • 3.1 Voice of the Customer
  • 3.2 Customer Engagement
  • 3.2a Product Offerings and Customer Support
  • 3.2a.(1) Product Offerings
  • 3.2a.(2) Customer Support
  • 3.2a.(3) Customer Segmentation
  • 3.2b Customer Relationships
  • 3.2b.(1) Relationship Management
  • 3.2b.(2) Complaint Management
  • 4 Measurement, Analysis, and Knowledge Management
  • 4.1 Measurement, Analysis, and Improvement of Organizational Performance
  • 4.1a Performance Measurement
  • 4.1b Performance Analysis and Review
  • 4.1c Performance Improvement
  • 4.1c(1) Best Practices
  • 4.1c(2) Future Performance
  • 4.1c(3) Continuous Improvement and Innovation
  • 4.2 Knowledge Management, Information, and Information Technology
  • 4.2a Organizational Knowledge
  • 4.2b Data, Information, and Information Technology
  • 5 Workforce
  • 5.1 Workforce Environment
  • 5.2 Workforce Engagement
  • 6 Operations
  • 6.1 Work Processes
  • 6.1a Product and Process Design
  • 6.1b Process Management
  • 6.1c Innovation Management
  • 6.2 Operational Effectiveness
  • 7 Results
  • 7.1 Product and Process Results
  • 7.2 Customer-Focused Results
  • 7.2a Customer Satisfaction
  • 7.3 Workforce-Focused Results
  • 7.4 Leadership and Governance Results
  • 7.5 Financial and Market Results
  • 7.5a Financial Performance
  • 7.5b Marketplace Performance
  • A Core Values and Concepts
  • A.01 Systems Perspective
  • A.02 Visionary Leadership
  • A.03 Customer-Focused Excellence
  • A.04 Valuing People
  • A.05 Organizational Learning and Agility
  • A.06 Focus on Success
  • A.07 Managing for Innovation
  • A.08 Managing by Fact
  • A.10 Ethics and Transparency
  • A.11 Delivering Value and Results
  • Baldrige
  • FAQs – Frequently Asked Questions
  • Uncategorized

Recent Posts

  • The Blue Yarn
  • Crisis Management & how to overcome it
  • Creating a Learning Organization
  • Four Barriers to Business Transformation
  • CEO Habits to Develop in 2018
  • Will Your Business Be Sold Or Will It Fold?
  • Measure Your KPI’s
  • Avoiding Blind Spots
  • Who’s In Charge
  • Dream of Selling

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