LEAN, NOT MEAN: TAKE THE WORK OUT What It Means Many organizations pay lip service to slogans proclaiming that their people are their most valuable asset. It sounds nice and it can make you feel all warm and fuzzy, but is it real? For that sentiment to mean something, it needs to be about more than just valuing your employees and wanting to make your organization a great place to work. It needs to be about leveraging the skills and ideas of every team member to strengthen the organization and find better ways of doing work. This means that building strong teams needs to be a top priority. That starts with fostering a culture that encourages and rewards the open sharing of ideas and takes concrete steps to empower workers with voice and dignity. Why It Matters Managers must look beyond the numbers and think like leaders. They must embrace their role in supporting every team member in order to maximize their performance. Many operational problems don't need to be solved through expensive changes to equipment or large-scale logistical or operational reforms. They can be solved simply by listening to the people closest to the work. Not leveraging the team's strengths to drive operational improvements leaves managers in an isolated and lonely place. Those seeking operational excellence shouldn't expect to fix everything on their own. They must use every resource they have, and the most valuable resource of all is the people on the teams who actually do the work. THE CHALLENGE AND OPPORTUNITY FOR MANAGERS Whether you work in a services, government, not-for-profit, manufacturing, or healthcare organization, wasteful activities are likely undermining the efficiency of your work. 7 types of waste were identified several decades ago by Taiichi Ohno at Toyota: Transportation -- Moving materials or information unnecessarily Inventory -- Too much work in progress or patients waiting in line within a hospital Motion -- Unnecessarily moving, traveling, walking, and searching for something not easily accessible Waiting -- Inability to process work because people are waiting for other people, equipment, or information Over-processing -- Performing unnecessary processing steps that do not add value Over-production -- Producing more than is needed, or earlier than needed by the next process Defects - Defective output and rework because it was not done right the first time Later on, in the 1990s, James Womack came up with the 8th type of waste - Skills under-utilization. An example would be an engineer or scientist spending over 85% of the time doing administrative documentation. The acronym TIM WOODS can be used to remind you of the eight types of waste. As a manager, do you see any of these types of waste occurring in your organization? Think about the end-to-end processes or value streams in your organization. How much of your value stream really adds value? Are there non-value-added (NVA) activities? The challenge for managers is to identify an organization's wastes, quantify the cost of wastes, and prioritize the improvement opportunities. Your efforts could be focused on a department, a work area, a process, or an entire value stream. You can address these Lean opportunities with Lean projects, such as Work-Outs or Kaizen events, to launch a change initiative. You can then reinforce the gains with procedures, metrics, KPIs, and rewards and recognition, all of which should be fully aligned to reinforce the right behaviors LEAN MANUFACTURING AND OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT Imagine you're washing dishes when your wedding ring slips off your finger and falls into the murky dishwater. You could fumble around amongst the dishes and blindly search for the ring. Or you could twist the drain knob to safely drain the water, knowing your ring is too large to slip through the grate at the bottom of the sink. With the water gone, the ring will be right there. Seems obvious, right? Well, this kind of problem solving has become obvious to more and more companies, evolving into what we call the philosophy of Lean. Like draining the water so you can find your ring, Lean is the process of making what adds value obvious by reducing everything else. Lean methodology is transforming companies and organizations in services, manufacturing, government, and healthcare. Let's take a look at just one example. Improving Patient Flow by Reducing Waste The otolaryngology department at Johns Hopkins Outpatient Center had problems. Registration lines were long, waiting rooms were crowded, and it was becoming increasingly difficult to start appointments on time. Something had to be done to improve service to the center's clients while reducing waste and cost. The methodology chosen to address the center's issues was Lean. The center's processes were mapped, while the team chosen to address the clinic's problems used a variety of different tools to identify waste. They then implemented a series of process changes to reduce that waste. For example, staffing patterns for the front desk were changed to better align with patient flow, reducing lines. Ultimately, applying Lean methodology to waste reduction in the clinic produced a 44 percent increase in on-time appointment commencements. TPS and the Roots of Lean The roots of Lean can be traced back to the automobile manufacturer Toyota. The United States first became aware of the Toyota Production System, or TPS, in the 1970s. TPS is a manufacturing system whose philosophy centers on the complete elimination of all waste in all aspects of production. The most officient methode are of the company'e cativition Just-in-Time (JIT) is a philosophy of waste elimination. It is based on making and supplying "only what is needed, when it is needed, and in the amount needed." Each process produces only what is required by the next process in a continuous flow, ideally with no shortages, no overages, and very little ongoing materials inventory. The 3 Operating Elements of JIT JIT is comprised of 3 operating elements: the pull system, Takt, and continuous flow. Another concept, Kanban, plays a key role across all three elements. - Kanban is the Japanese word for "sign" or "card." Kanban is something that sends a pull signal - a notice to personnel operating in a JIT environment that it is time to produce or replenish something and consists of a card, container, or a simple square marked with tape. An empty Kanban from a downstream station signals the worker to produce. If the Kanban is not empty, the operator does not act because, in a JIT system, it is not time to replenish that item. In this system, production is pulled by downstream stations and eventually by customers. Takt is the German word for drumbeat. The rate or pace of JIT production is timed to the pace - or Takt - of customer demand. WOMACK AND JONES' 5-STEP LEAN THINKING TRANSFORMATION Lean Thinking and the Value Stream "Lean" was coined by authors James P. Womack and Daniel T. Jones in 1996. Their book, Lean Thinking, explains that the value stream is central to Lean methodology. A value stream, you will recall, comprises all those activities and actions required to bring a product from concept to launch and from order to delivery. This includes actions to process information and to transform the product from raw inputs to finished goods.