Responding to requests

I am increasingly asked by clients and potential clients for simple guides that explain about the different approaches to improvement (which I generally view as Lean, Six Sigma and Risk Management).

In responding to these requests, I have completed three e-books as follows:

• Lean for Practitioners - a guide for practitioners and those tasked with leading Lean Improvements to the secrets of Lean and how to implement it in the service sector and NHS
• Introduction to Lean, Six Sigma & Risk Management - a beginners text on each of the three approaches to improvement and how they can be integrated
• Sustaining Lean Improvement - looking at the four aspects of successful Lean and how to engage the team, transform cultures and sustain improvements, this guide is for advanced users of Lean and for those who's Lean Improvement Programmes have stalled

For further details and an order form, drop me an email via our website (www.amnis-uk.com).

I look forward to hearing from you and wish you a Happy New Year.

A balanced approach to consulting

I was reflecting during a discussion with a client this week about different approaches to consulting.

At the one extreme is complete 'facilitative' Consulting - which is all about helping the team to work together to find the way forward but not providing much in the way of structure. In some environments this is a very valuable approach to consulting, normally where the team has a known outcome and they have the skills to get there and need a neutral chairman to sort it out. However, in most improvement environments this approach is far too passive as the team often need guidance on how to move forward and the next steps to take.

At the other extreme is the 'directive' approach to consulting, what is often termed the 'Screaming Sensei' who instructs the team what to do and then makes sure it happens. In some extreme environments (such as a high risk environment when safety is at risk and the Sensei is an expert or where insurmountable obstacles are being presented to improvement) but generally the Screaming Sensei will be far too directive for sustainable improvement to occur and will normally lead to quick gains that disappear just as quick as soon as the pressure is removed.

Life needs to be in balance between these two extremes. Successful consulting, where improvements are to be sustained, need to provide the support of a facilitative approach and the expert guidance of the directive approach, but without the extremes of behaviour of either end.

What are you looking for in your consultant?

From products to services

I was chairing a meeting of the IOM's Operations Development Panel (ODP) this afternoon at Cranfield University. The ODP aims to shape thinking in Operations Management across a range of sectors and one of the topics we were exploring was 'Product Servicisation' which is where companies look to stop selling products and start selling competences.

The classic example is Rolls Royce who sell 'power by the hour' on their aero-engines, so clients have access to the value (a working engine) but avoid the liability. For many companies trying to compete on price, this approach offers the option to differentiate themselves in the market, although it requires careful planning on cashflow and having a robust model.

Cranfield are working on a two year research programme to look at the most effective way of helping companies to 'servicise' their operations and also helping service sector companies to develop products that sell and I look forward to supporting them in this research.

Making that final investment decision

Even though many organisations are seriously unhappy with their organisational performance there is always a certain level of doubt about making an investment to make it better.

For most organisations investing in a physical piece of equipment seems to be much more palatable - yet investing in expert consultancy or training support at a fraction of the cost is often subjected to more scrutiny. I know the argument that if you have a piece of equipment it has a residual value - but that is the folly of many purchases as it is often extremely difficult to realise the value that second hand equipment have on the books!

I suppose the concern comes from whether or not you are buying quality support and consulting, unlike many commodity items, is not the same irrespective of the price. I will explain this point - you would expect a TV you purchased for £50 to work as much as you would a TV for £5,000 - the picture and features might be different but fundamentally they will both work. In consulting terms the same is not true - you can pay £50 and get a 'non functioning product' - much the same as you can for a £5,000 consulting project!

This does not make it easier to buy consulting, it actually makes it harder! Coming back to the first point I made, it is very difficult to make a decision about consultancy and many, many organisations have been caught out by being sold the 'corporate package' by a well dressed partner only to have the service delivered by a poor quality graduate.

To make the right decisions I would suggest the following five points:

1. Ask who will deliver the project - and meet them to ensure you like them
2. Buy in stages (with get out clauses) so you can terminate if you are not happy
3. Understand exactly the process/methodology they will follow
4. Ask for references - they don't all need to be directly relevant but they do need to 'stack up'
5. Get 1st hand feedback from the people working with the consultants on a regular basis

Of course, you could always go and spend £500,000 on a machine - but I would always say pay £5,000 on consultancy to identify whether you need to actually buy the equipment at all!

Repetition and (no) Deviation creates Hestitation

Stealing shamelessly from BBC Radio 4's 'Just a Minute', I have modified the rules for the game to highlight a problem that came up in a workshop I was attending today at Earl's Court.

Doing the same thing over and over again makes people an expert at undertaking that task, but in the longer term - when variation is required - this repetition creates a 'furrow' into which people channel their energies - making it hard for them to create the new patterns of working that are needed.

In the worst cases, the desire to continue doing what has been done before (without deviation) delays the organisation's ability to react to the changing circumstances and prevents improvement. This hesitation can be devastating to the long term health of the organisation.

The cure is often hard bear for some people in that it requires them to accept (and perhaps even value) failure, errors and divergent thinking - something that people normally get fired for in many corporates!

But to be clear, this disruption is different to devastation - which will be the topic of a later post!

Strategy Drives Improvement?

Earlier this week I was due to run a workshop but because of a mix up I had to allow someone else to do it for me.

The topic was to explore the linkage between Strategy and Improvement and in planning for the event (which ultimately I did not undertake), I was given the time to reflect on another reason why improvement programmes go wrong - this being that the various areas improved have no impact on the organisational trajectory and therefore the net effect is like the proverbial 'arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic'.

An example I was made aware of was given me by a friend last night who had worked with one of the 'Big 5' consultancies and had been tasked with transforming the administrative processes in the business's headquarters in Switzerland. Very quickly he realised that the real problems lay with the root and branch sales activities which were spread out across Europe. However, he diligently worked through the improvement programme, charging some £500k, and the overall effect on the bottom line was nothing as the company ran out of cash and closed.

This demonstrates that if you choose to improve the wrong thing, you will improve nothing! Therefore, being clear about the Strategic Issues facing the business is almost more important that rapidly moving to action and actually doing something!

Increase in Productivity or Increase in Intrusion?

I am writing this on a train coming back from a business development weekend in Scotland - the train is moving and I am sitting here wondering whether the fact that I have cleared my emails, dealt with a client proposal for the NHS and am now writing a blog entry is an increase in productivity or just an increase in the levels of intrusion into my 'personal space'.

At present, I am feeling quite good about the experience in that I know when I finally get home at around midnight tonight that I will not have to deal with any emails and can just go to bed -but if I were here with a friend, had a good book to read or just did not feel like working, I would probably feel that the ability to access WiFi/Emails during the journey would be an intrusion, nagging away at me - asking for me to deal with issues.

In business, having a clear delineation between 'work time' and 'play time' (the latter which could include creative time) is vital - but the line between the two is disappearing. On Tuesday I have a meeting which we have had to book a room in a hotel to avoid being disturbed, but even there we will probably be interupted by mobiles and the occasional message at the hotel.

I worry that this blurring of work and play will have a serious impact on organisational performance as individuals have less and less time to themselves and less time to be creative - but for now I am just enjoying the ability to travel and work!

Success in Healthcare

Last Friday I was delighted to host a meeting of one of the Ecademy clubs I belong too (CEN). The event focused on issues relevant to Healthcare and we had a great mix of people, including some with extensive 'in house' expertise of working in the NHS.

What we discovered is that (not unsurprisingly) the opportunity for improvement is great, especially in the area of sustainable improvement (using a variety of tools such as Lean etc). It is perhaps one of the best environments for leading change - you have motivated and skilled people who share a common aim (delivering patient care).

However, the issues of 'improvement fatigue (IF)' and changing public priorities will make it a long and slow process to implement (and sustain) the benefits that individual trusts can realise.........fancy joining us to help make it happen?

Loyalty in Adversity

When things start to go wrong in relationships (whether personal or business), loyalty becomes a very important issue.

If you have built up relationships with your network, when things start to go wrong they will support you - whether you are right or wrong - but when you haven't built the relationship, or if you use up all of your 'emotional credit', the loyalty and support is not there everything becomes much harder.

In change, it is important to have a relationship with the people you are working with so that when things start to 'get sticky' (and they will), they support the change.

The Duke of Wellington had a great saying which emphasises the power of loyalty and training and went something like, "When other Generals make a mistake they are beaten, but when I make a mistake my troops pull me through."

When things go wrong, who will support your change programme?

Buzzword Bingo

It is a very worrying fact that a lot of consultants use very complex language. Well, it isn't even limited to just consultants, but to pseudo- academics and pompous people of all persuasions!

Is it because they like the sounds of the words or because they do not really know the answer and need to use complexity to mask stupidity? In my time, I have worked with both groups of people, some of them even believing that they were really impressing others by using 'complex interactive knowledge processes' when in reality they were boring the others rigid and demonstrating quite the reverse of what they were hoping - instead of appearing intellectual, they appear confused and instead of appearing dynamic they appear boring.

I was prompted to write this entry by a good friend emailing me the link to Buzz Phraser which is, I am sure, where these people get their words from!

Every experience is unique

If you think about it, everything we experience is completely unique.

Where we are sat in a room of people is unique and therefore the acoustics at that point is unique. The way our brain processes the sound and then our conscious and sub-conscious analyse the sound into concepts we can understand is completely unique.

Two people sitting side by side listening to a speaker on a training workshop will both experience different events, take different learning and have different emotions.

This makes communicating such a fascinating topic for a consultant such as me - how do you ensure that the message you are transmitting is the message they are receiving - and how do you ensure that the activity you are leading is the activity they are needing.......

I don't have the answer, I only pose the question......

Random Connection

I realised yesterday that all the important people in my life (other than brothers, uncles, aunties and children) I have met because of a random connection.

In a family context, I met my wife because she happened to be at a mutual friend's house when I was and in a business context, one of my business partners I met because I decided to try a different form of networking event.

Subsequently, these random connections lead to a wide range of things such as children, contracts, further introductions and friendships, but the root of all success comes from a random connection.

In analysing why this is an important message, it is because the more random connections you make, the more success you will have - but the real issue is pushing yourself to go and make those connections!

On a different issue, have you seen my other blog on Lean Sigma (called Flexiblean - pronounced Flexible Lean)

20 Year Complacency

I was preparing some materials for an event that I am speaking at next week (download the brochure here) and realised that we are possibly heading toward another period of complacency in the UK.

In the 1950's, there is a lot of historical evidence about the fact that UK industry were complacent about the impact that the rising quality and productivity of Japan would have on us and in the 1960's/70's it killed off our motorcycle industry (for all intents and purposes) and a lot of our electronics and automotive industry as well.

In the 1970's we were complacent about the Asian revolution, joking about the quality of what they were capable of and in the 1980's and 90's they stripped our manufacturing and are now advancing on our service industries.

In the 1990's we were complacent about the rise of China saying they would be become the 'low cost but low tech' outsourcing centre of the world and today they are encroaching upon our high tech industries and sectors.

As we move toward the 2010's, I am beginning to wonder whether we are facing another period of complacency in the UK....perhaps because of the impact of Eastern Europe, the BRIC nations (Brazil, Russia, India & China) or even the Middle East or Africa - maybe it will not happen at all but history seems to be against us on that!

Stress + Depressed = No Success

Individuals who are stressed under-perform - everyone knows that - hence the growth in stress coaches, but have you considered that organisational health and levels of stress also affect performance?

Organisations which are feeling the squeeze find it difficult to focus on the longer game and it permeates through to the individuals working in the organisation, which in terms affects their performance and hence the results achieved by the business.

This is not about 'benchmarking', but is purely a matter of fact that organisational stress is a real phenomena and has a major impact on the results achieved - any comments?

Innovation?

I was invited to an 'Innovation Dinner' this week at which some 150 people had booked and paid to attend.

The dinner had a good keynote speaker, but the topic was less about Innovation and more about how they had grown their business from scratch.

The problem for me is that the whole affair seemed to be a 'ra ra' session about innovation without any practical advice or information for the participants - the typical 'Innovation: Its a good thing' type approach.

For many, Innovation means developing a new product, whilst others think of it as a new creative design for a brand, but if we take the government definition of Innovation it is about 'the exploitation of new ideas' - meaning that it is equally relevant to the improvement in a process as it is too the development of a completely new process.

To find out more, read my article on INNOVATION at Ezine Articles.

Changing Direction

I have decided to split my ramblings into two seperate blogs.

This one will change to be about the activities I am involved in, the people I have met and what I have heard, whilst my blog FLEXIBLEAN will evolve as the main site for comments on making change sustainable, flexible and high impact.

I hope you enjoy the journey!

Are you completeLEAN mad?

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I was speaking late last week to a real 'Lean Jockey' with a well known American consultancy who are building a presence in the UK.

I found the conversation both interesting and a little disturbing on the basis that the approach being followed appeared to be 'tools only' - a quick 'Value Stream Map' and a series of Rapid Ram-Raids on the business, with no focus on sustainability.

One of the worrying things about the approach they are adopting is that the consultancy concerned it is growing nicely with an impressive range of new clients - and this fact made me challenge what I believe to be true - namely that the 'tools approach' is not sustainable in the long term.......so why were these guys being so successful?

Having spoken to a couple of people last week, including one of whom has been a current client of the consultancy concerned within the NHS, my fears have been allayed - it appears that whilst the price is high and the benefits good in the short term, the results last as long as the consultant is on site, creates bad feeling in the team and does not create an optimal solution.

We are about to extend our research into the sustainability of Lean, the first phase of which led to the development of our PROTOCOLS(tm) approach which assists organisations to prepare for Lean (or any form of transformational change). We will be speaking in depth to up to forty organisations from the service sector who have tried Lean to correlate our findings - although initial feedback says that the same bunch of cowboys who saddle their Lean tools outside manufacturing companies are now putting on their boots and striding into the service sector!

Beware the 'tools only' approach to Lean - unless your people bed it in and believe in the change, it does not matter how good the consultancy presentation is, the project will fail!

Public Profile

I was delighted today to receive a report about the growing use of Lean and related techniques in the public sector.

Having spent a number of years working in the public sector on transformation programmes, including with the RAF, NHS, Public Agencies and Local Authorities, I have seen many of the pitfalls that can behalf public bodies embarking on a transformation programme.

It was a long time ago that I gave up being a 'Tools Jockey' - partly because I realised the damage it was doing to organisations when I was leading programmes of support in the private sector. Luckily I was able to take this knowledge of sustainable lean into the public sector.

Sadly, for many public bodies, it seems they are going down the route of a 'tools approach', using 'drive by kaizen' which makes a quick improvement and collapses even quicker, unless you pour an ever increasing amount of money into supporting it (normally ever increasing consultancy fees).

True sustainability of change (and particularly Lean), relies on employee engagement, a vision of the future and development of internal capability. These are hard learnt lessons which it seems that many public bodies are going to learn the slow and expensive way.

Ho hum..........

Your Attitutde Affects Your Performance

For some, this might be a statement of the blindingly obvious, but I think it is an important point to make.

My attitutde at the current time is based upon a range of external influences such as my relationships with my colleagues, clients, friends and family. It is also influenced by some internal influences, such as my energy levels and levels of confidence.

Now, my current attitude is based on the combination of these (and other) internal and external influences, and this attitude affects my performance. Obviously, as the influences change (perhaps after a good nights sleep, or receipt of some good news) so does my attitude and in turn my performance.

When you are the manager or leader of a change programme, the attitude you have makes a significant difference to the performance of your team and therefore the success they achieve.

Being aware of the affect external and internal influences have on you is an important step to maintaining an appropriate attitude - which in turn is essential to the success of your team in leading change - and the bigger the change, the more the attitude of the leaders affects the result.

Several development processes exist to assist leaders of change to manage the effect influences have on them - and these include NLP and Emotional Intelligence - and for further information please feel free to contact me about them.

Sustainable Does Not Mean Forever

An interesting concept that has raised its head this week is the idea that some organisations are looking to 'fix' their change - and are turning to the concepts of Sustainable Change as a way of achieving it.

Whilst Sustainable Change does ensure that organisations get the most benefit out of their improvement activities, motivate their people effectively and also ensure they maintain their position in there market, it is different to 'fixing' change in place.

To fix change would imply a rigid system - a winning formula that once developed was never changed. But what would this mean when the circumstances changed and the world, the market or individuals moved on?

Look at McDonalds, for years they had an almost winning formula; Burgers, Beverages & Breakfasts, but over the last few years they have recognised that society has moved on and demands more variety - especially healthier options.

Sustainable Change ensures an organisation remains 'best' for a period of time, but also leaves them with the capability to move on when circumstances change.

So, the idea is not to 'fix things forever', but to fix them and flex them as the requirements change - and this is the basis of Sustainable Change.

By the way - our new book entitled 'A Beginners Guide to Continuous Improvement' is now available.

Visit my Ecademy profile and then drop me an email for further details.