Are you missing a key ingredient toward moving your Continuous Improvement Program (CIP)?

Is your team having a hard time identifying CIP opportunities?

Are your CIP lean improvement projects struggling to be maintained?

There could be a very basic reason these barriers are occurring:

Standards!

It may be time to deeply examine your standards, and the process and activities those standards create.

First, we are not talking about CIP program standards, though those are very important as well. We are talking about the standards your employees use every day for their processes.

At the end of the day, as they are walking out the door do they have a sense of accomplishment? This is possible if your process standards are properly set-up and followed by everyone.

Project teams can easily become frustrated as they implement changes and, over time, this could result in little to no progress.  When a project is complete take these steps to ensure lasting changes are in place:

• Do new process standards exist and if so, are they actionable?

• Ensure Quality is built in by everyone at every step, not ‘inspected in’ at the end.

• Schedule regular Gemba’s to ensure the first two items are in place.

If you identify that there are still gaps that need to be closed, get the team back together to identify the next steps by asking these questions:

• What action needs to be taken when there is resistance? Were the employees who are affected given the chance to provide feedback?

• What adjustments need to be implemented to get back on track? Who should lead this effort?

• Was the project and solutions properly communicated? Including ‘what’s in it for me” (WIIFM).

• What actions should be taken when business policies and practices are enacted, but behaviors and actions contradict the new direction?

The last one is often the biggest hurdle to overcome. For example, you have a team that has identified an opportunity, implemented a solution, created a new process with standards and applied follow-up strategies to guide the future work.

If you have done everything else correct, including solid implementation of Process Standards, but you are still struggling to see the results you may have to ask yourself:“Is our company’s culture ready to adopt change?

Recently I heard a great one liner that may be the root of failed process changes: “Culture will eat Strategy for lunch.”

Great process standards are imperative to maintaining change, but only after the team is ready to accept that change.

If you feel like you’re missing that secret ingredient in your Continuous Improvement Program, take some time to review your current processes, gather your teams for feedback, and at the end of the day, dig deep to explore if your company culture is ready to accept the changes.

If not, try not to get frustrated, but instead, back track and find some other Rapid Improvement Events (RIEs) to move things in the direction you ultimately wish to go!

If you’re looking to improve your continuous improvement and lean program, contact us today! At MAU, we have in-house expertise and can help you get the right ingredients in place! 

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