THERE is clearly confusion between Lean, Agile, 6 Sigma, TQM, etc. But what falls under the Lean umbrella and how do you get there? And how do we avoid initiative overload?
The term Lean suggests no fat or a minimum level of fat and applying this to business would imply minimum levels of waste. This suggests that to become lean we must remove waste from the business processes to leave just that activity that adds value. Whilst this would appear logical, actually understanding that which is of value versus that which is not, and then applying this to all aspects of a business is difficult. And often the answers do not lie within the grasp of management running the business, but with people who are closest to the process and better placed to see the value and waste.
One of the key lean tools is that of “Value Stream Mapping” which enables us to create a map of both value and waste in a given process. This map can then be used to understand the waste and its causes before moving on to remove it so that value flows without interruption of waste.
Step 1. Lean Business Philosophy - For the senior members of a business to support any type of business improvement methodology there needs to be a vision of what the business would look like afterwards. The senior board must grasp what is meant by Lean, and identify the opportunities, dangers, level of commitment required and benefits.
This first step needs to take senior members and key decision makers through the issues, ideally through action-based learning simulation so they experience this first hand. They can then decide whether Lean can be supported, and develop a vision and implementation strategy.
It is often assumed that the biggest area for improvement is in the manufacturing/processing areas whereas the opposite can be true. Most businesses have focused on manufacturing for some years and may find to improve support parts of the process actually unlock more potential in manufacturing as a result.
Step 2. Culture and Organisational Change Programme - In order to implement the Lean philosophy we have to take great care of our most important asset - people. Lean has as big an impact on management as it does on the workforce, but in completely different ways.
With Lean, the people who can most easily get to grips with value-adding and non-value adding activities are the workforce. For Lean to work we need to adopt a bottom-up approach which is led and supported by a visionary senior group and facilitated by middle management. Waste is far easier to understand and remove as close to where it is created in the process.
It is essential to have a co-ordinated teams programme which runs alongside the lean activity and education to ensure that all members of staff are correctly coached. This avoids conflict and enables the efficient removal of waste.
Step 3. Applying Lean To Your Business - This stage involves educating middle management in the Lean business philosophy, creating understanding of how this can be applied and re-focussing them to move to a facilitation role.
At this stage we begin to deal with the cultural and behavioural issues that can exist between the management and workforce, and also with management releasing some of the ownership of improvement to put belief into the Lean process to drive the business forward. Lean will cut across functional/departmental boundaries which will eventually lead to a restructuring of responsibility for the major business processes.
Step 4. Transformation to Lean - We are now ready to move onto application which involves a series of critical steps that enable us to focus on the higher level issues surrounding this stage, which are People, Education, Support and Approach.
We need at this point to form teams of about 12 people, some of whom will come from the process, to be used for the initial education and training, with the minority (2) coming from outside to act as third party objective team members. The Oliver Wight Approach is to run an action-based learning event to educate the team, who are supported by middle management. The key here is not to take ownership of the plan but to provide conditions in which the team can implement. A nucleus of people trained in the Lean tools and techniques can then, with some external support, help others create lean processes.
Step 5. Sustainability - Sustainability is often one of the problems with any business philosophy adopted. Often this comes about as a result of lack of senior commitment, no goal alignment throughout the organisation, lack of understanding and no alignment to strategy.
This is why step 1 is important to both cover these issues and also to ensure that management understand that Lean is not just another initiative. Lean can only be achieved through behavioural and cultural change to a business where waste is not acceptable.
In conclusion, Lean can deliver huge benefits to any business by following a Proven Path Approach. Success can be achieved providing that the commitment is there at senior level and that companies recognise the need for some external support.
* Les Brookes is an Associate of Oliver Wight Europe, Africa and Middle East.