BACKROUND
The States of Jersey (SoJ) has embraced LEAN as one of the components to help it become more efficient and effective. Their LEAN programme, combined with government reform and a host of other initiatives to down-size and get into shape, will help toward both improving customer services, reducing costs and meeting the challenge of the £120m+ funding “black hole”
Their programme has been on-going for about 2 years, and I (and about 200 others) went along to their conference to understand more about their programme and the ideas, opportunities and lessons from others who have been using LEAN (or similar) initiatives in their businesses.
It was particularly useful to see a mix from Jersey and the UK, and hear different experiences of public and private sector about the benefits and challenges of LEAN (or similar) initiatives.
SUMMARY THOUGHTS
Blogs are seldom read if they are long so at the risk of missing some key points, and over simplification of brilliant presentations and insightful experiences I will bullet-list my thoughts against each agenda item.
240830 REGISTRATION AND COFFEE IN THE CONFERENCE FOYER
• It was interesting that circa 200 people attended of the 7000+ workforce
• I noted that 700 “yellow belts” have been trained in LEAN and 80 “green belts”
0900 - 1015 OPENING PLENARY SESSION, INTRODUCTIONS, WELCOME ADDRESS AND KEY NOTE SPEECH
The opening session was good and the speaker about LEAN in HM Courts was a valuable case study. Starting circa 1999/2000 they had successes and set-backs and many lessons along the way. What is important is that SoJ learn and tailor their approach so as not to take as long as the pioneers, but instead be more agile and targeted with greatest emphasis on those areas which were important in hindsight:
1) LEAN is about people, thinking and culture not tools and processes
2) Without leadership commitment progress will be slow
3) Shallow and wide approaches do not work
4) Engage with the customer to ensure you are delivering value for THEM
1045 - 1145 LEARNING SESSION 1,
There were four sessions to choose from and I selected to see my old colleagues at Royal Bank of Scotland International RBSI. I used Work-Out (based on GE & Jack Welch approach to LEAN / Six Sigma) and it was interesting to see how RBSI have developed since 2000. Their programme is more focussed on people and culture development than strict efficiencies (cutting head-count). It was noted that the more aggressive, numbers-based approach in the UK has faltered somewhat, whereas the skills approach in the Channel Islands has enjoyed greater success. The skills approach is not however a soft approach. Those who has struggled with ownership and responsibility for processes and performance have exited the business. Success seems significantly linked to daily dialogue with staff about everyday issues. The “little and often” approach of listening, gathering and sharing ideas creates more engagement, understanding and commitment than consultant driven change which losses momentum quickly if not co-created with the staff. The RBSI approach does appear to be centred around improvement in customer processes: opening accounts, sending emails, transferring information and less about saving chunks of money. However the reduction in waste, time and money is a great by-product to improved customer service. Their recipe requires the following ingredients…
• Customer
• Organisation and Skills
• Efficient Processes
• Mind-set and Behaviours
• Performance
Note that these are built into people’s performance and appraisal criteria. This is not something to do on a Friday if you have time. There is real focus (and peer pressure) to do this right, and significant support and tools to help managers manage better.
I was particularly impressed by the answer about Standard Operational Procedures (SOPs). I queried whether simplified one-size fits all SOPs might be a blinkered approach to complex issues. In the public sector in particular social needs of housing, health, safety, may have implications for many departments and often fall through the cracks, ultimately failing the customer. RBSI came back with a response that would have pleased LEAN critic John Seddon: In those situations of high complexity you need to use people not processes to solve the problem, and you need to “manage the variation” with empathy and understanding.
1150 - 1245 LEARNING SESSION 2,
In the second session I chose to attend David Brunt’s session, speaking for the Lean Enterprise Academy (www.leanuk.org). This again emphasised that LEAN (or similar) initiatives are about thinking and culture and used a case study to illustrate how 10 random audience members could each understand the problem differently. David went on to suggest that if each scenario can trigger 10 different initiatives it would be easy to be over-run with projects. He counselled that LEAN should not be about “yellow belts” and “green belts” and echoed another speaker that it isn’t about tools like 5S and 8W, but instead about culture and capability rather than 1000 projects.
1345 - 1445 LEARNING SESSION 3,
In the third session we were shown a time-lapse film of a car service, with the camera following the mechanics as they did their tasks. Note was made of tasks that added value (servicing the car) and tasks that did not add value (filling in forms, collecting parts, moving vehicles). Emphasis was on the real every-day practical tasks and the case study showed that after 4 or 5 iterations of the process they managed to complete a service that used to take 60 minutes in just 17. The key issue however was not the time (and money) saved, but how the learning and improvement was achieved. It was done with a cheap video camera, some guys with clip boards and lots of suggestions happening “live” on real customer cars in a real every-day situation (not at a desk, not in a lab).
1450 - 1545 LEARNING SESSION 4,
For my last session I learned about RR Donnelly (the people who print Harry Potter books, as well as many, many other things). Hear the lessons and ideas were many, but the take-away message was….
• Go-see
• Ask
• Show respect
1615 - 1700 CLOSING PLENARY SESSION, Q&A SESSSION WITH SPEAKERS AND CLOSING SPEECH
SoJ took solace that all those that had presented had taken years to get where they are today and LEAN is not going to be a quick-fix. My view however is that with the benefit of hindsight and the expertise of those presenting at the conference SoJ has an opportunity to do twice the performance in half the time.
I have no doubt that LEAN presents some great opportunities, but the lessons are clear: it depends on leadership, communication and culture.
REFLECTION AND POST-SCRIPT
It may be interesting to consider LEAN in the contact of an OST view of organisation (single, defined Objective, Strategy based on how you will achieve the O and Tactics that are the day-to-day manifestation of that Strategy or Strategies)
It may be interesting to consider where LEAN fits in? Is it O, S or T? Will lean be a T-tactic to meeting the challenge of the £120m+ funding “black hole” or an S-strategy as “the way we do things around here” and therefore embedded into every product, service and component of strategy.
Instinctively what it should not be is an O-objective: because surely the objective is about “public services” and not about the means of delivery. Doubtless this will become clearer as the LEAN programme emerges from its cradle and finds its feet.
What is undoubted is the potential.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This posting has been updated and I am grateful for the insight and contribution from a couple of people who reviewed the initial version. Just like LEAN, things can be improved by getting different perspectives and asking opinion and I am grateful for the suggested enhancements.
MORE INFORMATION
If you would like more information about this conference, or any of the significant amount of material that I have both in praise and cautionary about LEAN please contact timhjrogers@cichange.org
THE AUTHOR
Tim Rogers is an experienced Project and Change Leader. He is founder of www.ciChange.org and curator for www.TEDxStHelier.Com . He is Programme Manager for the commercialization of Jersey Harbours and Jersey Airport, and previously Operations Change and Sales Support for RBSI/NatWest, and Project Manager for the Incorporation of Jersey Post. He is also Commonwealth Triathlete and World Championships Rower with a passion for teaching and learning and is a Tutor/Mentor on the Chartered Management Institute courses. He is a Chartered Member of the British Computer Society, has an MBA (Management Consultancy) and is both a PRINCE2 and Change Management Practitioner.
Email: TimHJRogers@cihange.org
Mob: 07797762051 | Twitter @timhjrogers | Skype timhjrogers
