Transforming the Organisation

When organisations begin their improvement programme, usually priorities are obvious. As progress is made, the choices become more complex and less clear. Furthermore, the route to delivering year on year improvement involves the transfer of previously complex and specialist tasks to the lowest level possible. This releases management and specialist resource to move away from day to day issues, changing the traditional relationship between shop floor and specialist functions.

The prize of less coordination, improved communication and more empowerment can only be achieved when supported by a new set of accountabilities so that the whole organisation is engaged in a cross functional end to end improvement agenda. (See example below).

Releasing the Full Potential

Within each improvement programme we work with the management team to develop a hidden loss treasure map. This provides an overview of where current practices mask hidden losses and waste at each organisational levels.

Usually these hidden losses and wastes have built up over time in response to problems as they occur, typically increasing the level of management and administration. As the root causes of firefighting are removed, the level of management coordination can be reduced, safety stocks can be lowered, lead times reduced, forecasts improved, projects delivered more cheaply and in less time. Part of the leadership role is to anticipate the potential for improvement and manage the changes to lock in the gains.

This is managed through the setting of quarterly improvement goals linked to cross functional action learning programmes. This links the leadership agenda to the development of team capability, learning from experience and recognition processes.

The outcome includes:

• linkage between the improvement process and delivery of the business strategy;
• the setting of realistic and achievable accountabilities for operational technical and business process improvement activities;
• increased innovation and horizontal empowerment across functional boundaries (end to end improvement).