Let’s walk through each component of SMART and provide an example you can use in your customer KPI discussion.

SPECIFIC

            The first step to solving any problem is to make sure you have properly defined what it is.  Even if you think you know the problem, this is a good practice for providing focus and direction to your actions.  Being specific helps to get right to the heart of the matter, by focusing only on those inputs that directly affect your ability to achieve the goal.  Diagnosing what is broken is the first step to getting something fixed.

MEASURE

            This step is all about taking something that is qualitative and making it quantititative—turning the abstract into the concrete.  The point is, if you are going to sit with your customer and discuss performance, you should both draw the same conclusions as to where you stand.  If you have clearly defined the data, that is an indicator of an issue and the target state of that condition. Conclusions drawn from the KPI will not be subject to interpretation or bias the same way two teachers could grade the same essay test differently, but not if the test was standardized.  Being strict and honest with the measurements fosters true improvement by eliminating the ability to “dress up” shortcomings. Also, when measuring, it is extremely important to ensure that a baseline of data has been agreed upon between you and the customer.

ATTAINABLE

            Goals need to be attainable, in the sense that they should be possible to achieve. Just b/c you want 100% compliance, what will you actually live with? Where is your baseline? There is nothing that means you can’t raise your goal once you achieve it. The pursuit of perfection is admirable, but remember that holding someone to unrealistic expectations can also be a de-motivator. Always obtain your customer’s input when setting goals, as it is their expectations you should be exceeding.  Periodically review your targets to determine if they should be raised, especially if they’ve been reached. If you are having trouble reaching your KPI, maybe there is a root cause for that. It might be a good time to start an A3P (Problem Solving) to figure out why you aren’t reaching your goals in timely fashion.

RELEVANT

            It is important to know the distinction between information and data when compiling your customer KPI’s.  It is often the tendency to over do it when it comes to providing data to your customer.  The first thing you want to filter out is anything that doesn’t serve the purpose of defining the performance of a situation.  Remember, we’ve built the KPI around an issue that we want to resolve—if you are including figures that don’t directly correlate to a target, then it is likely just information and could be excluded unless requested, or provided in an appendix.  Keep the primary KPI free of ‘noise’ by clearing out superfluous data.

TIMELY

            Possibly the most often overlooked component of a KPI is establishing when the target is going to be reached.  After telling your customer what you can deliver, they’re naturally going to be interested in when they can expect it.  Targets need to have an element of time in order to drive action and bring closure to a problem.  If the issue you are tracking doesn’t have an obvious end date or required need-by time, annual or quarterly intervals work best.   At the end of each year or quarter, adjust your goals as needed to keep focus on bettering yourself for your customer.

Applying these principles to each of your KPI’s with your customer, as well as applying the PDCA method are the basis for forming open lines of communication with your customers and ensuring that we are always marching towards “True North” in our Lean Journey.

Written by Matt Wahl and Ben Green, Managers of Lean Supply Chain Operations at LeanCor

Four key factors of a returnable packaging system include:

1. Daily Usage
2. QPC (parts per container)
3. Inventories
4. Return Frequency

The first two items that should immediately come into question when experiencing container shortages are: 1) daily usage (production rate) and 2) QPC.  In most cases if not all, an increase in daily usage will warrant additional container purchase – if all other constants remain the same.  Cost analysis will be necessary if the daily usage increase is temporary vs. permanent to determine ROI of additional containers.

Ordering parts less than the agreed upon QPC will have a negative impact on container availability by increasing container usage. The shortage can be calculated based on reduction in QPC vs. the set QPC. For example, if QPC is set at 10 but part orders come in packaged with QPC of 5, this results in 50% less containers in the system.  To prevent this from happening, minimum order quantity should be set at QPC level to avoid QPC discrepancy.  Companies that don’t have a Packaging Agreement Form, Unit Load Data Sheet, or PFEP will have the greatest challenge in maintaining container availability – but also when calculating returns to the supplier.  (QPC variation is a bigger issue than just returns, but that is a whole other blog post.)

My reason for writing this blog post took place recently, and it pertains to numbers 3 and 4 on the list of key items.  Recently we experienced a “container shortage” for a supplier.  Our knee jerk reaction was to blame lack of containers in the system.  Upon further analysis this was not the case.  It was discovered that there was 3 weeks of inventory on hand.  Considering the initial container purchase was set at 1 week, this was 2 weeks more then what the system allowed.  Inventory levels, whether on hand or at the supplier, must be maintained at the agreed upon purchase quantity calculation or container “shortages” will occur.

It was suggested by the ordering specialist to return containers more frequently – twice per week instead of once per week.  Though this change might temporarily elevate the shortage, the root cause has not been addressed because the inventory maximum quantity level has not been agreed upon (if one week is no longer valid).  Unless this quantity is set\identified, the right quantity of returnable containers will not be known.  If, a month from now, inventory levels are at four or five weeks, does this mean we return every other day or buy additional containers?  The point is that we don’t know until we define our perimeters and are disciplined enough to stick to them.

The illustration below shows areas of returnable containers at one time in the system.  To maintain container availability at all times, there can’t be any variation in system.  When there are variations we need to understand why, instead of “throwing more containers” or adding additional returns into the problem.

Written by Tola Yim, Lean Packaging Solutions Manager at LeanCor

Warehouse, Green Logistics Co., Kotka, Finland (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I began my Lean Journey on April 26, 2010. I had no idea what lean was, but I knew I wanted to learn more about it. I left my previous employer after a year and was in search of more of a career within the supply chain. I began networking and was contacted by a company named LeanCor. I skipped a job shadow with another company and headed to LeanCor’s headquarters in Florence, KY, to hear about an “opportunity.”  Next thing I knew I was driving up I-75 to North Liberty, IA, to work at LeanCor’s Lean Logistics Center (LLC), which was in its early stages of start-up business for LeanCor.

The LLC is essentially an operation responsible for sequencing parts for a 1 x 1 production line for a LeanCor customer. The first few months in North Liberty were very interesting.  For me, it was a crash course in lean. I learned and used new lean terms and concepts on a daily basis. I arrived late for the initial launch, but there was still plenty to do. The foundation was built, but it was not yet stable. For any start-up operation, it is crucial to first standardize and sustain your processes, then continue to improve those processes by incorporating various lean principles and tools. We had one goal in mind when we started and it was to become a “world class” facility. Our eyes were on the prize, but how would we get there?

Looking back on my time at the LLC, I believe there are seven areas you should focus on when striving to make your operation a world class facility: 5S, Standard Work, Waste Elimination, Pull System, Quality at the Source, Visual Management, and Safety. Below are some stories of how we incorporated each within our operation and the effects they had on our goal.

Start With 5S:  

Sort, Set, Shine, Standardize, and Sustain. It is not just cleaning. That will be your first obstacle when explaining it to operators. It is a discipline that will keep your operation not only clean, but standardized and in order as well. The tools your operators need should be readily available and whatever they don’t need must go (“when in doubt – throw it out!”). Each cell should be organized and clean so the next shift can come in and start working and not have to worry about anything else. To start, we got rid of everything we didn’t need and created shadow boards for the tools, safety equipment, and cleaning supplies we needed. Over time, our 5S program grew and sustained.

Strengthen Your Foundation:

The first project was to establish our standard work for every process. I observed the current state of all of our processes and then turned them into standard work documents. This was time consuming, but not difficult. It’s not enough to improve the process in your head, you first need to capture and fully understand the current state. From there, we continuously improved our processes. Involving the operators and running tests proved to be an effective way to do this. We challenged the operators to come up with good poka-yokes that would stop a process when an error occurred. This prevented our operators from passing on errors that would eventually reach the customer. The operator who came up with the best poke-yoke would then receive a $10 gas card. A simple incentive that no one will turn down!

Improve Your Processes:

Each quarter, my fellow process engineer and I would perform an efficiency analysis. We used time and motion sheets to capture the process times for each step of a process. We would then enter this information onto a standard work combination sheet to visually show what the cycle time was compared to the takt time. We were then able to level out multi-operator cells so each operator had the same process time. For example, moving one task from Operator 1 to Operator 2, allowed us to even out the flow of processes and prevent bottlenecks to occur. We also found instances where an operator was underutilized and we were able to add work to his/her standard work to free up headcount somewhere else. If you are able to take on new business without adding resources, your customer will be very pleased. In any organization, it is important to plan projects like this so you can continuously improve your standard work documentation. In turn, as processes change, so does your standard work.

Training Your People:

We often cross trained our operators, so it was crucial to have each process’ standard work up to date. Our philosophy held that if a brand new operator came in today, they should be able to read the standard work and be able to execute the job without committing errors while meeting the customer’s demand. I realized that to accomplish this, you have to make your standard work clear, concise, and visual. The more pictures you can substitute for words the better. Also, include specific Critical to Quality (CTQ’s) elements to the standard work that can help an operator understand the process easier. We made standard work binders for each process and cell. This helped standardize the training process. The team leaders would first have the new operator read through the standard work binder. Second, they took the operator to the cell to observe. Third, they had them read the standard work again and sign off on the process. The operator was then able to perform the process. The team leader would use his/her discretion as to the level of supervision the operator would need during the first few hours of being on their own. After a while, the LLC was operating like a well oiled machine. The engine was the standard work and the processes were the fuel that kept the operation running.

Eliminate The Waste:

After standardizing the processes we realized the next step was to cut out the waste and also focus on quality at the source. We documented a weekly waste walk in our Leader Standard Work. Using a waste walk document, we would document the many types of wastes that existed in our operation. The most obvious waste was the amount of inventory we had. The warehouse was packed and the cells always had too much inventory in them. The operators would stock as much inventory as they could until there was no more space available. This type of batch process doesn’t just limit floor space, it also increases your chances of picking the wrong part because you could often find multiple items in one home location. This was a big issue at the LLC. One box or container in the wrong location could turn into several hundred picking errors. A lot of the parts looked similar and differed by only a couple inches. This made it very difficult for an operator to know that he/she was picking the wrong part. To correct this, we created a 2-bin kanban pull system and redesigned many of the cells to only allow the MAX level of inventory we needed. You can always discipline your operators when they are not performing a process correctly, but if you only give them the space they need, they cannot stock more than they need.

Make Your Workplace Visual:

The kanban pull system also improved our visual management. When a cell used up one of the bins, the warehouse forktruck or tugger would notice the empty spot on the floor or shelf and know it needed to be restocked. We later took it a step farther and created kanban cards. The cards included the part description and location in the warehouse. This eliminated the time spent waiting on parts and decreased the distance traveled by the forktrucks because they wouldn’t have to search for the product. They would just go directly to the location on the kanban card.

Create a Scoreboard:

The LLC had about 20-25 operators on each shift. It was important for them to all understand how they were doing each hour. There were many questions we wanted to make visible. Were we ahead or were we behind? Did a particular cell/commodity need help? What is the score? These questions are important for all the members of your team to know at any given time during the day. To make those questions visual, we created a delivery calculator that measured our performance. Based on the customer’s usage and what we had in WIP, we were able to keep an hourly demand. We established different ranges of the demand to changed colors on the delivery calculator (Purple = Overproducing, Green = Meeting Customer Demand, Yellow = A Little Behind, Red = Risk of Shutting Down the Line). The best part was that we projected this scoreboard above the dock doors so everyone in the operation could see their numbers and stay informed.

When I look back at the time I spent at the LLC, I am very proud of the work I did there. The guys I worked with taught me a lot and we were all a part of something bigger than ourselves. After my time in Iowa, I was relocated and now work as an on-site representative for another LeanCor Customer. My new role takes me out of the warehouse setting and puts me on a team who manages an estimated 250 truckloads a week across four different distribution centers. The work is much different, but my goals are in line with the high level objectives I had while working at the LLC.  I am extremely lucky to have had so many great experiences up to this point in my career and feel I have all of the tools to make a difference in my new role. My team and I have introduced many problem solving tools, established new processes, and standardized many aspects of the shipping program. But there is still room to improve. And that is exciting for us because “No Problem is a Problem!”

Written by Tom Kinder, Lean Supply Chain Operations Manager at LeanCor

Related articles

• New Gemba-Based Workshop This June (leanlogisticsblog.leancor.com)
• The Secrets of Successful Employee Training… Do or Die! (leanlogisticsblog.leancor.com)
• Evaluating, Building, (Rebuilding), and Completing Projects (leanlogisticsblog.leancor.com)

As my facility team picked up speed it began to feel like my New Year’s resolution to work out at the gym five times a week.  Only this time, I didn’t have the option to be lazy and neglect my commitment.  The facility was up and running 24/7 whether I liked it or not.  Soon I learned to ECHO lean: Educate the Gemba, Chase the plan, Hammer the problems, and Optimize over time.

Educate the Gemba

Education will put the plan into motion and help sustain it later.  Education lays the foundation.  As with my workout plan, going to the gym wouldn’t be enough.  I had to learn how to use the machines and how each would benefit my body.  The facility implementation had to begin with training – teaching what we were there to accomplish.  It was more than just getting everyone on the same sheet of music, it was getting everyone to create the same song.

In Japanese, Gembameans “the real place.”  In order to fully understand the plan, we need to go where it will all take place.

Originally the receiving process was done with one clerk, one printer, and one computer.  When the facility opened, the docks and space available expanded.  It seemed we would be fine using the same amount of processing equipment.  Soon we found that traffic through the docks increased and we didn’t have enough time to verify the freight.  We needed more equipment. This realization could only have been had by seeing the work being done in real time as opposed to hearing about it from team members on the floor.

Chase the Plan

Chase the plan.  For me, this is about keeping focused and keeping it simple.  Trying to over-complicate an  implementation or changing it too frequently only causes trouble in its sustainability.  Get rid of all the ‘good’ ideas and only work with the great ones.  It was difficult for our team members to let go of some improvement ideas in order to stay focused on the plan – the big picture.

Hammer the Problems

Being proactive in a start-up is crucial.  Start planning for potential problems and coming up with contingency plans.  ”No problem is a problem.”  Implementation rides highly on the premise that most of the big problems will be  uncovered first.  Our facility hammered out a big one.  Though we had a shuttle service for manufacturing parts being transferred, we had to plan for “hot” needs that came in by having our own equipment ready to run beyond the scheduled shuttle.

Optimize  Over Time

It takes time to improve and sustain that improvement.  Time will show more problems, better solutions, and ultimately success.  Although our facility is still young, we can gauge where we have been, where we are, and where we are going.  It’s exciting to know there is so much more to learn.

Lean thinking is easy.  It’s the lean doing that is difficult.  I hope the ECHO principle can help you in your own facility start-up.

Written by Tabitha Zamarripa, Lean Fulfillment Center Supervisor 

Suppliers

In a perfect world, suppliers ship everything on the day and time that works best for your logistics network.  In reality, they have other customers, operating hours, and production constraints that prevent the perfect scenario.  These problems gets magnified in an unmanaged network, where suppliers control when freight is picked up, and when it “should” arrive, bringing us to…

Carriers

Image via http://info.c3solutions.com/

Carriers make money by driving trucks, not waiting around to get unloaded.  This one is really chicken-and-egg, because when things go according to plan, carriers will get unloaded as soon as they arrive.  In many cases, all it takes is one truck being an hour behind schedule to mess up the rest of the day’s plan.  At the same time, early-arriving carriers  who aren’t keen on waiting until the planned delivery time can have a similar effect.

Purchasing

In my experience, the piece-price incentives driving purchasing decisions are one of the best examples of unintended consequences I’ve ever seen.  This can be anything from 10% off if you order in truckload quantities to end-of-year closeouts, to traditional volume discounts.  The consequences of these decisions are seen when a part used every day arrives once every four weeks in full truckload quantity.

Material Planning

Given the constraints of the purchasing agreements made with suppliers, material planners still have some impact on adding to the variation.  The best logistics design in the world still falls apart if the parts are ordered at a different cadence than the design suggests.  Also, the process of splitting a purchase order into multiple releases is often manual. With all the firefighting and expediting planners experience, who has the time?

Systems

Every computer program has to have a default, and in my experience, every MRP developer has chosen Mondays as the default due date on parts.  It makes good, logical sense.  Start of the production week, everyone’s ready to hit the ground running, etc.  The problem-if a purchase order hasn’t been adjusted in some way by a material planner (which is also how it’s supposed to work a majority of the time), it will deliver to meet the default due date.  Repeat that scenario a few hundred times, and your system has defaulted itself into a spike of activity every week.

Receiving

It reminds me of that Seinfeld rental car rant about taking versus holding a reservation.  In this case, anyone can unload a truck, it’s really about receiving the material on the truck.  The ability of your receiving team to keep up with the flow of materials is critical to avoiding bottlenecks in the process

Production

Image via http://www.andrews-sykes.com/blog/tag/andrews-ventilation/

Batch production is awesome from a strictly production standpoint (I’m going to get grilled for that comment).  High efficiency, low cycle times, etc.  It’s just not awesome for anyone else in the supply chain.  The impact of producing in batches is magnified back through the supply chain in a bullwhip that can create tons of havoc.

Image via http://content.4frontes.com/dpc/blog/

Have you ever walked out on a receiving dock and not understood why everyone was reading blog posts on their smart phones while all the dock doors were empty?  Ever seen ten trucks lined up around the block waiting to get unloaded and a dock overflowing with freight?  I’m guessing the items listed above helped contribute to these problems.

Life is full of variation, and a lot of it is beyond our control.  The good news is in our supply chains, we have the ability to control a lot of that variation.  Managing suppliers and carriers with disciplined supply chain design and processes is a great start.  Installing incentives for purchasing that focus on total cost of fulfillment is also a key.  Having material planners who are able to dedicate a majority of time to identifying and removing variation, and giving them the tools (systems) to do so is critical.  It’s amazing how much of the firefighting disappears when the variation is reduced.  Finally, receiving and production processes should be built to handle smaller batches at a higher frequency.

Obviously, a lot of these solutions are much easier said than done.  The first step in beating a variation problem is admitting you have it and identifying the causes.  Now it’s your turn.  What contributions to (un)level flow have I left off the list?

Written by Randy Siever, Director of Operations at LeanCor

The lean journey generally begins inside the four walls of the manufacturing facility, however eventually it extends to the supply base and our customers. As we begin focusing on waste elimination, inventory reduction and flow, we quickly realize that engagement by the “extended enterprise” is required to complete the lean journey.

Modeled after the LEI workbook Building a Lean Fulfillment Stream, this workshop teaches how to apply lean to the supply chain and logistics function.

This workshop is part of the overall LEI effort to support organizations and individuals interested in identifying and removing waste along the entire value stream: from raw materials to end customer.

Learning Objectives:

• Understand the critical elements of the building the Lean Fulfillment Stream
• Value-Stream Map the extended enterprise
• Calculate “total cost of ownership” for the entire supply chain
• Uncover areas of waste to reduce lead time and inventory levels
• Develop customer and supplier measurement systems and accountability processes
• Break down cross functional barriers for effective supply stream collaboration
• Implement pull systems to drive material replenishment
• Implement the concepts of increased delivery frequency, lot size reduction, and leveled flow
• Implement lean tools to establish supply chain visibility
• Create an optimized logistics network and implementation roadmap

Benefits:

By applying the concepts and principles learned in this workshop, you will be able to:

• Improve supplier performance and accountability
• Improve customer satisfaction and  customer relationships
• Drive lean supply-stream management and lean logistics through your organization
• Reduce the total cost of ownership through the reduction of inventory, space, lead time, logistics costs, and increased fill rates.

The workshop is being conducted at the LeanCor Supply Chain Group Operations Center located in Florence, KY, to enable participants to “go see” lean principles and best practices applied to logistics engineering and transportation management processes.

It will reinforce concepts learned in class by demonstrating visual management, pull vs. push, standard work, PDCA, problem solving tools, quality at the source, and continuous improvement. Additionally, the Center will instill an understanding of the “see as a group, know as a group, act as a group” mentality by displaying real time data reporting and KPI metrics.

For more information on the workshop content, dates, registration, discounts, and other details, please see below.

Discounts

There is a 12.5% discount for registering 2 or more attendees from the same organization.

Workshop Details

New! Building the Lean Supply Chain: Gemba-Based Workshop 

Instructor(s): Robert Martichenko

Date(s): 06/06/2012  – 06/07/2012

Length: 2 Days

Workshop Location: LeanCor Supply Chain Group
Recommended Hotel: SpringHill Suites Cincinnati Airport South
Discounted Room Rate: $92.00 USD
Room Rate Expires: 5/22/12

Prices include all participant materials, breakfast, lunch and snacks each day.

Click here for more information and to register.

In my role as an on-site manager for a large manufacturing customer, I was following up on some supplier short shipping issues that were impacting truck utilization, expedites, and transportation cost.  When I spoke with one supplier, the conversation went as follows:

Jacob: I’ve noticed that we are having a lot of short shipments and expedites, as well many additions of material that are shipping early.  Can you help me understand what is causing this?

Supplier: Yeah, we ship what we have ready.

Jacob: Can you walk me through your production scheduling process?

Supplier: Well, most of our product takes only one day to assemble. So, each morning we look at all of the orders we have due to ship for the next week and compare it to what we have enough raw material to build.  We build it that day and ship it that afternoon.

Jacob: If you produce something before the scheduled ship date, why are you shipping it early?

Supplier:  We’re a lean facility, so we don’t hold inventory.  If we have it finished, we ship it.

Jacob: But if you ship it early, then we end up with the extra inventory on our end. It’s important that you only ship what we are asking for.

Supplier: We don’t make room for inventory, as it is wasted space.  We clean our dock of all finished goods every afternoon, without exception.  It’s our policy.

Jacob: Regarding the not shipping of material that is needed, it appears that you have some tier 2 supplier issues causing you to have raw material shortages that prevent you from shipping many schedules on time.

Supplier: Yeah, our suppliers are bad and rarely get us our material on time.

Jacob: Have you looked at re-sourcing to suppliers who can meet your demand?

Supplier: Our suppliers are the cheapest producer; it would be crazy to buy elsewhere.

Jacob: Have you considered building any buffer into your raw materials to ensure you can build the right schedules?

Supplier: You clearly don’t understand lean.  Inventory is waste.  We can’t ship to your orders because we are too lean!

The views the supplier expressed in our conversation are not uncommon among suppliers, manufacturers, and even six sigma black belts and other “experts.”  The truth is that inventory has a purpose, even if it doesn’t add value.  The most important thing to the above supplier should be meeting the customer expectations (in this case the manufacturing company I was working with).  If they have chosen low cost producers that can’t meet production or quality demands, then they should hold buffer stock on those parts to ensure their downstream customer is not impacted.  This means they hold extra inventory, which will also serve as a very visual flag that they have a problem.  They should then problem solve with the goal in mind of no longer needing the inventory they are holding.  This could include working with their tier 2 suppliers to negotiate lead time changes, increasing visibility of their demand to the tier 2 suppliers, or even re-sourcing the parts to a more reliable source at a higher price.  They should also engage their downstream customer in the problem solving efforts to see where they may be able to assist. Increased cost for them will typically mean increased cost passed on to their customer.

Often times, inventory is justified by the logic of reducing transportation cost.  A lean practitioner will use that as an opportunity to discuss the importance of the Total Landed Cost (TLC) Model.  TLC focuses on the idea that you have to look at all of the cost of decisions, instead of their silo effects to portions of the business.  It follows the notion that there are several levers that you can use to adjust the supply chain (lead time, lot size, transportation mode, etc).  The right solution is the one that has the lowest total landed cost in the current context that meets the customer expectations.  This may even include increasing inventory levels if the cost of the extra inventory is less than the savings in other areas like in the example below:

(Click on image for quality view.)

How to use the TLC model to effectively manage your supply chain:

1. Identify your levers – the options you have to adjust the supply chain.
2. Identify the impact of the levers on your cost areas.
3. Find the right combination of levers that result in the lowest cost within the current constraints while meeting customer expectations.
4. Problem solve and improve current constraints.
5. Identify new combination of levers that result in lower cost.
6. Repeat steps 4 and 5 continuously.

If you ask a random sampling of the population what they think when someone says “lean,” I believe a majority of them would either respond with “5S” or “eliminating inventory.”  A portion of those people would go on to share with you how lean has made their lives harder, or how they worked for a company that tried lean and it only caused them problems so they gave it up.  Unfortunately one of the biggest roadblocks in the path of spreading the value of the lean model is “pseudo-lean” methodologies. These typically result from a telephone-game-like passing of parts of lean from one person to another.  The result is a focus on the WHAT of lean instead of the HOW or WHY of lean.

We need to be responsible ambassadors of lean, and ensure we take the time to teach those with whom we come in contact the why of lean. We need explain concepts at the root of lean, as opposed to just tool sets and catchphrases.  We have to be careful saying things like “increasing inventory is ALWAYS the wrong thing to do,” when in fact sometimes, that is exactly what needs to be done in the short term.

Do you agree?

Written by Jacob Nance, Lean Supply Chain Operations Manager at LeanCor

Building a lean problem-solving culture begins and ends with people and leadership. While many books teach about lean tools, few address the day-to-day leadership requirements of successfully transforming organizations into the lean enterprise. In 15 easy-to-read-and-reference chapters, People: A leader’s day-to-day guide to building, managing, and sustaining lean organizations, outlines the high-level concepts, activities, principles, and practices that a lean leader must know intimately and apply daily. This book was written with the sole purpose of fundamentally changing how you think and act relative to leadership.

“A lean leader is an educator, trainer, coach, and mentor. The lean leader is always planning, sharing the plan, and executing the plan based on deep knowledge of his team members’ personalities, skills, and how the game is played. As a student and teacher, the lean leader understands the value of people. We love the game, and the people who play it.”

Reserve Your Copy Today!

Send an email to lthomas@leancor.com to reserve your copy. You will then receive an emailed link when the book is ready for purchase.

Sneak Peeks!

Download the entire introduction and table of contents on leancor.com.

A lot of things probably come to mind.  You might be thinking about your overall business structure or marketing model.  Could it possibly be your CEO or leadership decisions?  Would it be the adaptability of your supply chain in response to market conditions?  I would argue that above all of those things, a successful process for employee training is the most important area your company could focus on to ensure long term growth and success in your industry.

When we talk about Lean, what we’re really talking about is processes.  The company who “thinks Lean” thinks in terms of processes.  They think about eliminating waste through excellent process creation, discipline, and unrelenting PDCA (Plan-Do-Check-Act).  Following along with this analogy, if processes are the basic “building blocks” of Lean, then I would argue that the people operating those processes are the lifeblood of Lean.  The bottom line is that your processes are only as good as the people executing them on a daily basis.

Over the past 6 weeks, I’ve been reading through Toyota Talent: Developing Your People the Toyota Way.  This book has radically changed my view and understanding of both the importance of a robust training process and the long term impact it can have on your business.  Training our people properly seems to be one of the most important, yet overlooked aspects of many businesses today.  As Lean thinkers and doers, we should be implementing processes to eliminate waste and streamline our training experiences both internally (employees) and externally (customers).  From a very high level, here is what training should look like in a Lean environment:

1. Identify Critical Knowledge
2. Transfer Knowledge to Others
3. Verify Learning and Success

While this model might seem overly simplistic, there are some key points in each of these steps that can make or break your overall training effort, so don’t miss out!

Identify Critical Knowledge

This is by far the most important stage of any successful training effort and in most cases it seems to be completely overlooked.  When initiating a training of any kind with another person or group, the goal is for the right information to be transferred in the right way to produce the right results.  If we don’t preemptively take time to plan and agree upon what the right information is, there is no way we should expect the right results to be produced. If we are believers in Quality at the Source, then taking the time to identify the right pieces of information is essential to our training process.

 When you’ve been performing a task for a long time, it is easy to overlook the amount of accumulated “know-how” that you’ve gathered.  It is easy for you to forget the layers of understanding that are involved in knowing what the correct output looks like and what the most important value added steps are in the process.  It cannot be overstressed that determining exactly what these critical pieces of knowledge are is essential to your trainee producing the right results.  Once you know the critical pieces of information, you also have to document them in a standard format.  If you have not outlined and documented the critical pieces of knowledge, how can you ensure that you will convey all of the information needed and convey it in the correct way during your training effort?

One of the best ways to document those critical pieces of knowledge is to use a Job Breakdown Sheet:

I won’t get into the details of creating this document, but you can see that each major step is identified, key points within that step are pulled out, and the reasons for those key points are explained. It is crucial to boil this Job Breakdown Sheet down to the most basic level of the job tasks.  If you are at too high of a level with this document, there is good chance you will be missing critical knowledge needed to perform the tasks.  For the scope of this piece, I won’t spend time explaining the method used to break down each job task, but the main idea is to keep drilling down until you’ve hit the most basic operations involved in each task and can explain both their impact on the overall process and why they are important.

With your completed Job Breakdown Sheet in hand, you are prepared to move on to the next step.  (I realize that the time investment to create standardized Job Breakdown Sheets for every task inside of your organization is daunting, but you can start small with this and build up over time.)

Transfer Knowledge to Others

Once you have created an effective Job Breakdown Sheet, your actual training process should be very much simplified and straight forward.  As previously stated, the goal of any training is for the right information (already gathered at this point) to be transferred in the right way to produce the right results.

For the actual training, the trainer will be walking the trainee through the job task using the Job Breakdown Sheet as an outline.  Each step should be explained individually and the reason for each step (how it adds value) should be explained clearly so the trainee starts to get the bigger picture.

There are a few things you can do as a trainer to ensure a more effective training every time:

• Clear your schedule to make sure the training period will be uninterrupted.

• Clearly set the scope of the training session and do not allow other topics to be discussed within that session.

• Prepare the training environment so the trainee will be fully engaged once the training starts.

• Don’t plan to teach more material in one session than can be processed effectively. This will vary from person to person, but keep in mind that knowledge absorption will start slowing rapidly after a certain point. (usually around 30 – 60 minutes of a training session)

• Keep in mind that training is more of an art than a science; be prepared to respond uniquely to each individual based upon their learning needs.

Verify Learning and Success

This final step should be happening both during the training and for weeks (and possibly months) to come depending on the complexity of the task. Here is an example of what this looks like within the immediate training:

When you are preparing your material and training schedule, make sure to build time into the training session for the trainee to practice whatever is being taught directly in front of the trainer. As the trainee is practicing the task, the trainer should be correcting any errors and verifying the success of the trainee. This cycle of teach/practice/verify should be happening for every single task that is being taught.

Think about your own company… how many times do you or another trainer teach a large amount of material to a trainee and then walk away to resume your work and assume they will execute it just like you taught the first time around?  Without a disciplined process in place to ensure results, we shouldn’t be expecting a consistent and high level of performance from our employees.

The biggest mental shift that has happened for me around the topic of training during the past few months is this: The output and performance of a trainee is a direct measure of the quality of the trainer.  Not only is the success of the trainee  the direct responsibility of the trainer, but the quality of the trainee’s work can even be used as a KPI to evaluate the quality of the trainer and training method.

We live in a culture where individual blame is the norm. I can promise that an amazing shift would happen in your company if your trainers start taking ownership for the performance of their trainees and your leaders and managers started viewing one of their primary roles as a teacher and trainer.  I’ve heard it said that a Lean culture is a learning culture, and there is no better way to create a learning culture than by the leadership of your organization embracing effective teaching and training as one of their highest priorities.

So… now that you’ve heard my thoughts, what are yours?  Feel free to share some good or bad training experiences you’ve been a part of and what made them effective or lacking.

Also, be sure to check out the upcoming Lean Supply Chain training courses at Georgia Tech.

Written by Colin Willis, Lean Logistics Specialist at LeanCor

It’s been four years now since I spent that fateful day with my daughter Abbey in her first grade classroom. The result of my day with Abbey was my writing the book Everything I Know about Lean I Learned in First Grade. I am very proud of the book as it was a labor of love, and I am equally as proud that several thousand copies of the book have found themselves into the hands of eager lean readers.

However, just like all things in life, most good things that happen have some element of an unintended consequence. In the case of the Lean in First Grade book, the unintended consequence was that my oldest daughter Emilee, was quite put out about all the attention Abbey received with respect to the book. While they are very loving sisters, a dad should never underestimate the “hey, don’t you love me too?” syndrome. And so, in my endless pursuit to be a good dad, I promised Emilee the follow up book would pay attention to her and level the dad attention playing field.

The challenge was how to do this? The reality is, I never intended on writing the Everything I Know About Lean I Learned in First Grade. It truly originated from me simply trying to spend time with Abbey due to a busy work and travel schedule. So I talked to Emilee about coming to her 8^th grade class. However, I was then educated about how 8th grade does not work the same way as 1^st grade and therefore a “day” with Emilee was, according to her, not practical for many reasons. Then, one evening I noticed Emilee working on a project that included building a vehicle or sorts and attaching a balloon to the vehicle in order to propel the vehicle across the floor.

“What are you doing, Emilee?” I asked.

“Nothing” was the response from my newly-teenage

daughter.

“Looks like something to me?” I replied.

After a few rounds of what may be construed as dialogue, I determined Emilee was in fact building a car that she intended to test and compete with the following day in science class.

“It’s settled then,” I said. I’ll join you tomorrow for your science project and watch you race the cars!”

I was pleasantly surprised when Emilee agreed and was eager for me to join her the next day. After a couple of emails, I arranged to be a spectator the next day in 8^th grade science class.

The next day was filled with fun. Emilee’s teacher brought the class and I to the cafeteria and we launched our cars. To say that we had high variability in product design would be like saying Niagara Falls has a little bit of water flow.  Alfred Sloan and Lee Iacocca combined could not have come up with

so many random automobile designs. Each student came up to the starting line, attached their balloon, and hoped for the longest ride across the cafeteria floor. To say that we had high variability in results (as measured in linear feet) would be like saying the Grand Canyon has a bit of a drop-off. The high score was well over 40 feet and the low was in fact a negative value where the balloon shot off the car and twisted the car in such a way that it propelled backwards. (The improbable physics of this particular test run still puzzle me today.)

In the end, it was an amazingly fun morning. Emilee and I and her classmates shared some laughs and conversations about how we could make a better balloon-propelled vehicle.

However, in that one morning, I did not gain enough insight to make good on my promise to Emilee to write the follow-up book to

Lean in First Grade. What was a dad to do? That evening I interrupted Emilee while she was doing her homework to discuss my predicament. She was actually doing her science homework and I noticed her text book was very colorful and alive with pictures and tables and all sorts of images and figures that made the text book itself appealing to look over.

“Wow, text books have come a long way,” I said in a “you should have seen what it was like in my day” tone of voice.

“I wouldn’t know” was Emilee’s reply in a tone of voice that only a 13 year-old can perfect.

Over the next few hours I read through Emilee’s 8^th grade science textbook. Similar to my experience while sitting in Abbey’s 1^st Grade classroom four years ago, I had a sudden revelation: it’s all here.

The fact is, lean thinking and lean principles sh

ould not be thought of as anything new or innovative.  The complexity of creating a lean business is in its simplicity. We have the answers to many of our challenges; they have been around for centuries. Why is it that collectively we cannot simply get back to basics, get back to theories and models that have created all of the positive advancements we know in the world today? Arguing against lean principles should be no different than arguing against the laws of aerodynamics or penicillin fighting infection. Not much argument about the latter two.

My commitment to Emilee was that I would write a follow up to Lean in First Grade where she would be the lead protagonist. Holding true to my commitments is very important to me, not only as a business leader, but in this case as a parent. How can I preach the wisdom of walking the talk if I don’t practice it myself? Yet, life is busy. The new normal work week is almost abnormal. So I decided I needed to talk to Emilee and confess that I was unsure of my ability to complete my end of the bargain.

This is how the talk went. Picture my family of four around the dinner table:

“Emilee, I think I will need at least twelve weeks of full time attention to our project if I have any chance of completing the book. And honey, I’m just not sure I can commit to that right now as work and travel make it very difficult to find that much time to focus on one thing.”

“Ok, Dad, no problem. Why don’t we just do a little bit a time? We can spread it over what time we have available to us.”

What came next was silence on my part and full recognition that once again, even with all my training, education and real world experience in lean, I missed to see the obvious solution to the problem. Why did I feel the writing of the second book needed to be a batch process?

“You’re absolutely right Em,” I responded. “Let’s just do a little each day and before you know you it, a job that seems larger than life will get done –done in an efficient and effective way. That is, by doing the right things a little each day, we will complete a great book in the end.”

The good news: in the spirit of small lot size and high delivery frequency, we can share the updates of this second book with our readers as it progresses one chapter at a time. I’m very excited about this second book and look forward to sharing it and hearing comments from our readers.

“A journey of one thousand miles” begins with a single step, or in this case, chapter 1.  Please join myself, Emilee and her classmates, and of course Orloe the Wise Owl next month in the LeanCor newsletter as we introduce Everything Else I Know About Lean I Learned in 8^th Grade Science.

Written by Robert Martichenko, CEO of LeanCor

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