This section describes the nature and operation of 15 structural configura-tions. These fall into two categories, as shown in Figure 6.3. Configurations that fall under the Leadership of Significant Change umbrella serve to struc-ture and manage large and/or focused changes. These configurations provide a means of ensuring that the executives responsible for the day-to-day opera-tion of a site have a shared and agreed-upon ownership of and involvement in the allocation, direction, and guidance of change resources at the site. The configurations also provide for a large number of extremely effective leader-ship touches and direct actions (see Chapter 15). A site can be a manufactur-ing plant, a server farm, a back-office processmanufactur-ing center, a research center, an administrative center, and so on.
The Team Metrics and Ownership System (TMOS), the other category of configurations, is a “pure” kaizen entity. TMOS elements enable many small improvements. These configurations are the structures that generate and sup-port the ownership of day-to-day work processes by the employees and the removal of waste in each of the intact work groups (IWGs) throughout a site.
TMOS is called the Lean Daily Management System (LDMS) in OK1. A
Leadership of significant Change Team Metrics and Ownership system Executive Steering Committee
Work stream teams Work stream team leaders Work stream champions Charters
Site improvement facilitator Continuous improvement events Kaikaku events
Gemba Wall
Daily work group meetings Visual metrics display Key goals visual focus chart Kaizen action sheet system Team 21
Weekly continuous improvement meeting
Figure 6.3 The 15 structural configurations.
number of improvements to the LDMS motivated the name change so there would be no confusion between the contents of OK1 and this book.
Leadership of significant Change elements Executive Steering Committee (ESC)
The ESC consists of the top-level executives who own and direct the func-tions and processes at a site. In addition to the executive responsible for the overall site, a typical ESC consists of the heads of various departments such as operations, human resources, finance, sales, quality, customer service, and so on. By and large, the ESC will consist of the same people who would be called the site leadership team, the executive staff, or the management team.
In unionized sites, it is wise to include an elected union official if he or she is willing. In the initial stages of many transformations, the union leadership is often reluctant to be so visibly and intimately involved with management in driving change (prior “me” assumptions at work). In that case, arrange to brief the union official immediately after each ESC meeting. Eventually, he or she will come around as the employees’ “me” assumptions change. If there is a person at the site responsible for continuous improvement (or lean, Six Sigma, etc.), he or she should also be on the ESC.
The purpose of the ESC is to plan, guide, and direct all change efforts at the site. All too often, many of the functional or process heads at a site are not aware of the wide array of change efforts that are under way at the site. In most cases, each executive is operating with a different set of expectations, a differ-ent view of the currdiffer-ent reality, and a differdiffer-ent vision for the future. In such a situation, each executive runs his or her area of responsibility as a somewhat discrete entity, somewhat connected to the site’s processes but serving mainly its own needs.
The ESC operates to ensure that every ESC member has a clear understand-ing of the change priorities at the site and how they are beunderstand-ing addressed. In addition, the ESC approves any new change initiatives that cross departmental or process lines, provides resources to staff the change efforts, and reviews the progress of each change effort each week. Change efforts can include relo-cating a department, conducting a kaizen event, addressing a quality issue, improving customer service, introducing a new product, and so on. No longer will a department simply assume leadership of change on its own because its name seems related to the issue.
For example, in a traditional environment the information technology (IT) department would organize, lead, and staff any software upgrade projects. This would not happen with an ESC in place. The ESC would select a team leader
(probably from IT) for the upgrade, assign a champion from the ESC (see
“Team Champions” in this section), and have the team leader and the cham-pion develop a charter and select team members who represent the processes and interests of other groups as well as the IT knowledge required. The ESC would approve or revise the charter, approve or revise the requested hours of effort assigned, and launch the effort. This same process would work for all but the very smallest changes: those whose impacts stay within departments and absolutely, positively don’t impact anyone else’s processes.
Think about what this means. For probably the first time, the manage-ment of the site will have a single, agreed-upon strategy for improvemanage-ment and change. Further, they would have all discussed every allocation of the resources necessary to implement the changes. Each of the ESC members would under-stand a little about everything that was going on and a lot about the changes for which he or she would be the champion (see “Team Champions” in this section). Because the ESC reviews each effort each week and the champion checks on each effort a couple of times each week, there is almost no chance that an effort will have problems for very long before the ESC takes action.
The ESC must meet every week at the same time without exception.
Remember, every employee is preconsciously attempting to support nega-tive “me” assumptions—1 missed meeting out of 10 is all it takes to create the “Aha, I knew they weren’t serious!” response from team members who report to the ESC each week. If an ESC member is traveling or otherwise disposed, he or she must send an empowered substitute. Those who might be used as substitutes should attend a number of meetings as totally silent observers to understand how the meetings work. The meetings must be care-fully and tightly facilitated so that ESC members do not revisit old issues or discuss other business topics besides change efforts. The ESC meeting is only for reviewing and prioritizing suggested change efforts; drafting/revising char-ters; assigning champions, team leaders, and team members; and reviewing each change effort’s progress. All other business should be addressed through normal channels such as the regular management meeting. Do not attempt to combine the ESC meeting with the regular management meeting. This always results in the ESC portion of the meeting being compromised.
Each week, each team (or the team leader if all team members do not attend—this is up to the team if the team champion or the ESC has not requested that all of them attend) gives a very brief update of its progress.
These presentations should take place at the beginning of the meeting. No new overheads should be produced for these reports. If the team is on schedule and there are no problems, that is all that needs to be said, since the team’s charter,
with which all ESC members should be familiar, has already specified the schedule, deliverables, objectives, team membership, and the like. If there are problems, the team should briefly discuss a recovery plan, which has already been worked out with the champion before the meeting. The latter part of the meeting is spent reviewing proposed charters (see “Charters” in this section), generating objectives for new charters, following up on open action items, and setting priorities among the list of possible projects and teams.
The ESC meetings provide an opportunity for the ESC members to send a great many very effective direct leadership touches (see Chapter 15). ESC members are seen in the best possible light as involved coaches/leaders, and the employees relish their time in the spotlight.
An important structural configuration that dramatically improves the effec-tiveness of the ESC is the Gemba Wall, described later in this chapter. With-out proper use of a Gemba Wall, an ESC sacrifices 30%–50% of its potential impact on driving change and improving operations.
Work Stream Teams (WSTs)
WSTs are ad hoc teams of employees, usually three to seven, assigned to a change effort by the ESC. The ESC determines the number of hours each member of a WST is permitted, expected, and/or assigned to work on the change effort. Not everyone on a team is assigned to work on the team for the same number of hours. Some team members participate only a few hours per week to ensure that the change effort is accommodating the concerns of their home departments.
For example, while several IT people may be on a software upgrade team 20–30 hours per week, other members from operational work areas may be on the team for only a couple of hours each week to make sure that the installed upgrade will be easy for their compatriots to use. Because the ESC members run the site, the team members typically have little trouble getting free from their “normal”
work for team duties. If they do have trouble, the team champion resolves the issue with other ESC members if the team leaders cannot get satisfaction.
It is important that team leaders and team members be hands-on pro-cess workers, not supervisors or managers, unless there is no other technical resource that can do the job. Teams loaded with managers and supervisors typically do not get as much done, because managers and supervisors tend to spend a lot of time directing others instead of actually doing team tasks themselves. It is important that the ESC meeting facilitator (the site improve-ment facilitator) be on guard to prevent the ESC from assigning managers and supervisors as team members and leaders unless there is absolutely no other resource with the required technical skills.
Work Stream Team Leaders (WSTLs)
Team leaders must operate as more than simply senior team members who coordinate meetings. WSTLs are responsible for checking on the task status of every team member every day and working with team members to resolve issues and stay on schedule. WSTLs must be high-energy “can do” people who work fairly well with others. It is not necessary that WSTLs be expert in the technical issues their team is attempting to resolve, although in some cases this may be desirable. It is always good practice for WSTLs to be expe-rienced in the basics of problem-solving tools (cause-and-effect diagrams, Pareto charts, brainstorming techniques, meeting management, etc.). Each WSTL meets with the team champion (see “Team Champions” below) at least twice a week in addition to being at the team meeting with the champion at least once a week.
Team Champions (TCs)
TCs are members of the ESC who assist teams of several types (WSTs, kaikaku teams, and kaizen teams—see “Kaikaku Events” and “Continuous Improve-ment Events” in this section). Each member of the ESC typically champions two or three teams simultaneously once the ESC is up and running. The role of a TC is not to provide daily coaching to the teams (this is the role of the site improvement facilitator [see “Site Improvement Facilitator” in this section]) and the WSTL but to ensure that a team is on track and is getting the resources and support it needs. The responsibilities of a TC include leadership touches such as checking on the team several times a week to see if it needs help, checking to ensure that it is on schedule, and working with members if they are having problems. If necessary, the TC works behind the scenes with other ESC members to arrange new or different resources, resolve disputes between departments that may be impacting the team, and/or approach the ESC for changes in the charter.
It is important that a TC not be in charge of a department or process that a team will be working in or on. The role of the TC is to support the team’s work and maintain the change leadership structural configurations, not tell the team what to do. If a TC runs an area being addressed by the team, there is always a tendency for the TC to preconsciously or consciously steer the team toward his or her biases. Also, the team members may hold back on being candid about issues that they fear (either preconsciously or consciously) will elicit a nega-tive reaction on the part of the TC. A TC not directly involved with the areas or processes under examination is more likely to be neutral. Keep in mind that all ESC members are involved in approving the charters for all teams—the
interests of every area and process that will be impacted by the WST should be adequately represented by ESC member input into the team charter and WST composition.
Being a TC not only helps the various change teams but provides tremen-dous benefit to the executive team. Over the course of championing a num-ber of teams, each TC learns a great deal about the workings of parts of the organization of which he or she had little knowledge in the past. Over time, this knowledge changes each executive’s perspective from that of an executive who leads an area/function to that of an executive who develops an informed, well-rounded organizational viewpoint. Experienced TCs are also closely in touch with the pitch and timbre of the organization culture.
In the course of being a champion, each ESC member also administers a great many direct leadership touches each week to the team members and an even larger number of positive indirect leadership touches to all of those who witness the TC working with the team. These touches by a group of TCs are invaluable in challenging the traditional “me” assumptions of employees.
Charters
Charters are contracts between the ESC and each team. They detail objec-tives, deliverables, resources required (including the time commitments of each champion, team leader, and team member), schedules, and planned activ-ities. No team of any kind can begin work until the ESC approves a final-ized charter. While some may initially contend that this requirement slows down changes, the opposite is the case. The effort that goes into producing a charter before beginning work is returned tenfold by the quality and speed of charter-supported initiatives. The charter ensures that all members of the ESC have reached consensus on the priority of the issues being addressed, the desired outcomes, the resources that are required, the objectives, and the gen-eral approach that will be used. Never again will an effort be pulled up short after a few weeks because an executive suddenly finds out that he or she has to provide a resource for 10 hours per week that cannot be spared. Never again will the executive team discover three months into a project that three depart-ments have been trying to solve the same problem with different approaches, all unknown to one another.
Charters get their starts in many ways. Often, charters are born in the ESC, proposed by ESC members to address annual strategic goals or resolve opera-tional issues that arise suddenly. These issues would arise in the course of normal business, management meetings, and so forth. They would then be referred to the ESC meeting: “Okay, let’s develop a charter and get a team
working on this in our ESC meeting on Thursday.” If the issue is urgent, an emergency ESC meeting would be held following the current meeting. Never do ESC business in a non-ESC meeting and vice versa. When management generates the need for a charter, the ESC (or the appointed TC) generates objectives and a rough cut at the other sections. The TC, the team leader, and perhaps the selected team members then complete the charter and it is reviewed by the ESC. It is then either revised or approved. Charters can also come from employees of any level who approach an ESC member with a sug-gestion for a project.
A critical element of successful charters is specified and audited follow-on activities after implementation. That is, it is not enough for a team to imple-ment an improveimple-ment. The team must also take responsibility for ensuring that the changes are supported after they have been implemented. The team must work with involved managers and supervisors (those who “own” the processes being improved) to design and monitor metrics that monitor performance. The team must also assign its own team members to audit involved work areas on a regular schedule to ensure that the changes are being maintained. If the changes are not being maintained, the team must work with the area supervi-sor and its champion to correct the problems.
Site Improvement Facilitator (SIF)
The SIF, perhaps also called the site lean leader, Lean-Six Sigma leader, Six Sigma leader, site improvement coordinator, and continuous improvement leader, is responsible for coaching the ESC, the champions, and the teams on a daily basis. The SIF also provides lean, kaizen, and continuous improve-ment training in real time to champions and team members if no other training resource is available. The SIF leads kaizen and kaikaku events and trains oth-ers to do the same. The SIF also monitors the performance of champions, team leaders, and team members (such as checking to ensure that each champion meets with his or her team once a week and the team leader two other times).
The SIF also tracks and reports on the status of open action items from past kaizen and kaikaku events (see “Continuous Improvement Events” and “Kai-kaku Events” in this section).
The importance of a good SIF cannot be overemphasized. Without a knowl-edgeable and high-energy SIF, the organization runs the risk of falling victim to small but steady degradations in the maintenance of its structural configu-rations. Each little slip, whether it is a champion who does not meet with the team as required, a team that falls behind its schedule without anyone saying anything, or a team leader who does not check on team members each day,
reinforces the worse “me” assumptions of traditionally minded employees and decelerates the benefits the team should be attaining. The SIF also checks on the status of the structural configurations of the TMOS. Only a good, full-time SIF has the time and focus to make sure that all of these duties are performed consistently and correctly and that remedial coaching is quickly delivered. If a site has more than 100 employees, a full-time SIF is absolutely necessary. A site should have one full-time SIF for every 200–250 people. The investment
reinforces the worse “me” assumptions of traditionally minded employees and decelerates the benefits the team should be attaining. The SIF also checks on the status of the structural configurations of the TMOS. Only a good, full-time SIF has the time and focus to make sure that all of these duties are performed consistently and correctly and that remedial coaching is quickly delivered. If a site has more than 100 employees, a full-time SIF is absolutely necessary. A site should have one full-time SIF for every 200–250 people. The investment