The Gumby Walk

The Gumby Walk, or Going to Gumby...

Oh,wait, that's not it. Gemba. Gemba, not Gumby.

If you are not familiar with gemba or the gemba walk, here's a couple of great posts that illustrate the concept so that you'll never forget it. The first is by Jon Wetzel at the Gemba Tales Blog, the second is by Norman Bodek. I heard Norman speak once. What a character! But also full of knowledge.

To summarize the concept of gemba in the Lean Management system, it means going to the source, or where things actually happen. If you want to know what's going on, go look. Don't just listen to what people tell you. Go look and see for yourself. If you run a manufacturing plant, go out onto the factory floor. If you provide services to clients, go to where those services are provided and see for yourself how it's being done. Go look.


As for Gumby? If you've never heard it, you have to listen to The Ballad of Gumby. Or, if country western ballads aren't your thing, try Zydeco Gumby Ya Ya.

Leading the Race?

... and it's Lean leading by two and a half lengths coming into the turn...

I just came across this report that says that Lean is leading Six Sigma as the preferred corporate improvement system. Maybe it is. Without reading the full research analysis I can only comment on what is reported in the press. But I am a bit skeptical about the whole thing.

A couple of points jump to mind. The first is that the analysis is based on job ads that list Lean and/or Six Sigma expertise and experience. I'm not sure how valid that is as a measure of the popularity of the systems. Sure, it says something, but what exactly I'm not sure I'd speculate about.

Second, I don't see these two management systems as competing against each other. First, they are complimentary systems. They work well together, and you could argue that either one is an extension of the other. Second, commitment and implementation are more important than which one you choose. Actually, what's more important is which one is the most appropriate for your organization at any given point in time.

A point I often make is that instead of focusing on what the particular system you're looking at using is called, understand what you're trying to accomplish and what tools you can use to get there. Use parts and pieces of the various formal systems and make them work for you.

Of course, many times it is advantageous to implement a formal, named, system, such as Lean, Six Sigma, or Sales & Operations Planning because that allows people to get their hands and heads around it and keep them focused. Only you know what's best for you.

But you have to have enough knowledge to make the decisions. My book will help.

Pontificate

I'm going to speak to an accounting class at UH tomorrow (University of Hawaii Shidler College of Business). Hopefully I will be more engaging than just standing in front of the room pontificating. Although I think I would look pretty good in a Pope's hat.

Shirely Daniel (Professor, PhD, all around good egg) invited me to speak to her senior level (undergrad) management accounting class. I do have a degree in accounting, although that's not what I do. But looking at the sample of materials she's sent me, the class is more about good business than just a narrow view of accounting.

The class includes discussions of Lean and Supply Chain Management as these topics relate to the accounting function. This is right up my alley, and I'm looking forward to tomorrow.

Hard Times Offer Chance - Now How To Improve

There’s nothing more motivational for a blogger than to know that someone is reading your blog. And when they ask for more, or a follow up to a post, that will keep you going for a while. Sexy Lady (?) wants some follow up on the Hard Times Offer Chance to Improve post. Thanks for reading, and sorry for the delayed response.

Kaizen is the term for Continuous Improvement. This is a fundamental principle of the Lean Management system, and for good reason. Even in the best of times business is not easy. Conditions change constantly. Procuring materials and supplies, finding the right people to keep you moving forward, changing customer tastes, changing market and economic conditions are all part of the day-to-day. The ever more global marketplace of competition makes any business a wild ride. So even in the best of times it is important to continuously strive to improve your organization so that you can either remain in front of the pack or gain ground to move to the front.

Continuous improvement means looking at everything you do and making it better. The hard part for many organizations, though, is to see what you’re looking at. On the surface, many things you do, your processes, might look like they’re just fine and don’t need any improvement. Other processes might not even need a close view to know they need improvement. But how many times have you seen something that needs to be improved, but it just never gets done? Kaizen means seeing what you’re looking at, looking below the surface of some processes, and getting off your bum and fixing the things that you’ve been putting off.

Kaizen isn’t so much a technique, but a mindset. It’s a way of thinking where you never accept that the way you do things is good enough, they can always be done better. Your processes can always be more effective and more efficient. Efficient means using fewer resources to get the same result or using the same amount of resources to get more done. Resources include time, people, materials, equipment, space, whatever it is you use to get the job done. Effective means that you accomplish your goals. And each process has a goal.

Your organization as a whole has goals, or you should have clearly defined goals. Every process, a process simply being a series of tasks to do a job, should also have a clearly defined goal. Have you ever had a job where you performed some task and always wondered why you did it? You knew it wasn’t necessary or could have been done much better, but you had to do it anyway? That’s because no one ever defined, or questioned, the goal of that process and how it supported the larger process or the goals of the organization. I’ve experienced this first hand a number of times. It’s common with reports. At some time, for some reason, someone wanted a report, and it might even have been useful at the time. But over time the report had become unnecessary, but nobody wanted to stop generating it. On more than one occasion I’ve stopped generating and distributing reports that were unnecessary – and no one even noticed! That process was not only in need of improvement, it was in need of elimination. If you look, I’ll bet you can find many processes that fit this same criteria. And it’s not always something as innocuous as a report. Sometimes there are steps in a manufacturing process that can and should be eliminated.

More often, though, a step or series of steps must be performed, but they can be done much differently than they are now. They can be done in a different way that takes less time, fewer people, less materials or space, and less money. But you have to look, and you have to see. Look at everything you do. Do three people really need to approve that? Do you really have to write that down AND enter it into the computer? Do you really have to enter that manually, can’t it be done automatically? Do you really need to send a (signed) purchase order to your vendor, can’t you just send them an electronic signal (after you’ve set up an agreement on terms such as quantity for re-orders, price, etc.)?

The point is, examine everything you do, be sure you know why you’re doing it, and find a way to do it better. Every improvement doesn’t have to be a big breakthrough. Small, incremental improvements add up quickly. Better small improvement than none at all.

I’ll continue this thread in future posts.

Late Late Supply Chain Show

I haven't watched this whole video yet, but the part about the origin of the term kanban is great. It starts about 3 minutes in. I think I'm going to have to "borrow" the demonstration the next time I give a presentation on Lean.

Take a look.

New Links

I've got a couple of new links, both rugby and operations:

New Operations Links:

This is an excellent blog I found; LearnSigma. It's a blog about Lean and Six Sigma. It has some excellent posts and some excellent links. Definitely check this out. And if you're looking for some simple, but very effective, lean games to use in your training, here's a link to one of his posts that I found very useful. I used both the Nickel Game and the Dollar Game in the Lean Seminar I just gave in Tucson and they were quite effective - and fun. Very simple and easy, but clearly illustrate some of the Lean principles I was reviewing. And the best thing is all you need is some coins. You don't have to spend hundreds of dollars buying some lean board games that some people are selling. Also, I love the videos of the demonstration of these games.

I'm also adding a link to the Tucson Chapter of APICS. I presented a seminar for them yesterday, and Introduction to Lean seminar. I titled it Leaning Towards Excellence. I also gave a presentation at their dinner meeting. That was titled Selecting the Right Tools for the Job, which is based on my book. I recorded the presentation, and sent the audio and the slides to the Tucson Chapter, so check in on their site and look for both the audio and slides of the presentation. I started this with the Mission Peak Chapter of APICS, and they're now recording all their speakers and posting the presentations on their website. I did a presentation for them earlier this month. The audio wasn't working that night, so I re-recorded the audio in my "personal studio" (i.e. my hotel room). Check in on their website for that presentation - Lean & Six Sigma: Working Together.

I'm going to post these presentations to my website, so check there too. The wifi connection is a little slow here at times (I'm on the road), so it might take me a couple of days to get it up there.

Next up is a blog dedicated to the music business; Your Music Business. The gentleman who authors the blog, Liam Abramson, contacted me because he wants to post an article that I wrote on his website (he has an arts business consultancy, focusing on the music business); Tips for Managing Your Small Non-profit Organization.

New Rugby Links:

I found this blog a while ago, but didn't add the link because the posts were so old; Coaching Rugby. But now Just Call me Coach has been making posts. Her posts are quite good, and she has some great links to excellent rugby coaching resources. Rugby coaches should definitely read this blog, and all ruggers should check it out too. Well worth your time.

I was just contacted today to join this Yahoo Group; World Rugby Masters. This is a group, from "Trapper" Dan, dedicated to Masters Rugby, also known as Old Boys or Old Farts. There are different groupings, but generally Master Rugby is considered over 35 years old. I'd love to play some rugby again (when I get in shape), but if I do it would have to be Old Boys. Don't let that fool you. When I first started playing rugby and still in my teens, one of the best players I met was about 50 years old. Jim Sims (sp?), first of Durango, then Santa Fe. He was one of the toughest guys I ever met, not very big, but solid, and it felt like you were running into a rock when you tackled him. He's the one who taught me how to tackle. We asked him to come down to Socorro to help us out, and he spent one night giving us some tips. I remember the tackling drills. It must have worked. When I moved to Albuquerque and started playing club rugby, for a good team (Albuquerque Aardvarks), my tackling skills were noticed. I had to fight for my position (number 6, or blind side flanker) with one of the fittest and best rugby players I knew. I finally won the starting spot, but in tournaments we often alternated games. I remember, though, in one tournament I was selected to play in the finals when it was the other gentleman's turn. I was selected for my tackling skills, that would be especially needed against the team we were playing in the finals. Sure made me feel good.

So, I'm still in Tucson, Arizona. It was cold the first couple days I was here, but it's been warming up since. I went on the downtown walking tour today, with my wife's aunt. It was great fun. I'd never walked around downtown before. Found some new coffee shops and restaurants. I love Tucson.

Going on tour

I'm going on tour. I'll be giving presentations and conducting seminars. Here's the itinerary:

February 21-22 - ASQ Quality Management Division Conference, Orlando, FL
Two presentations: 1) Effective Strategic Planning, 2) Selecting the Right Tools for the Job (based on my book)

February 26 - Redwood Empire Chapter APICS, Santa Rosa, CA
Seminar and dinner meeting presentation - topics TBD

February 29 - ISM Silicon Valley, Santa Clara, CA
Lunch & Learn presentation - Lean & Six Sigma: Working Together

March 4 - Sacramento Chapter APICS, Sacramento, CA
Dinner meeting presentation - Effective Strategic Planning

March 5 - ISM Silicon Valley, Santa Clara, CA
Two 1/2-day seminars - 1) Lean & Six Sigma, 2) Selecting the Right Tools for the Job

March 5 - Mission Peak Chapter APICS, San Jose, CA
Dinner meeting presentation - Lean & Six Sigma: Working Together


If you're interested in attending any of the events, please contact the organization listed (just go to their website), or contact me and I can point you in the right direction. If you'd like to have me speak to your group or conduct a training session or seminar, please contact me.

What is Lean?

Lean, also known as Lean Manufacturing, and now morphing in the Lean Enterprise, Lean Supply Chain, the Lean Office, Lean Six Sigma, and more. But what is Lean? There was a discussion recently on LinkedIn when someone asked a question about implementing Lean in a Make-to-Order or Engineer-to-Order environment. That’s where a product isn’t made until customer actually orders one, or the product isn’t even designed until the customer orders it (think buildings or satellites or something like that). The questioner said that “traditional” Lean techniques didn’t work and was asking for advice.

To ask a question like that tells me you don’t really understand Lean and what Lean is. Lean, for those not familiar with it, is a management system that evolved from the Just-in-Time (JIT) system. JIT was an evolution of the Toyota Production System, which was an evolution, of sorts, of Henry Ford’s automobile production system. But that doesn’t really tell you much. What is Lean?

Lean is a philosophy. It is a business philosophy to operate your business or organization in the most efficient and effective way as possible. The term you’ll hear the most is Eliminate Waste. Waste takes many forms. Wasted time, wasted effort, and wasted resources are the biggies. Eliminating waste, improving processes, and becoming more successful and profitable are the goals. There are many tools, or techniques, associated with Lean. Things like 5S (Five S), which means to clean up and organize your work areas, Cellular Manufacturing, where you produce an item in a small, compact work cell, rather than moving things around to different departments, are used to make improvements.

Not every tool or technique will work, or work as well, in every situation or for every organization, but the basic philosophy is sound. Understand the philosophy, understand the tools, modify them for your organization, and reap the rewards. An instructor I had many years ago said “adopt and adapt”. Adopt the principles, and adapt them to fit your needs.

Supermarket Operations

I went to my local Safeway again. I often question why I still shop there. The answer is it's close by and easy to get to. The problem is they're always out of half the things I want. I mean, it's not like I'm in there looking for some kind of exotic French cheese that is made one wheel at a time by a hermit in a cave. I'm going in there for yoghurt and peanut butter. And beer. This upsets me, when they don't have Guiness (Extra Stout) in stock. It especially upsets me when it's on sale and they're out of stock. But it really, really upsets me when the same 4 bottles in a six-pack carton are all that's in there for the second week in a row. Why can't they get things right?

If I wanted to get everything I was shopping for I'd have to find out when they stock each particular item and get there when they're stocking the shelves. Otherwise the odds are against me. If you sell that much yoghurt or peanut butter in a day, maybe you could restock more than once a day. I can hear the managers and executives now telling me why this isn't possible, but wait, I'm the customer and I have other options. One day I will be pushed over the edge and just stop shopping in your store, and I'll tell everyone I know not to shop there. Maybe one customer doesn't mean much to you, but with the competition in the supermarket business being what it is, I don't think you can afford to lose even one customer.

I might just consider myself ignorant and get over it, but in one of the most influential books on the Lean management system (Lean Thinking, by James Womack & Daniel Jones) the authors use an example of Tesco, a supermarket chain in the U.K. for how Lean works to improve operations. If they can do it, why can't Safeway? I'm sure there are lot's of things that can be done, even given whatever constraints they have, to improve their operations and keep the shelves stocked on a more consistent basis.