We started Lean a couple of years ago with 5s and a few Kaizens all of which have been successful. Since then we've done ok at 5S but are slacking a little on sustaining some of the standards we implemented during the Kaizens. I want to have Team Leaders on the floor in each department. Everyone in that department would report any problems to the Team Lead and he/she would organize a small team to:
1. Identify the problem; did we stray from our standards?
2. What caused the problem
3. resolve the problem; come up with a new standard if necessary
4. Post/share the results with the department.

We are a commercial printer with 200+ employees; most of which are long time employees. Change is not well accepted and hard to sustain. How do I find Team Leaders and how can I encourage Buy-in?
Like I said above; we've been successful but Buy-in by most employees isn't there.

Does anyone think I should approach this in a different away? or am I on the right track?



Thanks,
Jeff

I want to have Team Leaders on the floor in each department. Everyone in that department would report any problems to the Team Lead and he/she would organize a small team to:
1. Identify the problem; did we stray from our standards?
2. What caused the problem
3. resolve the problem; come up with a new standard if necessary
4. Post/share the results with the department.

We are a commercial printer with 200+ employees; most of which are long time employees. Change is not well accepted and hard to sustain. How do I find Team Leaders and how can I encourage Buy-in?
Like I said above; we've been successful but Buy-in by most employees isn't there.

Does anyone think I should approach this in a different away? or am I on the right track?

Thanks,
Jeff


Jeff, a couple of things regarding the identification of right person for a team leader position.

1) Is the team leader somebody that people look to when they have a question?
2) Is the team leader going to be comfortable questioning those "long term" employees who aren't following the standard?
3) What kind of training and/or support are you going to or willing to provide to the candidate to help them be successful?

In my case, I went outside to fill supervisor positions (and I've filled three of them in the past year) with people that had experience working with Lean methods and not necessarily from within the same industry.

You have what are typical challenges in front of you and how you deal with them will determine your level of success in transforming your organization. Here's some additional questions you should ask yourself regarding your organization:

1) Has the organization's committment to changing how they operate been communicated?

2) Is management actively supporting the initiative? Are they involved in kaizen or improvement activities? Are they visible on the shop-floor and do they ask questions about the activities and metrics being posted?

3) Has the workforce been trained on the methods being used and what it means for them? The majority of employees will likely have a "How does it affect me?" or "What's in it for me attitude?"

4) What has been the response, if any, towards those individuals that don't participate?

Wayne

Hi Wayne,



I'm going to be looking for someone who is creative and, like you mentioned, someone people already look to when a problem comes up.

All of our employees, from office personal to production, have had at least some general Lean training to intense training in 5S, TPM, VSM, Standardization and Changeover.

The CEO and President of our Company have encouraged Lean to the GM's of all divisions. Our GM is behind Lean and is a member of our Audit team.

Our Production Manager is steer heading Lean with my help coordinating projects and audits; she and I have been involved with all of the training and Kaizens. We've tried to bring people into the Kaizens that we felt would accept change, and after the kaizen the others are shown results and changes made and are told to comply; it's then left up to the department managers to see that their employees follow the new standards. This is an area that we are week in. We have replaced one manager with someone from the outside. He has only had a little Six Sigma training but is someone who is naturally Lean minded. His department has shown big improvements the three months he's been here and that has had some effect on the other manager.

Thanks for the reply,
Jeff

You have what are typical challenges in front of you and how you deal with them will determine your level of success in transforming your organization. Here's some additional questions you should ask yourself regarding your organization:

1) Has the organization's committment to changing how they operate been communicated?

2) Is management actively supporting the initiative? Are they involved in kaizen or improvement activities? Are they visible on the shop-floor and do they ask questions about the activities and metrics being posted?

3) Has the workforce been trained on the methods being used and what it means for them? The majority of employees will likely have a "How does it affect me?" or "What's in it for me attitude?"

4) What has been the response, if any, towards those individuals that don't participate?

Wayne


Spot on, Wayne.


Js_odom,

Getting things done right and changing a culture can be a painfully long endeavor.
If upper management is truly committed and involved, and persuasion of change is through nemawashi, with a balance of urgency and purpose, buy in will happen, in time. Everyone has a time line though, and those that miss the train more then twice may not be cut out for a new way of being.

Do you have a "enterprise lean transformation plan"? How does it fit into a the quality plan and mission statement?
Without that, it can be easy to get caught up in kaizens and training that are good, but fragmented, and fail to hit the overall target of corporate wide, harmonized transformation.... the greater purpose of survival and excelling will require such; well not so much a plan, but more so the continuous planning to a lean enterprise.
Think pareto, what are the dragons that need to be gone after?

Consider these things and you will know if you are on the right track!


Also, while I understand the production manager is leading lean, I would recommend consideration of a full time change agent on site, from within. In many cases this is absolutely essential.

HI Dante,

Thinks for the input. A Change Agent is a new term to me (but I googled it). I will be that person; my title is Lean Coordinator.

A plan is what I'm trying to get together. I'm just not sure who to bring in as team leaders that will be willing to hang in for the long run; as I said before buy-in is going to be hard around here. I don't want to over load them with goals in the beginning. I know we won't always have a winning Idea; but I'd like them to have a successful start.

I agree with you statement about getting caught up in kaizens and training, that is what has happened here over the last year or so. That is where I see us looking lean more than being lean; that's why I'm trying to aproach this from a different angle.

I agree with you statement about getting caught up in kaizens and training, that is what has happened here over the last year or so. That is where I see us looking lean more than being lean; that's why I'm trying to aproach this from a different angle.



You need to work in reverse and train "up" the ladder before trying to roll it out to the organization. Identify what the vision and strategic plan for organization is, and understand how Lean can be used to support that plan.

Ultimately, should be tied directly into the strategic plan for the best chance of success. By doing this, the organization gets the sense that upper management understands Lean and is supporting it. The application and focus should also be directly supporting that plan.

An example of misalignment might be trying to set up kanban with your vendors, when the growth of the business needs an additional 20% capacity and your equipment is operating at only 65-70% uptime. In this example, applications such as SMED (Single-Minute-Exchange of Die) and/or TPM would provide greater benefit to the organization and align the activities with the needs of the business. It isn't to say that setting up kanban would be useful, only that the results aren't in line with the strategic goals.

This would be good application for Hoshin Kanri or Strategy Deployment. Let me dig through my hard drive and see if I can't the presentation I gave to at Lean conference titled, "Driving the Lean Transformation with Corporate Diagnosis and Policy Deployment"; and forward it on. It is an entire business/market analysis and strategic planning method rolled into one.

Wayne

If you can find the presentation that would be great. I think I understand what you're saying. Yesterday I had a meeting with the production manager and expressed my concern; management is behind lean but I don't think anyone in management, from me up to the GM, has had any training on how to plan and implement lean. All employees including some of middle management has had basic training and a few kaizens lead by facilitators. So what we've been trying to do is repeat what they have tought us in different areas of the organization.

So I need to get management to give me their vision and we need to tie into it with a strategic plan?

Thanks to you both for all the advice.

Jeff

Firstly congratulations on what you have achieved so far.

The sustainabilty of 5S is always the hardest part.

Do you complete 5S audits to help you understand the core reasons why 5S is not sustainable?

We always complete monthly audits to help us understand why the 5S program may not be going as well as it should.

Also do people within the company understand that their is no end date with 5S and that it needs to be a part of everyday life for ever?

Lastly how involved are the more senior levels of the organisation, i would also include them in the audit process

Best regards

James

I am also from the printing industry and have seen 5s programs that work and some that flopped.

The one that flopped had management and consultants deciding how work stations would be configured, employees went along with the idea, for a short time, the problem being that the systems imlemented did not meet the needs of the people using them.

In another intance pressmen were consulted and they had to come up with solutions themselves, hence buy-in as the system was theirs from the start. That approach worked wounderfully well.

A good team leader wil have the ability to get people involved and the humility to let the users ideas be the basis for improvement.

Tamale

I am not a lean systems user but I think anyone successful in the quality field will eventually face the same problems described in this case. Creating teams is something that will eventually be needed to solve the more difficult problems but it may not be where the focus needs to be at this time. My experience with setting up a viable system involved gaining the trust of the floor workers and, more importantly, the floor supervisors. I knew I was there when they started talking about their perceptions of how serious the quality efforts were being taken by senior management. They noted two things that convinced them of management's commitment.

The first was that quality was important enough that someone like me who reported directly to the division vice president was put in charge of the quality efforts for all plants. It took a few attempts but they soon realized that if something needed changed that I would go to the vp and get the necessary support for that change. Sometimes that even meant that the vp called up the plant managers and explained what we were doing and why and to ensure they were also committed to the change.

The second part was that I was not a corporate person who sat in his office giving out directives. I spent lots of time with the plant people including helping them actually do the work. I led teams until they had team leaders who also understood what to do and did lots of just in time training on the various quality techniques. Besides doing some high level auditing, I also spent time at each plant as part of the regular audit teams. As an engineer with some plant experience it could have been easy for me to just tell the plant what was wrong and how to fix it but that was not what happened. I assisted the teams in finding out root causes and let them decide the necessary solutions. That is not to say that I did not have suggestions also but they were no more or less weight than any team members ideas.

The one role that did become mine for a long time was the expert on the quality tools. Even when we had more people trained in the techniques there was always some analysis that required more knowledge and time than the plant people had.

What I am describing evolved over a 2-3 year period to happen.

Bill Pflanz

Jeff -

I know where you are coming from. I worked for a commercial printer and understand what you mean by "production focused." Its great to see that you are doing 5S/Lean. I understand that you have "support." My experience in printing is that management has much shorter patience for results (due to their lack of experience with quality) and they have bought into the broadly marketed expectation that lean will deliver immediate results (without investing in quality systems infrastructure). Make sure that you dont operate under vague objectives. If your GM's objectives are all productivity, make sure yours are too. Focus your activity on moving the indicator within 6 months.

I am guessing your facility doesnt have the normal document control/training programs setup - or they have been reduced.

I am also assuming that your 5S activity has cost a lot of money, but has made a visible impact in the workplace.

You said you have done some kaizens - on what? Make ready? Are you showing a shift in MR times/waste?

I am concerned about your idea of adding a coordinator. This may cause further separation between CI and the floor. It also increases the labor spending for the CI activity putting a big target on your back.

Consider instead creating roles for your workteam members. Then provide targetted training, best practices and work teams leveraging these resources. That way you spread the training resources and recognition (and hours!) to the people you need buying from.

Nice to hear from you Jeff. I would like your feedback. Like I said, been there!