Why results don’t always sustain
To meaningfully impact financial results, performance improvement needs to sustain. Performance improvement projects, by design, jump performance from one level to another.
Peter Follows
But where are the actual savings?
One of the more common complaints we hear about consultants and internal improvement projects is that the savings that are promised or reported never really hit the financial statements.
The three perspectives of sustainable improvement
When we look at organizations to understand where they might be able to make improvements, we do so from three different, but related perspectives: the process; the management system; and management behaviors.
The less obvious root problem
If you spend enough time trying to improve processes, one of the fascinating things you will observe is that sometimes the root problem has nothing to do with the process you are trying to fix.
Managers work for employees
A number of years back it was popular for consultants (and a few executives) to draw the company organization chart upside down. The idea was that organizations needed to recognize that managers actually worked for employees, and not the other way around.
Why “day-in-the-life” studies work
When we are trying to figure out how effective a process is or isn't, one of the basic studies we do is to spend a day in the life of an employee at some key part of the process.
The Achilles heel of every management system
Management systems are tools created to help managers plan work, execute the plan, and then measure and report on the results.
The importance of volume and rate
When we study processes, one of the first things we think about analytically is to break the process down into two components: volume and rate. These are the two main drivers of cost in any process.
Variability is difficult to manage
One of the things we look for when we examine organizations is the degree of variability present. The more variability, the harder it is to manage. Variability can be both inherent in the nature of the industry and it can be self-imposed through policy or errors.
Profit Driver: The missing link
In many organizations the link between the financial and operating world is missing. Financial results can't be managed on a daily basis, but the activities that create them need to be.
Learning through observation
People are often curious about how we can go into such a wide variety of organizations and businesses and somehow help them improve. One advantage we have is that we tend to see similar patterns over and over across industries and even across nationalities.
The emotional roller coaster (of change management programs)
During a change program, everyone goes through a real emotional roller coaster. You tend to be a little overly optimistic at the front end