Continuous Improvement

The goal of a Continuous Improvement Program is to improve business and reduce waste.

My business is running just fine. Sales are right where I want them. My blood pressure is as stable as my work force. But ... I know the operation could run a little more smoothly. Could run better. If only I could put my finger on where to start!!

Do you ever have these thoughts? One solution is to look at how your processes are carried out. How much time is taken to accomplish the tasks associated with your business?

What's that? Look at the processes and the time? Yes!
Anywhere from 75 to 85 per cent of any process is consumed by wasted time. How often have you been asked for an estimate to complete a task, and you invariably add a little extra padding? We all say "Well, you know Murphy!" And Murphy does raise his ugly head from time to time. We depend on co-workers to complete a task only to have them call in sick or take a vacation. Your delivery date has just slipped!

Another bit of information: 65 per cent of the businesses in America deliver their products or services on time. The means a third of the time, deliveries are late. Every market is wide open to those who improve their processes and eliminate waste! In order to become more competitive, we need to look at the steps involved with improving any process.

Processes
A process is defined as a series of actions which repeated come together to transform your inputs into value-added outputs for a customer. One way continuous improvement happens is to analyze your processes and the time it takes to accomplish work. Continuous improvement keeps your business very competitive and adds more to your bottom line.

Everything we do is a process. Some typical processes in a business include payroll, accounts payable, selling, purchasing and accounts receivable. Processes around the home might include cutting the grass, cooking dinner and washing the car. You get the idea.

The continuous improvement process, or time-focused management, involves identifying waste by focusing on time as a common denominator. Special emphasis is placed on the power of the people involved in an operation to identify the opportunities for change and then drive toward the goal of theoretical best.

Select A Work Process
Be sure to pick an initial project that will yield success quickly. This way, you and your employees will see the value of eliminating waste.

Document The Work Process
Gather the people together who perform the process (work) to define all current activities. List all work process activities in sequence. This helps you put all of what I call "tribal knowledge" on paper so that everyone can understand.

One tool that works especially well for this activity is to make a flowchart of the tasks using Post-it Notes.™ A flowchart is nothing more that a pictorial representation showing all the steps of a process.

Have the participants go through the complete flowchart and verify the flow, taking care every step is included. Make sure that all decision points are identified.

Analyze The Work Process
Prepare process worksheets that list all of the steps in the process. Have your team record the amount of time each step takes on the worksheet. Next, identify the value-added and non-value-added steps.

You and your team will now have a clearer picture of where the non-value-added tasks are located. Remember, a process is a series of actions that transforms inputs into value-added outputs. Now you will have an appreciation of where the time goes for that particular process.

Implement The Improvements
Rank the non-value-added tasks in order and have the group tackle the largest time offender first. The most important part of this whole exercise is the implementation. If your team identifies big time wasters and management does nothing, the entire improvement process will die and so will the morale of the employees. The worst thing a manager can do is to encourage improvement efforts and then not implement the changes.

After the priority list is set, begin working until that particular process is improved. Once you have removed all of the non-value-added tasks, look closely at the value-added activities for additional improvement.

Repeat the continuous improvement steps until you have gone through all of your processes. A project has a beginning, a middle and an end. A process continues forever.

Next: A Suggested Implementation Schedule

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