A company’s goal is usually to improve. It cares deeply about its customers, its work, and its business. Rather than blaming individuals for lack of improvement, we need to examine systemic factors that may be broken and interfere with people’s efforts to improve their organizations.
When leaders see perceived resistance to change, they state that “the people in my department hate change.” However, people are more likely to dislike being ordered to change in a way they believe would not be beneficial.
“People resist change, not being changed.”
Peter Scholtes
We, as leaders, can engage people in the improvement process rather than just telling them what to do. We can say, “Here are the problems we need to solve,” and then work together to figure out what we can do.
This Nurse Manager’s Medical-Surgery Unit provides a great example of how systems can be improved in a healthcare facility. Surprisingly, she had no knowledge of the plans to install new carpeting in the hallway until she was alerted to the presence of a work crew. This lack of communication and input urges us to review our procedures for informing staff about any major changes in advance.
She tried to ask some questions – “Why is the carpet being installed? What is the problem being solved?” A senior leader in her unit informed her that patient satisfaction scores needed to improve and that noise at night was the most common complaint. In order to reduce nighttime noise, someone at the C-level who had little direct knowledge of the department decided to install carpeting throughout the hallways.
It was the nurses who learned that they needed to improve their noise scores that closed doors at night, turned down the volume of the television, and became more aware of hallway conversations after learning that they needed to do so. These were all little things that might be considered “Kaizen” improvements, small things that collectively solved the problem, and could have been done without the cost of carpet installation.
Since their computers were on wheeled carts and had wheels designed for hard floors, not carpeting, nurses feared sprains and strains and tended to stay in their nurses’ stations to do their charting and other work. Top-down orders from the C-level conflicted directly with those ordered from the top down that “Thou shalt not hang out in the nurses’ station.”
Unidentified Continuous Improvement Mistakes
Reluctance to adopt ideas from outside
Even if outsiders identify problems and opportunities we cannot see, people tend to embrace their ideas rather than those of outsiders, regardless of how correct those outsiders might be. Organizations must create an environment where insiders can share ideas and where outsiders can work alongside insiders to improve the organization.
The right tool, the wrong culture
A doctor in England said, “It’s not the checklist itself that matters. It’s how it’s managed.” The checklist needs to be accompanied by a larger culture and process; one in which people feel involved; one where they can build a team, introduce one another, and have an environment where they feel comfortable voicing their concerns and sharing their insights.
Without this level of engagement, people mindlessly run through the checklist (often to say, “we did it”) and begin the procedure without deeper consideration.
Boxes for suggestions
It is often a batch process where suggestions are put in the box, and at best, someone looks at it a month or two later.
Kaizen improves productivity
Identifying problems and opportunities
When faced with seemingly unsolvable complicated problems, many people flounder a bit, and the problem needs to be addressed and may even escalate. How do you improve massive issues? The best option is to break them down into smaller components that people can address more quickly. Rather than trying to save millions of dollars with each improvement, we’re looking for ways to make your job easier and save a few seconds.
“There are no big problems; there are just lots of little ones.”
Henry Fod