“A Start Without a Finish, the Journey to World-class” August 26th, 2016
Why do so many traditional businesses fail on their journey to world-class? It seems that too many businesses barely escape the gravitational pull of their traditional core. They stumble and fade near the starting line. I have a theory; try typing “start without a finish” in a web browser. More than likely, you will get page after page of articles and websites focused on finishing what you start. On my search, the first hit was an article on “Productivity” with the headline, “Finish what you start …”.
Under normal circumstances, would you start a race that has no finish line? Would you start a project around the house that had no conclusion? Would you start a homework assignment that never ends? Probably not. As humans, we are programmed to believe every start has a finish.
The journey to world-class is endless. There is no finish line. The day your organization thinks they have done everything they can to be the best at what they do is the day a competitor gets one day past you on the same journey. If we live in a society that measures success on finishing everything we start, then we are programed for adequacy and complacency. Driving an organization to world-class means we are never done improving every business process, every product design, every service action as seen through the eyes of our customer.
As an Operational Excellence Consultant, this phenomenon is the first thing I see when assessing a traditional organization. During an assessment of the business, it is very common to hear “we did 5S” or “we moved some machines around to form a cell”, “we put up performance boards”, etc. It is always past tense and conclusive. Done! Complete! Finished!
In companies where this has happened, there is typically frustration in the lower ranks of the business because most employees enjoy doing things that improve safety, improve their performance, and improve their productivity. When the leadership moves on to new initiatives and assumes the lean/six sigma culture continues without their support, the journey falls flat. In some cases, the business regresses to a lower level of performance caused by the employee’s frustration with the company’s leadership.
I interviewed a General Manager once that was quick to show me a chart that depicted twenty or so lean/six sigma tools by name. He then circled 4 or 5 of the tools his business implemented a year earlier. Again, past tense and conclusive. He was very satisfied that they had implemented something that most businesses in their industry hadn’t tried. I was amazed that he recognized the value of the remaining tools, but had not plans to implement them. His organization was done. He was moving on to the next corporate initiative. I believe he did not see the problem declaring their implementation was a huge success and, “they had done lean”.
Don’t wait any longer. Put a note on your desk, white board, toolbox, alarm clock, whatever makes sense to you. A simple note to yourself; “what can I improve today”. This journey does not have a finish line. It is endless. You will not be able to measure success on how long this journey takes you, but rather on how far it takes you and your organization.
