Lean Blog Audio: Practical Lean Thinking, Psychological Safety, and Continuous Improvement

Stories like this have been in the news before, but this was circulating the past few days: "Why erratic schedules are one of the worst parts of low-wage work."The story refers to so-called "just-in-time" scheduling techniques that jerk employees around and disrupt lives.

It happens to share a term, "JIT" with "Lean manufacturing" or just "Lean," but it's either a coincidence or it's a bastardization of what Lean is really about. And I can prove it quite easily.

http://leanblog.org/audio86

I saw this story when it originally appeared online as part of a local public radio station in California. It was now picked up nationally by NPR and a number of you emailed me about this Lean healthcare piece about UCLA Medical Center:Hospitals Turn To Toyota To Make Care Safer And Swifter

It's a generally positive story about a large hospital system working to improve... and turning to Toyota (directly to Toyota) for help. To be fair, they did far more than organize closets... but that was the main photo and lead story that started the piece.

How do you MAKE time for continuous improvement?It's been a little while, but here's a new video about Kaizen and continuous improvement from our friends at Franciscan St. Francis Health in Indianapolis.

In this video, Hollynn Lobsiger, the manager of the endoscopy unit, talks about what Kaizen means to her and her team and she also shares some thoughts about how to make time for Kaizen.

Everybody (or nearly everybody) complains about not having enough time for improvement - that includes time for staff and time for managers. The challenge is how to go from "lack of time" being an excuse to being a problem that you solve (see my video about this).

Hollynn and her team are a great example of being proactive to make time for improvement (as you can see in this video with staff describing an improvement). See how Hollynn sets a tone for them and expects input from everybody? They're "Kaizen Crazy!" :-)

The Problem With Underreporting Problems, When Warnings Aren’t Heeded in Aerospace, When Warnings Aren’t Heeded in Aerospace, When Warnings or Concerns Aren’t Shared in Healthcare

http://leanblog.org/audio84

Allen Iverson was a legendary NBA point guard and scorer who played from 1996 to 2011.In a 2002 news conference that still appears regularly on ESPN, Iverson responded to criticism that he missed practice (due to injury) and he somewhat indignantly asked (over and over) some variation of:

"We're talking about practice?"

Iverson wasn't complaining about having to practice, but more about the media's insistence on asking questions about practice, which is a topic he apparently didn't think was too interesting to talk about.

Practice is certainly important. Maybe not when you're already as good as Iverson was.

I guess this counts as a "Flashback Friday," as I was reminded of an old game show that I loved as a kid: Match Game. I was too young to fully appreciate the show, I guess, but I remember it fondly and love watching old reruns (you can find episodes on YouTube).Last week, I read this article: "A happy workforce is a productive one."

You'll certainly get no argument from me on that!

Well, I think "engagement" is more important than happiness, as happiness might possibly be superficial. But I've long said that an engaged workforce is the key to success in an organization.

I thought the article got off track when the author brought up suggestion boxes. Oh no. Suggestion boxes never work.

So I took a line from the article and posed it as a Match Game type question on Twitter:

http://leanblog.org/audio81

Lean is not about banning bananas from people's desks or banning sweaters hanging on chairs.We should be solving problems that matter, for customers and employees, through Lean. We should be engaging people rather than throwing silly top-down mandates at them.

I tend to get on a soapbox and rant about the "bad office 5S" examples... but I got an email this week that made me smile, because it helped an organization avoid the L.A.M.E. office 5S trap.

The email, shared with permission:

http://leanblog.org/audio80

Here's the Key to Visual Management:To me, the core of visual management is captured in this statement from Fujio Cho, now the honorary chairman of Toyota:

"Know normal from abnormal... right now!"

If the "visual" isn't helping accomplish that goal, it's probably not visual management. Visual management has two parts - the visual(something you see) and the management (the action you take based on the visual). Why do we have to manage the visual abnormality? To get better results.

http://leanblog.org/audio79

I love the Texas-based grocery store chain "Central Market." It's like a local version of a Whole Foods, basically.One of their features is a sushi area that's run by a third-party company, Yummi Sushi.

Posted prominently is a letter that outlines their stated approach to quality and safety. Click the photo for a larger view.

Below, I'm going to basically transcribe the letter, but as if it were the policy of a hospital or health system.

Here is my latest article for the LinkedIn“Influencers” series, written for a general audience that might not be as familiar with Lean:

How These Credit Card Websites Illustrate Lean Mistake Proofing

I hope you enjoy the article, even as a Lean thinker.