Fundamental to any company adopting a Lean approach, Leader Standard Work is critical to maintaining the success of the Lean initiative. As your company has detailed instructions on how to build products and operate machines and systems, Leader Standard Work does what its name implies: it standardizes the work of leaders, changing management from individuals sitting in their offices reading reports to team leaders actively engaging the workforce both out in the open and in various mentoring sessions.
The five disciplines of Leader Standard Work (LSW) include:
Reflection Meetings (Huddles) - Keeping your team focused on long-term goals can be challenging in the day-to-day rush. Reflection Meetings, usually held in the morning, build the teams ability to identify root causes and implement solutions.
Gemba Walks - A daily walk to where the value is made - factory floor, programming cubicles, others - is critical to the Lean approach. In addition to maintaining baseline performance, the leadership team builds a culture of engagement, focused on solving problems and not blaming people.
Rapid Response (AndOn) - Sometimes defects occur - parts shortage, tool malfunction, more - and they must be responded to. AndOn is the system that clearly notifies management and other workers of an issue, giving the worker the empowerment to stop production and work to prevent a recurrence.
Individual Mentoring - Not your traditional "performance review", Individual Mentoring is less about specific objectives and more about general performance or specific issues. Building each individuals talents and problem-solving skills results in the next generation of leadership.
Accountability - Accountability, not blame, should be the watchword when mistakes do happen and things go wrong. And accountability goes both ways: "People respect what you inspect".
The journey from Good to Great is not something that happens overnight or within a week, but will require leaders developed so that the culture of continuous improvement will flourish.
Please speak to one of our Operational Excellence coaches in order to begin your journey.
