The only three fundamentals in operational excellence are to deliver what the customer wants (On-Quality), when they want it (On-Time) at a cost that yields you a profit (On-Cost). It’s easy to improve any one of the three to the detriment of the other two. For example, many programs start with the objective to reduce cost but while they achieve this short-term objective, delivery and quality performance suffers – in other words the initiative has failed to achieve a net gain.
Game Change ensures net gain – meaning that improvements in any of the three do not harm any of the others.
Research and our experience point to a number of critical elements in delivering effective, sustainable improvements in operational performance:
- Decide the priority of each of the three fundamental aims (Time, Quality, Cost), then set clear quantifiable objectives and measure a baseline for each objective.
- Determining the baseline early on is critical to being able to prove the benefits of your intervention later.
There are appropriate tools depending on your primary business objectives, so select the right toolset. Generally, tools of Lean are more effective in improving the on-time fundamental, whereas Six-Sigma tools are better for improving quality. A message here is to avoid overloading your people with a myriad of tools that they won’t use, or will use ineffectively.
Every improvement project must capture the views of disparate parts of the business. Generally, businesses are complex organisations meaning that no single person, department or function has a complete understanding of any cross-functional process. An end-to-end view is critical to ensuring effective change otherwise a change will almost certainly create problems in other parts of the business.
For sustainable change to happen, the people who must change their actions and behaviours must design the solution together. A core principle of implementing changes is to enable the ‘actors’ to influence the outcomes. Failure to do this will result in any changes being thrown out at a later stage as the organisation reverts to its previous state.
Typical initiatives where Game Change can help you realise effective and sustainable improvements:
Improve On-Time Delivery
- Reduce Cycle Time
- Eliminate Rework/Duplication
- Improve Planning and Prioritisation
- Eliminate Stock-outs
Reduce Costs of Poor Quality
- Improve Process Capability
- Reduce defects / rework
- Prevent defects / rework
- Manage risks
- Improve Process Compliance
- Reduce Concession Claims and Risk
Increase Capacity (without increasing costs)
- Improve planning
- Reduce labour time per unit
- Improve forecasting and estimating
Rapid Cash Release
- Reduce Work in Progress (WIP) or Inventory – kanban, Just In Time (JIT)
- Cleaning & Organizing to Make Work Easy
- Increase in bottom line profitability
- Eliminate Rework – Right-first-time, exception management
- Reduce Process cost– standard work, capability, TPM/OEE
- Process harmonisation, simplification and automation
