Skip to main content

Are You Working On The Right Problem?

Have you ever had that feeling that the change you are trying to make in your business is the wrong one?

There sometimes comes a point, when your improvement just isn't making progress, that this thought crosses your mind.

If you are feeling this way about something that you are working on currently then it might be time to review where you started your change.


Commonly referred to as 'problem definition', it still surprises me how often business will start to make a change in their business without stopping to fully understand what their problem is.

Asking some good questions, to truly define your problem, is key to making sure that you are solving the right puzzle for your business.

One of my favourite examples of this, from my days in Operations Management, is the realisation that I had on a Friday afternoon when the rest of the factory had gone home for the weekend.

We had been desperately trying to work out how we could improve the on time delivery performance of the business. The age old wisdom was to reduce the cycle times through the overall manufacturing process. This is what we had been working on and it wasn't making a tangible difference to our delivery performance.

Anyway, this particular Friday afternoon I chose to re-state the problem and see if I gained any insights. By re-stating the issues we faced it became clear (yes, I got a shot of the blinding obvious) that our capacity planning was seriously lacking. We didn't have a throughput problem, we had an overloading problem.

The short end to that story is that the on time delivery performance of that business rose from about 20% OTIF (On Time In Full) to an average of 98% within 6 months.*

And, if you are wondering what is a good way to re-state the problems in your business it might be worth using the 5W1H structure:

  • What
  • When
  • Where
  • Why
  • Who
  • How

(Or, you could search the Internet for Rudyard Kipling's Six Honest Serving Men!).

Ask and answer each one of the above questions about your current problems. See what you come up with and see if you can get a different perspective on your current challenges.

Stating the situation that your business has, without judgement and without trying to guess the answer at the same time is a skill that can be developed. Many times if you can properly state / recognise the problem your business really has, then the solution will appear.



Giles Johnston
Author of Business Process Re-Engineering


* There were a few other things we did too of course. For a fuller account please visit this link.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

What do you think?

Popular posts from this blog

The Kaizen Checklist is here!

Do you want to get better results from your Kaizen programme? Improve your business results quickly with my downloadable kit (including guidebook, workbook and templates) for only $39. Are you looking for a sustainable way to identify and implement improvements across your business? Practical improvement strategies The Kaizen Checklist is a downloadable kit that you can use with your management team to develop a system that suits your business and allow you to quickly implement Kaizen effectively at your place of work. This works great if you use it as the centre piece of your own internal workshop. The kit includes a 40 page guidebook, a workbook, four appendices and three templates. All parts of this kit are designed to get you up and running as fast as possible. If you are unfamiliar with Kaizen, let me stress that this is a simple improvement philosophy that is so much more than just  ‘a Japanese word for continuous improvement’. I’ll cover what it...
Read more

How to get started with continuous improvement

We all know that continuous improvement is a strategy that is essential for business. It involves constantly seeking ways to improve processes, products, or services in order to achieve better results and outcomes. However, for many people, the thought of starting on the path of continuous improvement can be daunting. The fear of doing it incorrectly or not knowing where to start can be overwhelming.    The key to successful continuous improvement is to start small and gradually build upon your successes. Here are some tips to help you get started if you are unsure of how to begin:   1. Identify areas for improvement: The first step in continuous improvement is to identify the areas that need improvement. This can be done by looking at the processes, products, or services that are not performing as well as they could be. It is important to involve all stakeholders in this process to gain a comprehensive understanding of the areas that need attention.   2. Set specifi...
Post a Comment
Read more

Nail the number one improvement project

Over the past few weeks I have intervened in my client's continuous improvement programmes . I did this for one good reason: They weren't getting results. They caught the improvement bug, like so many organisations do. They got caught in the trap of wanting to change everything now! As I said, this happens to most of us from time to time. You start with some small improvements and you then identify more improvements you could get your teeth into. The next thing you know, you are trying to run ten improvement projects as well as deliver your day job. I know from bitter experience that this usually leads to having lots of loose ends rather than tangible increases in performance. So, what can you do about this? I know that with careful experimenting and resource management, you could find your sweet spot and figure out how many projects you can handle at once. Or, you can take the quick route and pare back your list until you have one priority. The one project that will give you t...
Post a Comment
Read more