Filtering your improvement list

I was recently presented with a client's list of improvements for 2024. It was a good list, there were plenty of meaningful items on there.

They had a problem, however. They didn't know where to start.

If you have read my books, or my blog posts, you'll know that I am a big advocate of proper prioritisation of improvements.

Our PDCA Complete continuous improvement platform has a built in prioritisation tool (the BCS scoring system). I really do think it is important that you know what you should be working on first.

So, back to my client's list. Before we even had to prioritise anything, a clean up of the list was in order.

There were items that were:

Strategic in nature.
Waiting for a director to make a decision and set policy.
Outstanding tasks, that just needed mopping up.
Urgent items that needed doing now but weren't projects.

Once the team got clear about what was what, prioritising the strategic projects was straightforward.

If you have a similar situation, I urge you to give the list a clean up first.

As I write this post, the team now have a clear set of continuous improvement priorities and some to do list items.

Enjoy your list tidy up.

Giles

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About the author:

Giles Johnston is a Chartered Engineer who specialises in helping businesses to grow and improve through better business processes and embracing Kaizen.

Giles is also the author of Effective Root Cause Analysis and 'What Does Good Look Like?'.

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