The other week I was talking to a production supervisor about one of the business' recent recruits. The supervisor was grumbling about a mismatch in expectations.
Can you review what you team are doing and confirm if expectations are being met?
The new recruit had been with the business for about three months and was only running one machine. I asked what they should have been doing and the supervisor said 'at least two at once'.
From a little bit of digging it became clear that this expectation was not mentioned, or documented, anywhere. It's what everyone else did in the business, it was the culture, but it wasn't obvious to this member of staff.
Years ago I completed a project for a company that used the term 'reasonable expectations'. I liked this term as it sounds considered and based on facts. They used it to define the pace they expected their staff to work at. I think it is something that most of us could use.
Being clear about what good looks like is an essential part of good management. Defining reasonable expectations for your team's performance is part of this.
In the case outlined above, it would be really simple to tell a new member of staff that it is expected that they will be able to operate at least two machines at the same time, once they have settled in. Doing this as part of the induction process would make it even easier.
This also reminds me of the time I was asked to find out why an office worker was taking a long time to input sales orders into their ERP system. There was nothing wrong with the process and the worker in question was simply taking their time. After I explained that the process shouldn't take longer than ten minutes to complete, amazingly they were able to complete their order processing task in around eight minutes.
This was just a case of clarifying expectations and nothing to do with process improvement.
Can you review what you team are doing and confirm if expectations are being met?
If you find a gap, you might just have found an easy win to improve the performance and productivity of your business.
If you want some more ideas on defining expectations for your team, check out my book What Does Good Look Like?
In the meantime, keep being clear on your 'reasonable expectations',
Giles
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?'.
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?'.