In our off-site this year, we established a vision for our lean journey.  This is really our second year with lean.  Our first year was spent getting everyone in the company into a lean class and help them learn to see waste.  We used Paul Akers book “2 second lean” as the basis for our classes and we all learned about Muri, Mura and Muda and learned the 8 wastes: Overproduction, Over processing, Waiting, Defects, Movement, Transportation, Inventory and Unused employee Genius.  After that, we had each employee make a small improvement each week.  They would create a “before and after” video and upload it to our company Youtube site.

The challenge for us was, what’s next?  Based on what the senior leadership team has been working on, we understood that we needed a guide.  There are so many tools in the lean tool kit and they are all used in different ways to help you expose waste.  The problem is that they don’t translate well to just reading about them.  After our experience at the Bally Kaizen event, we saw how much more powerful these tools are when you learn them from someone who really understands them.  My experience with the “5 why” process was a good example.  I had read about asking “why” 5 times in so many books but when you tried it for yourself, it really fell flat.  When we had to do them at Bally, I was challenged by our Sensei to really understand what the problem was, to really keep my logic clean with each answer to “why” and to really find the root cause.  It was a very powerful tool when I had learned how to use it.

So, this year our first step in our journey was to pick a Sensei.  We called and did phone interviews with everyone we could find.  We were looking for someone who could guide us and teach us and train us to be our own Sensei.  After several weeks of screening, we brought our top two candidates out to Fremont for an interview.  We had one on Wednesday and one on Thursday.  We spent the morning giving them a tour of our offices, our shops and out to some job sites.  None of the people we spoke to had worked with a construction company so we thought it was critical that they understand the distributed nature of the team.  We then spent the afternoon in a conference room trying to understand what they had to offer and give them a better indication of who we were and our commitment.

I think it is unusual for these people to have the attention of all the senior managers of a company.  I think it is one of the things they struggle with.  We spoke at length about what we want to accomplish and how they would approach the task.

In the end, we decided on Adil Dalal from Pinnacle Process.  Adil brings a deep knowledge of lean along with a great personality that really fit with out team.  Both of the Sensei recommended that the very first step in our journey together would be to build both a current state Value Stream Map and a future state Value Stream Map.  This would give us the vision of what we are trying to accomplish along with a good idea of where our efforts need to be directed in the near term.

So, in another week or so, I will be involved in my very first Value Stream Mapping process.  I’m excited for the opportunity to lean a new skill and also excited to see the vision of where we are going to apply lean to our processes in 2014.

I usually try to take the last two weeks of the year off.  First, the office is quiet so I’m not missing as much.  Second, with the Christmas and New Year’s holidays, you don’t have to take too many days off to get a full two weeks.  Third, with all the reviews and year end stuff, I’m burned out!  But what I love about those last two weeks, is it lets me recharge and spend some time planning for the next year.

I have set goals every year.  They may have been “New Year’s Resolutions” but they were still goals.  I only became intentional about this in the last few years.  I thought I’d share my process and a few tips on how to achieve your goals.

First, I usually start by reading a book or maybe two on goal setting and achieving your goals.  A couple I’d recommend is The Compound Effect by Darren Hardy or Brian Tracy’s Focal Point.  These types of books really get you thinking about the power of intention.  This is great to do a few weeks before you get started.

Second, I gather up all my information on what I worked on this year.  I have my Trello page.  I have my Wiki entries.  I have my 750words.com entries.

So I tend to end up at a coffee shop early in the morning.  I like the mornings and it is my best time to think.  I spend the first part of the session reviewing how last year went.  I review the goals I set.  I review from my Trello boards what I actually completed and what is still in progress.  I review from my Wiki posts all the books I’ve read, trips I’ve taken, conferences I’ve attended, and projects I’ve been part of.  Then finally take a glance through my morning writing on the 750words.com site to see a bit of what I was thinking over the course of the year.  This really puts my year in perspective and helps me see if I was able to hit what I was shooting at or if things got off course for me.

After this, I begin to set my goals.  From all the books I’ve read on the subject, there are some things you need to do.  First, you need to put your goals in writing.  Second, you should set goals in 7 main areas of your life:  Career, Finance, Personal Development, Social, Spiritual, Family, and Health.  This gives you more of a balanced approach and keeps you from spending too much time in one area of your life.

Goals should be Measurable and Time bound.  Some people talk about SMART goals:  Specific, Measurable, Actionable, Realistic and Time Bound.  That’s a lot of stuff.  I find that if it is Measurable then it is specific and actionable.  As for realistic?  Really?  Dream big!

So what would a goal look like?  Lets say you want to lose weight.  You should put your goals in the positive and you should state them as if you’ve already achieved them.  So this goal might look like:  By April 1st, 2014 I weigh 170 lbs.  Measurable and time bound.  Stated in the positive as if I’ve already achieved it.

After writing down the goals I want to achieve, I then need to break them down into smaller chunks.  Monthly targets, weekly targets and daily targets.  I usually don’t go out too far.  If I can make a plan for the next month that is usually enough.  I’ll be reviewing these plans as I go so I can make adjustments if I need to.  I will write these goals out each morning so I can see where I am and what progress I am making and if I need to adjust or change something.

Another great idea I heard on a podcast the other day.  If someone followed you around for 2 weeks, both at work and in your personal life, and then had to answer the question: “What 3 values do you think Steve tries to embody every day?”.  What would someone say?  Maybe the idea of selecting a couple of key values, defining them clearly, then deciding how you will live those values to other people in your work and personal life would be a great way to look at next year. What could you do each day to increase the likelihood that someone would say you embody those values?  Friendship, Patience, Leadership, Respect, Joy, Humor, Faith, Integrity, Loyalty, Accountability, etc…  What would you want someone to say about you?  How would you define the values you would pick in simple terms?  What would you do every day to embody them?

I’m looking forward to an exciting 2014!

As we begin our lean journey at Walters & Wolf, one of the things we are doing is reaching out to companies that practice lean to see what they are doing and what things we might want to adopt or avoid at our company.  It was that practice that lead our Las Vegas office to contact one of the local slot machine companies.  This company in Las Vegas has been practicing lean for over 7 years.

Nick, our COO had attended a tour here several months ago along with the other people from our Las Vegas office.  On the tour they mentioned that they hold Kaizen events every quarter.  Nick then asked if it would be possible to observe one of the events.  We were told they would let us know.  As it turns out, we were not allowed to observe an event, we would need to participate in an event.  That first event a few months ago involved three of our employees. Nick, one of our Las Vegas employees and one of our Arizona employees.

Last week, I was invited to participate in one of the quarterly Kaizen events in Las Vegas.  It was so interesting working at another company for a whole week so I thought I would give a quick overview of what I learned.

First, the structure.  Scope sheets for different projects are created ahead of time.  Months before the event 3 scope sheets are selected.  The sheets show what the current state is, what problems they are having with this process, and what the goals of the improvement will be.  For our Kaizen, we arrived at their office at 8:00 on Monday.  The first day was just training.  An overview of most of the lean tools, some practice in how to calculate Takt time, how to measure cycle time, and several other great exercises to help you with things you will probably need to do in the coming days.  There were three teams that ranged from 7 to 9 people.  The teams were very cross functional and the people had either volunteered or had been picked for the group.  Some people that were selected were necessary for the group to achieve their goal.

My team arrived in the training room at 7:00 am on Tuesday.  We set out to document the current state and validate our scope sheet and that took most of the first day.  You find yourself going out to different departments and talking to lots of people and getting input on how things “really” work.  We then put that puzzle together and started to form a view of the problem we were tackling.  On the second day, you dig into the cause.  This was an amazing experience for me because I had read about a lot of these tools but had never practiced them.  The most interesting and powerful to me was the 5 why exercises where you use this tool to find the root cause of the problem.  In most cases, people have a very hard time defining a problem.  The problem is we have no standard process.  The problem is our cut sheet should have a bar code.  These are the kinds of things you write down at first and then the Sensei or one of the managers has to reel you back in to say “No, that’s not the problem”.  It really forces you to stop stating things as solutions and begin to really find the problem.  You then have to create a very logical list of questions that get you to the root cause.

After working out the current state, defining clearly the problem we are trying to solve, gathering data about the problem and examples of things contributing to them and then using the 5 why techniques to find the root causes to those issues, you now work on the countermeasures.  What will you put in place to solve these problems?  How will you know if they get solved?  What other ideas do you have if the first solution doesn’t work?  By the third day you should have a countermeasure in place and be able to observe if the change is successful.

Each afternoon there is a “report out”.  The team leader gives an overview of the day’s progress back to the leadership of the company.  This runs from 4:00 to 5:00 and allows the rest of the department heads and upper management to help guide the process.  “Did you think of how that would effect shipping?”  “Are you sure you looked deep enough into that issue?”  “Maybe tomorrow you should go to the line and verify that?”  This helps ensure the project is moving forward correctly and that all the departments have a say.  As outsiders, we were allowed to view this process.  Typically it is just the team leader and the management along with the Sensei.

On Friday morning we gave a presentation to the company on what we found.  We gave our results, read through several of the 5 why’s and read through our 30 day follow-up.  Everyone on the team presents part of the story from the week and the audience gets to hear what they found and what countermeasures were applied.

For me, the main takeaways were as follows:

• Man, I have a lot to learn.  If I’m going to lead lean in our company, I need to know these tools so well that I can teach others to use them properly.
• These events really help people inside the company learn more about how all their departments operate.  You are also interacting with lots of people in your company and getting to know them better.  They really help to build synergy inside the company.
• A structured event like this yields great results.  This company, as good as it is, still has lots of issues to work on.  But with every event (they don’t just do them at the quarters) they get a little closer to their goal.
• Inviting outside people to participate yields a different view.  In addition to Walters & Wolf, several vendors were present.  This allows an “outsider” perspective but it also gives the vendor a view of what is happening inside their customer’s company and how they might better serve them.
• Pay it forward.  We are so grateful for the help of companies like this that share their time and ideas with us.  We will definitely be paying that back as we start our events.
• Make more connections.  We actually met one of the vendor companies and invited them back to our Las Vegas office for a barbecue on Friday and then toured their facility in the afternoon.  Another good connection that we may be able to learn from or share with them what we are learning.