A Good Day
26/09/14 07:38
It was a Six Sigma extravaganza yesterday. Make no mistake about it. The Team had the opportunity to strut their stuff and they hit a proverbial home run. I was so proud of them. They were totally focused on the task at hand and their engagement was over the top. The problem solving session (RCPS) was a thing of beauty. I changed up the intro to throw in a spate of recent successes and used a recent example of a cross functional team approach to a problem we were having with an outside vendor to emphasize the need to do periodic checks to make sure that our solutions in pilot were in fact working as designed. We asked our guests to hold their questions until we had completed our work and with one or two exceptions that worked pretty well. It was so funny that just the day before I was having a discussion with a couple of the managers and they were a little concerned that the problems we were wanting to solve had what they thought were obvious solutions and that they didn't think that would be useful as an example to work through especially with the audience we were playing to. I assured them that we didn't know where the process would take us and it was more important that we follow the process and not focus on the problem. I think our guests were astounded at not only the discipline of my team as they worked through the problem but with the seemingly remarkable array of terrific solutions and other opportunities that came out at the other end of the hour we spent behind closed doors. I think we blew them away.
The Team huddle couldn't have gone any better. We assembled around the Tier board at 10:30 with throngs of onlookers including the group of management that had joined us for the RCPS session. I was facilitating the session and had a short list of topics I wanted to touch on and got them all in during the 15 minute session. My group was on their game and we had just the right number of "voice of the customer" issues and "reflections" so as not to push our session beyond the 15 minutes we had to work with. We played to the metrics on the Tier Board to demonstrate our ability to do just that and we wowed our audience at every turn in the topics. We even managed to get in the theme I had been using during the week which was around process and the customer. "Give me one process you do and tell me the "input" and "output" of that process", I asked them one after the other. Their answers were clear, energetic, and unequivocal. The icing on the cake was the discussion about the stickies and the two examples we used were just perfect. The owners of the stickies read the problem; gave the target condition; highlighted the associated wastes; spoke to the prioritization and tier ownership; and it was a wrap. My focus on the task at hand was laser-like and I lost any and all sense of any onlookers. At the end of the exercise my manager came up to me and extended his hand in appreciation of a job well done. The magic of what we had accomplished was not lost on me.
There was management and then there was management at our session. The Six Sigma manager spoke to my group later in the afternoon and said that "if he could bottle up what we brought to the sessions during the day, he would." He lavished the team with praise for a job well done. It's important to keep in mind that the other groups with whom we've gone through this transformation have yet to even come close to the level of accomplishment my team has reached. I don't say that to brag; it is a fact. So, we go on our merry way and we're on to the next problem. Or should I say, opportunity. We're 60 stickies strong; 70 pieces of Standard work done or in the process of being done; 3 cross functional RCPS sessions under our belts; and a daily huddle that is the talk of the town. I laugh when I think about the efficiency and effectiveness objectives I set for my group around this initiative at the outset. We're three months into this deal and we've blown away those objectives. I think there is a lesson there somewhere. And, we were very happy to share everything we had in ways that no one expected. It's all good. I topped off the busy day with a dinner with the management group by the river in downtown Portsmouth. The tuna was seared as ordered but there just wasn't enough of it. And where, may I ask, is the wasabi with this wonderful dish? My coffee drink was black and strong and almost too strong. It was a good day and a good night. If the good lord is willing and the creek don't rise, we'll do it all over again tomorrow.
The Team huddle couldn't have gone any better. We assembled around the Tier board at 10:30 with throngs of onlookers including the group of management that had joined us for the RCPS session. I was facilitating the session and had a short list of topics I wanted to touch on and got them all in during the 15 minute session. My group was on their game and we had just the right number of "voice of the customer" issues and "reflections" so as not to push our session beyond the 15 minutes we had to work with. We played to the metrics on the Tier Board to demonstrate our ability to do just that and we wowed our audience at every turn in the topics. We even managed to get in the theme I had been using during the week which was around process and the customer. "Give me one process you do and tell me the "input" and "output" of that process", I asked them one after the other. Their answers were clear, energetic, and unequivocal. The icing on the cake was the discussion about the stickies and the two examples we used were just perfect. The owners of the stickies read the problem; gave the target condition; highlighted the associated wastes; spoke to the prioritization and tier ownership; and it was a wrap. My focus on the task at hand was laser-like and I lost any and all sense of any onlookers. At the end of the exercise my manager came up to me and extended his hand in appreciation of a job well done. The magic of what we had accomplished was not lost on me.
There was management and then there was management at our session. The Six Sigma manager spoke to my group later in the afternoon and said that "if he could bottle up what we brought to the sessions during the day, he would." He lavished the team with praise for a job well done. It's important to keep in mind that the other groups with whom we've gone through this transformation have yet to even come close to the level of accomplishment my team has reached. I don't say that to brag; it is a fact. So, we go on our merry way and we're on to the next problem. Or should I say, opportunity. We're 60 stickies strong; 70 pieces of Standard work done or in the process of being done; 3 cross functional RCPS sessions under our belts; and a daily huddle that is the talk of the town. I laugh when I think about the efficiency and effectiveness objectives I set for my group around this initiative at the outset. We're three months into this deal and we've blown away those objectives. I think there is a lesson there somewhere. And, we were very happy to share everything we had in ways that no one expected. It's all good. I topped off the busy day with a dinner with the management group by the river in downtown Portsmouth. The tuna was seared as ordered but there just wasn't enough of it. And where, may I ask, is the wasabi with this wonderful dish? My coffee drink was black and strong and almost too strong. It was a good day and a good night. If the good lord is willing and the creek don't rise, we'll do it all over again tomorrow.