Overproduction, one of the 8 wastes of Lean. Image: Hakan Forss
Apr

14

2015

Lean in Oil and Gas — What you Need to Know Now

Lean Manufacturing, Lean Processes, Lean X. It seems everyone is talking about Lean process these days. Google “Lean” and you’ll be greeted with millions of search results — 213,000,000 results to be exact. Google “Lean in oil and gas” and you’ll get fewer results (only 25,700,000), but still it’s not hard to see that Lean is gently infiltrating the oil and gas sector. “Lean consulting” again, turns up millions of results. It seems more and…

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Red for Stop and Green for Go
Mar

18

2015

Red for Stop and Green for Go

Visual management – traffic lights Everyone is familiar with how traffic lights work, few would argue that green means go, amber be ready to stop and red means stop. Traffic lights are used internationally from Calgary to Chattanooga. The familiarity is such that my 3 year old will shout “GO” at a green light and “STOP” at a red light. Situation This is a lesson I learned while working with a major client. The company…

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Art of Mastery and Lean
Mar

11

2015

Art of Mastery and Lean

Last week there was an insightful article in Wired Magazine on “Why We Should Design Some Things to Be Difficult to Use” well worth reading. The article dealt with the challenge and joy in mastering how to drive an old Land Rover, a difficult task. The article at the same time gave insight into why Lean is often resisted precisely because it often disassembles the traditional skills of mastery a company has built up. Image…

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Creating Momentum for Lean Transformation Better is a good Start
Mar

3

2015

Creating Momentum for Lean Transformation Better is a good Start

Take your Opportunity Lean is often about momentum, building momentum and keeping it going. How does a company start to join the dots and keep going? Often the challenge is not about getting the perfect first step but taking any step that gets you going in the right direction. After all if you have failed to make any progress in the last few quarters speed is more important than the starting point. Situation In this…

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Going to the Gemba to understand you have to see it
Feb

24

2015

Going to the Gemba to understand you have to see it

Quickest way to map a process is to walk it : The client was part of a large multinational company and struggling to deliver the required engineering services to other parts of the parent company. At the start of our work delivery of over 40% of engineering projects was late to schedule, threatening the overall project schedule. This situation meant the management team was coming under a lot of internal pressure and losing the respect…

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Successful Lean Implementations have Something at Stake
Feb

19

2015

Successful Lean Implementations have Something at Stake

Background In the book ‘Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard’ by Chip and Dan Heath they argue that all change needs to do two things. One there must be a rational reason for change to happen and second there must be an emotional reason for change to happen. And when the two come together then change can and will happen. Yet in leading many Lean transformations the critical factor that senior management…

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Training – The First Step to Change Challenging Preconceptions
Feb

10

2015

Training – The First Step to Change Challenging Preconceptions

Learning and Unlearning in Lean thinking One of the challenges of implementing Lean thinking is that much of Lean goes against what people have often been traditionally taught. Lean thinking also goes against how people have been rewarded for their performance. Think of Pavlov’s dogs, they were taught (very simplified) to associate the ringing of a bell with being fed and would salivate when they heard a bell ring. People are similar but more complicated….

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Engaging the C Suite How to get the CEO involved
Jan

31

2015

Engaging the C Suite How to get the CEO involved

Talking about Continuous Improvement One of the wonderful parts of my job is I have been able to work with a number of very good leaders. The challenge for many CEO is how to engage in Lean when there is so much else demanding their attention. Situation This Client had grown quickly and was now started on their Lean Journey. The shape of the journey had not taken shape, staffs were highly engaged but to…

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No one can achieve excellence by always Insisiting on 5 Star feedback
Jan

22

2015

No one can achieve excellence by always Insisiting on 5 Star feedback

Closing the perfection gap in service Excellence happens when you identify a gap and can close that gap. Let me give you an example of how a company I did some work with reject orthodoxy to do that. The company sold and serviced motorized equipment. As an independent distributor they had a little more autonomy in the way they could work with customers than the traditional big company distributor. The big company wanted to be…

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Every System Has A Bottleneck, Be strategic in its location
Jan

16

2015

Every System Has A Bottleneck, Be strategic in its location

Choose your bottleneck One of the primary rules of the Theory of Constraints (TOC) or Bottleneck theory as it is often called is that every process and hence every business has a bottleneck. Now that bottleneck can be inside the business or it can be outside. Most people are familiar with the idea of an internal bottleneck; company capacity being limited by the capacity of a piece of equipment or the number of bays in…

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