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A new year is already underway. It is usually the period in which new opportunities are mapped out and new plans are made. On the road to improvement, change and progress. How do you avoid that well-known, disappointing conclusion in the evaluation at the end of this year? That although many things in your organization have been tackled with a lot of time and energy, objectives have not been reached and real results have not been achieved?
In many organizations, a form of continuous improvement has already been organized to a greater or lesser extent. It is important that there is an optimal cooperation between the various teams that together form the total supply chain. Because everyone knows: initiating change on your own takes a lot of time and energy and implementing improvement only within one department rarely leads to results. Working together is key.
I see good things happening in practice when all key players are part of making a plan. And the conversation gets going. Have we mapped out the current situation in detail? What do we know and what don't we know (yet)? Where can we start short-term improvements? Do the efforts required and intended results contribute to the higher organizational goals? And who has the necessary capabilities and expertise to actually initiate the desired changes? Those who are able to answer these essential questions accurately can then record starting points, objectives and action points in an improvement plan.
An improvement plan without effective execution is no use. It is therefore crucial to organise the implementation in the right way. Who has what expertise, who participates? Who takes what role and responsibility? What exactly are we going to do, how are we going to do it and above all: what are we NOT going to do? Successful change simply requires making choices. And the trick is to put things that are low priority further on the timeline. No one should be distracted by non-value added activities. It helps to bring focus to the change and improvement process. We simply cannot do everything at once.
The courage to be surprised by people in your organization can lead to unexpected breakthroughs. Talking to each other, questioning and challenging each other can be extremely inspiring. It often turns out that people who normally speak less often have fresh ideas and unexpected talents. It is also nice to see what really experiences different approaches to the most important themes together can bring about. This often gives just the needed boost to bring the desired change up to speed.
Being ambitious is good. But realism is at least as important in change and improvement processes. Especially to avoid unnecessary disappointments. Sometimes realizing small improvement steps and quick results can be motivating and appear to make larger and more complex improvements possible. The basis for this lies in a realistic estimate of the time and capacity actually available for change processes. Because day-to-day business continues. The daily operation, vacation days and so on. A rough rule of thumb is that you can spend a maximum of 50% of the available time on change. If more time and perhaps extra expertise is needed, you can always decide to source extra resources.
Change and improvement is therefore a matter of setting priorities on all fronts. A rolling schedule, with room for reflection and flexibility, works excellently. The world around us is changing rapidly. The market, society and your business are more dynamic than ever. It is therefore possible that things that you have previously put away for 'later' suddenly become a priority due to current developments. Once on the road, evaluation moments and progressive insight are therefore the most important advisors. From first experiences and the first results achieved, there is much to learn about the choices that have been made and the steps that have been taken. They put you in execution mode, which is important for improvement and change. After which the conversation will increasingly be about the next improvement steps, instead of about things that have not been implemented and achieved. The joint drive to continuously improve will thus permanently anchor itself in your organization.
Marcel Aardenburg
Principal Consultant ARV Group