Five Minute Lean – Use Pareto to Find Where to Start

July 27, 2017Five Minute Lean Excerpt80 20 rule definition, five minute lean excerpt, lean book, learn lean, pareto chart definitionDavid McLachlan

This is an excerpt from the book "Five Minute Lean", by David McLachlan - a wonderful book that blends teaching of the tools, culture and philosophy of traditional Lean with a modern-day Lean parable.

You can get the whole book on Amazon here and enjoy your own copy.

Use Pareto to Find Where to Start

‘The 80/20 rule states that 80 percent of our problems or opportunities come from 20 percent of the inputs. A Pareto chart makes it easy to see where our best opportunities are.’

In some cases we might have a few different problems to choose from when improving our job or business. When there is more than one option it can be a good idea to discover the area that will give us the most value for our effort and start there.

Pareto Analysis or the “80/20 Rule” is a tool that can help us discover this, and quickly. The theory is that 80% of our results often come from 20% of our effort. This is the kind of thing Steve might point out at the boardwalk, where a restaurant might make 80% of its profits from just 20% of its menu. For Lisa it might be that the Call Centre loses 80% of customers waiting in queue because one of the five voice menu options sends them to the wrong place.

The amounts don’t have to be exactly 80/20, but you will usually find one or two stand out processes or problems that can give you a larger return on your effort if you focus on it first.

A Pareto Chart is a bar chart of whatever we are measuring – whether they are queue times, number of requests, sales figures, defects or mistakes. This bar chart is sorted from largest to smallest, and a line chart is then placed over the top of it showing the cumulative percentage as it grows from 0% of the results to 100%. In this way we can see where our larger opportunities are (such as in the first two queues in Figure 14) as they make up the majority of around 70% of the total time, and we can focus on these first.

Figure 14: An example of Pareto Analysis. Queue 1 and Queue 2 have the longest times and combined they make up around 70% of the total – the ‘significant many’. We can see that it might be valuable to start working on Queue 1 and 2 processes first.

By using a Pareto Chart, we can focus on where our biggest impacts might be. It is a tool that can be used for almost any input or when making a decision on where to start.

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Five Minute Lean – Use Kaizen and Kaizen Events to Help Stakeholder Buy-In

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Use Kaizen and Kaizen Events to Help Stakeholder Buy-In

‘Kaizen, and Improvement Events get the right people involved all at once, to properly define the problem and map the path to a solution using Lean tools.’

The term “Kaizen” is Japanese for improvement, or continuous improvement.

A Kaizen Event, therefore, means an “improvement meeting”. It often involves a few front-line staff from the process involved, a few people who are not familiar with the process to get an outside perspective, and sometimes a few people from the leadership team. Your team use any of the tools they need to from this book, to reveal problems, discover opportunities and make a solid case for change.

If everyone is already familiar with the concepts (and with a book like this in everyone’s hands, they should be), then it is much easier to get everything down on paper quickly. It could be started over a cup of coffee with someone involved in the process, or integrated into an existing regular weekly meeting with a team of front-line staff.

Ensuring front-line team-mates and leaders are involved with your Kaizen events will also help you get one of the most important and often the most elusive things: stakeholder buy-in. The more input someone has into something, the more likely they are to support it. As you take them through the steps, you are not only building their skill-set, but helping them be a real part of the solution.

This is why Steve was so insistent on Lisa getting her team-mates involved when starting with her current state map.

By itself, Kaizen or continuous improvement should be a regular part of your week, including “every person, every day” in stopping when there are problems (4.2), defining them using the customer driven metrics (1.2), getting to the real cause of the problem (3.3), and checking ideas to fix them. Even small ideas that warrant a “just do it” test (easily done using Agile, 5.3) to quickly see if they work, can get things underway.

Figure 2: A Lean practitioner leading a Kaizen Event, involving people who do the process every day.

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Five Minute Lean – Gather Direct Feedback and Indirect Feedback

July 27, 2017Five Minute Lean Excerptask the customer, customer feedback, five minute lean excerpt, gather feedback, lean book, learn lean, quality delivery costDavid McLachlan

Gather Direct Feedback and Indirect Feedback

‘By gathering feedback from our customer we can provide the value that they are willing to pay for.’

If the product is something that brings value to the customer, how do we find out what value actually means to them?

We need to gather feedback, both directly from the customer by asking, and indirectly in the form of measuring results.

Indirect Feedback – Measuring Customer Results

In Lean, there are certain results, called the “Customer Driven Metrics”, which can show us whether a process is working well or not, and also help us clearly define any problem before we begin (3.3). Almost every improvement opportunity within a business can be defined using these metrics, as they are centred on our most important participant, the customer.

They are:

1. Quality

An increase in the quality of the product or service (or reduction in defects or rework)

2. Delivery

Making the delivery faster, or better suited to the customer, including faster “delivery” between each process (or improving timings such as Cycle time and Lead time in 2.5).

3. Cost

A decrease in the cost of creating the product or service, which is ultimately related to Quality and Delivery as well.

Of course, Quality, Delivery and Cost are not the only things that can be can measured. Another great way to see whether a product is providing the right value to the customer is to gather feedback on the metrics below:

1. Sales

When there is a product, even a Minimum Viable Product for a start-up company, we can measure the sales of the product as we change or add features to it. In this case, the more sales the better.

2. Returns

While not traditionally considered a good thing, if a product is being returned this is still feedback that we can use, and can also be a good opportunity for us to ask our customer more about what brings them value.

3. Customer Complaints

Complaints are the perfect way to measure if a product is performing well. Obviously, the fewer the better. They are also a goldmine for Lean initiatives because where there is a complaint, there is an opportunity to improve, so we should collect complaints and use them wisely.

Direct Feedback – Asking Our Customer

Alternatively, the most straight forward way to get feedback from a customer is to ask. And typically the best time to ask a customer for feedback is after they have bought the product or service and the experience is fresh in their minds – for example when Lisa has been through a sales call with one of her customers.

Depending on the situation, we can use:

Asking face to face
Telephone follow-up calls
Email follow-ups
Customer surveys
An online question box
A feedback slip to collect or place in a box

Sections 1.3, 1.4 and 1.5 go into more detail as to what to specifically ask your customers, and how to manage the results you get.

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Five Minute Lean – Create a Future State Value Stream Map

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Create a Future State Value Stream Map

‘When you can see a possible future next to a current reality you can see at a glance if your change is worthwhile.’

Seeing the possible changes that can be made side by side with an existing process is one of the most eye-opening experiences ever. As a manager or business owner it is possible to lose touch with the ground-level processes, and seeing improvements mapped out clearly can be extremely valuable.

This step is called “Perfection” at the Lean Enterprise Institute, simply because when we are continually improving, testing changes and streamlining processes, then our aim of perfection becomes much more achievable.

Going through the steps so far, we have a Current State Value Stream Map that shows us our wastes, queues, rework and more. Once we have been through the process of brainstorming ideas for eliminating waste and increasing value, we need to show what it would look like in a Future State Value Stream Map and present it to the appropriate decision makers.

This is the kind of tool that Lisa can use to build a case and help management or stakeholders buy in to the change.

Have any existing processes been taken out? Have we taken out queues or combined two systems into one? Have we performed Line Balancing? Have we added in Supermarkets, FIFO, Error Proofing, Visual Management or new Kanban triggers? All of these will change the Value Stream Map, and now it’s time to show the effects. We should ensure that our new reduced timings are included, including our new Value Add times versus Non Value Add times and the new total Lead time.

Presenting a change in this way ensures professional results, using solid data and facts to support them. An “A3” can also help your presentation, which we discuss in (5.2).

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Five Minute Lean – Create a Pull System with FIFO, Kanban Triggers and Visual Management

July 27, 2017Five Minute Lean ExcerptFIFO lane, FIFO Lane definition, five minute lean excerpt, Kanban, Kanban definition, lean book, learn lean, pull system definition, visual managementDavid McLachlan

Create a Pull System with FIFO, Kanban Triggers and Visual Management

‘By making our process visible, including visual triggers and a small standard inventory where necessary, we can create our product or service as our customer orders it, instead of working to create something that no one wants.’

We know that our customer can be our end customer or anyone who is next in the process (downstream) from our department or process. In this part of our Lean journey we will start doing things to get rid of work piling up and being forced on us or our downstream customers.

At the Lean Enterprise Institute, this fourth step is simply called “Pull”, and the idea is to create a Pull system as opposed to a Push system. What this means is that you or your department creates a product or service only as your customer (or downstream process) requests, or “Pulls” it. We don’t “Push” our product to our downstream process or customer, or we don’t create product unless it is asked for.

This has the effect of reducing large inventory of unnecessary items, reducing “work in process” or a build-up of unfinished work, streamlining the process and promoting one piece flow (3.5). This in turn improves upon our customer driven metrics of Quality, Delivery and Cost.

Many of the tools below will assist in promoting a Pull system, and fit nicely with the methods we’ve already learned.

FIFO Lane

FIFO stands for First in First out, and it is an outstanding way to make sure that stock doesn’t go out of date, or that work is distributed fairly. It is most commonly used in a “FIFO Lane” where items in a lane are taken at one end and supplied from the other.

Lean - FIFO Lane

Figure 19: An example of First In First Out – a small amount of inventory that takes the oldest first.

You will have seen this in the bread aisle in your local supermarket – you take, or “Pull” bread from the bottom as you need it, and they restock it from the top. Of course, this is the best way to avoid stale old bread! But it might also be how you delegate work. It might be how you replenish perishable medicines. It might be the order in which you prepare food in after taking a customer’s request in a drive-through. The main idea is that the item is pulled only as it is needed, and an empty space in the FIFO lane triggers the need for the item to be replaced.

Not every job will be able to create their product or process from scratch as quickly as a customer orders it. A bakery still has to bake their goods, and a hotel still has to prepare their rooms, for example. This is why keeping a small amount of “inventory” handy in any process via a FIFO Lane or Supermarket (below) can assist you in delivering quickly, without overproducing.

Supermarket

Another similar theme to FIFO is the Lean “Supermarket”. A Supermarket is a predetermined standard inventory that is kept to supply the downstream process in exact amounts.

For example, if a doctor used 10 vials of medicine at a time in one operation, we might keep 10 of that particular medicine in one place so the doctor could take that exact amount for each operation. When that box is taken it will leave an empty space, triggering us to replace it with another pre-made box of 10.

Figure 20: A basic Pull system, where the customer pulls (orders) the product, and the empty squares prompt our team-mates to pull ingredients from their upstream supplier and create another product for the customer.

Kanban Trigger

Kanban is a Japanese term for “sign” or “signboard” and is basically a signalling system to trigger action. In other words, we ask ourselves:

How do we know when we need to begin work on an item?

And:

How do we let our supplier know we are pulling work (or product) so they can replenish or create their product as necessary?

What is the trigger that tells us these things? This is where a Kanban comes in.

Traditionally Kanban was associated with a “Kanban card”, which was a card (or small “sign”) holding details such as the product and quantity required of a product, handed to the upstream supplier to trigger production.

In a company using Agile techniques (5.3) it might be items in a Kanban “To Do” lane waiting on their wall. Ask yourself what the trigger is, or if you don’t have one, what trigger would work best for you? In other industries, a Kanban can simply be any trigger to begin working on an item. It might be a green light telling us “ready to go!”, it might be an “ORDER MORE” or “REPLACE” card placed where there are two left of something in stock, it might be an empty slot in a FIFO lane or an empty space (specially allocated by Five S in 4.4) for our Supermarket.

Figure 21: A simple Kanban card, with standard instructions and quantities included.

Visual Management

Visual management is another Lean method that can be applied to industries of all types. The idea is to increase transparency by making your process “visible”. Things that are visible tend to get noticed, and things that are visible tend to get done. This can include detail of work queues, anything blocking the flow of the process, who is doing what or sizes of jobs; the list goes on and really depends on your industry or workplace.

For this step we ask ourselves:

What information would be really useful to see at a glance, so we can know if things are working as they should?

Then we can go about putting this on one board, signal or sheet of paper for all to see. A Layered Check Act board (5.2) that shows process metrics is a good example of visual management. It could also be instructions for a process step made clearly visible at the work station with Five S (4.4). The Kanban board or Kanban card we mentioned earlier is also an example of visual management.

Visual Management is something that Lisa might use, if she wanted to make her sales calls visible. It is not uncommon for a call centre to have a large electronic board with the amount of people waiting, or the amount of people available to take calls.

If you come up with any ideas for visual management during your Kaizen meeting, add them to your current Value Stream Map as a Kaizen burst (2.5) so you can remember them for later.

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Five Minute Lean – Eliminate the Eight Wastes to Improve Flow

July 27, 2017Five Minute Lean Excerpteight wastes definition, five minute lean excerpt, lean book, lean waste, learn leanDavid McLachlan

Eliminate the Eight Wastes to Improve Flow

‘The eight wastes are a standard, fast and easy method of discovering ways to make our job better’

Now we get to the really good stuff – in fact, this part is my favourite. The best thing about mapping our process in the previous step is that it makes it easy to see possible ways to improve. Articulating any wasteful steps or processes also helps us clearly define our problems before we begin.

At the Lean Enterprise Institute, this third step is called “Flow”. As we go through step three you will see that reducing “waste” in our processes will improve how well and how quickly those processes flow from beginning to end.

The Eight Wastes are a standard way of identifying process blockages in a Lean transformation, and they form a wonderful acronym: “D.O.W.N.T.I.M.E.”

The Eight Wastes are:

Defects
Over-production
Waiting
Non-effective use of time and talent
Transport
Inventory
Motion
Excessive processing

Let’s find out what they mean below, and see if you can recognise any of these wastes in your own job, company or processes (here’s a hint: you definitely will).

Defects (and rework)

Defects are mistakes that require rectification, including rework; or worse, an item being scrapped completely. This might include a job not done properly the first time that needs to be re-done, or items that can’t be delivered because they don’t work as they should. The cost of team-mates time and resources to perform this rework can be staggering.

Over-Production

Over-production is producing more of our goods or services than necessary, and that do not meet the specific needs of our customers. Ideally we will produce items only when our customer requests it, with a small buffer of items to meet demand if necessary.

Waiting

The waste of Waiting is when groups of team-mates in downstream processes are waiting for the completion of upstream work. Have you (or your customer) ever waited too long for someone before you (upstream) to complete their work, while you were unable to do anything?

Non-effective use of time and talent

This is the failure to fully utilise the time and talents of employees. It will include things like not using the front-line process or customer expertise of staff, or not asking for input in solving problems from relevant team-mates who are experts in the process they perform.

Transport

The waste of transport relates to unnecessary transport of material, items in production, information or products. For example, a warehouse that shifts things around too many times, or worse still – moves items from manufacturing, to a warehouse, then back to manufacturing. Or in an office environment – moving things between too many systems, folders, forms or departments.

Inventory

This waste refers to the production of inventory that no one wants (or has requested). It costs money and time to produce and store items, and companies often have additional inventory lying around because they can’t yet produce at the rate of customer demand. The more inventory, the costlier it is.

Motion

This is unnecessary movement by employees active in a process. Reaching too far, moving around to get to things or, in a technology environment, having to sort through items, or folders or systems to find what you want, all relate to motion.

Excessive Processing

This means processing steps that are not needed, or any steps that don’t add value to the customer. This could be excessive approval steps, meetings with no outcomes, or anything else that does not specifically add customer value.

Two additional inefficiencies that are noted in Lean are also:

Overburden:

Unnecessary burden or stress on people or equipment, often because of waste.

Unevenness:

Peaks and valleys in workloads creating too much idle time, followed by times of stress.

Can you see any of these in your own company? How about examples in other jobs you’ve worked in?

One of the most important wastes to note during a Lean transformation is number (4) – failing to utilise the time and talents of people. For a transformation to happen quickly and with enough momentum, it must be taught to all levels, including management or owners who can properly support a change initiative, and front-line staff who know their customers and the process well and can share valuable knowledge on how to improve it. This ensures that everyone is on the same page, speaking the same language, and can use the same problem solving tools in combination with their own process expertise.

Most people can see at least one of the eight wastes in their own work, and many will be able to see four or five.

Note them into your Value Stream Map as Kaizen Bursts (2.5) so you don’t forget them.

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Five Minute Lean – Go to the Gemba

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Go to the Gemba

‘To truly know a process we must go to where the work is done – second hand information will not suffice.’

Now that we know what brings our customer value from chapter one, we can use the following tools to map out the process of creating that value so everyone can see it clearly and use it to move forward. For this reason, the Lean Enterprise Institute calls this step “Map”, and a good map will also reveal opportunities, problems and “waste” (3.1) in a process. We will go through all of these in this chapter.

We also started this book by saying that most businesses don’t have an existing standard, repeatable process for their work. Mapping the process is an easy way to articulate the current way of working, to use as a makeshift standard process before you start improving it. After all, you can’t improve something you don’t have.

First, in order for us to truly know a process we have to go to where the work is done. In Lean this is called going to the “Gemba”, and Gemba is the Japanese word for “Actual Place”.

In a Lean transformation, getting reports on a situation or hearing it from someone else (like a team-mate or a manager reporting to you) is not good enough. To find out the true situation we must go and experience it first-hand, preferably every day.

This could mean:

Walking the Gemba (going directly to where the work is done), spending time with the people and asking questions or mapping the process as you go.
Involving people from the front lines in a Kaizen Event (2.2) as you map a process and get to the root cause of problems, and;
To a lesser degree, using an LCA Board (5.2) to track metrics of front-line processes.

But it doesn’t just mean going to where the work is done. It also means that we “go and see” as soon as a problem occurs, so we can get our team-mates’ consensus on what the problem might be before we try and solve it. While this may seem like more work initially, it will save you many hours of wasted effort in the future as a problem gets older or becomes embedded in the workplace culture.

If you are an employee like Lisa, you will already be very familiar with your process, and this book will give you a great way to visualise problems and the tools you need to solve them. If you are a manager or an owner like Steve, you may be more removed from the front-line process during the course of your daily work, which is another reason why learning to regularly go to the Gemba to see and experience for yourself is worth many times its weight in gold.

If you are not sure of a problem, or even a solution, nothing can replace the experience of actually going to where the work is done.

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Five Minute Lean – Value is Determined by the Customer

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Value is Determined by the Customer

‘Value is determined by the customer, and to find out what they value we need to ask.’

If you want to start revealing process improvement opportunities straight away, you can jump to Chapters Two and Three, however the reason we start here is that when it comes down to it, customers are the reason we are in business. Happy customers mean a happier workplace, and ultimately they pay the bills by buying our product or service. By properly defining value, we can give them an experience they will love, and everybody wins. The first step on our journey is a simple one – we need to define what value means to the customer, to ensure our product or process provides that value.

“Customer” in this case doesn’t just have to be the end customer who buys a product or service. It can also be any person or department downstream, or next in the process from you, as they receive the benefit of your work. In Lean terms, “suppliers” are upstream (before) people or departments, and “customers” are downstream (after).

At the Lean Enterprise Institute, this first step is referred to similarly as “Specifying Value”. Whatever you decide to call it, there are three main things you need to know:

The product is something that brings value to the customer,
Value is defined as something the customer is willing to pay for, and;
To find out what value is, we need to ask, or get feedback.

We will go through all of these in this chapter.

If you are an employee like Lisa, this first step should be fairly easy. The process you go through for your customers on a daily basis to create your product or service is most often what brings them value. Adjusting a product, or adding additional value, can be done using the tools in this chapter, and it starts with gathering feedback (1.2).

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Lean Parable – Where Lisa Makes a Change

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Where Lisa Makes a Change

“I’m going to quit my job.”

There was silence on the other end of the phone. Lisa was walking at a brisk pace, as she normally did during her lunch hour. It was a great way to enjoy the bay side and escape the office, not to mention giving her a break from the unrelenting phone calls in the call centre that had made her life so difficult over the last few years.

When Lisa joined the Shoe Emporium five years ago it had seemed like a dream. After all, she was working in a job that paid her to talk about one of her favourite topics – shoes, and it was a small business with an owner who was passionate about the things he created. When they came to work every day, she truly felt like they were changing the world.

Now, as the company grew larger, it was less like a family and more like a business. She shared the floor with more than 300 employees, while shareholders and board directors controlled most, if not all of the decisions. More often than not they were decisions that cut costs and reduced the quality of service to the customers that Lisa had once loved so dearly. It had made service queues horrendously long and these days it took forever to get anything done, let alone delivered.

So now, there really seemed to be no other choice.

“Hello? Steve, did you hear me? I said I’m going to quit.”

Lisa was answered by the sound of loud clanging, grinding and shouting – certainly not what she was expecting. It sounded as though Steve was driving, but if that was the sound of his engine it was clear he wasn’t going to get very far.

“Lisa, I heard you,” Steve shouted. “But I thought you loved that job? Can you meet for coffee? I’m three blocks away.”

“No, I – “

“I’ll see you there.” Lisa looked at the ended conversation on her phone and rolled her eyes. Steve was not going to talk her out of this one. But one coffee couldn’t hurt. Could it?

By the time Steve’s beautiful, shiny car limped into the parking lot of their local café, Lisa had already ordered them both cappuccinos and was seated at a table overlooking the bay.

Steve leapt out of the car, brushed himself off as though he was ridding himself of the experience he just had, and sat down. He was a fair looking man with a mop of light brown hair, perhaps in his late forties but wearing an outfit of someone in their late twenties, and with an impossible smile permanently plastered on his face.

Steve had owned a car detailing and tinting service for many years, but it was only recently that things seemed to be going extremely well for him. Which was obviously the reason for the new ride.

“Wow, what a car!” he said. “I’ll have to remember that it doesn’t seem to like driving over 120 miles per hour on a dirt road, though.”

Lisa smiled and shook her head.

Before she had time to respond, a shiny new van pulled up next to Steve’s car, and out popped a man in overalls. He looked around, spotted Steve, gave a quick wave as though they’d done this all before and then headed under the hood of Steve’s clanging monstrosity that had only just made it into the car park.

Ignoring Lisa’s slightly perplexed look, Steve put down his coffee and said: “But more importantly, did I hear you correctly? You said you are quitting your job?”

Lisa’s face sunk a little. “I just can’t do it anymore, Steve. I know I used to love this job, but with all the cost cutting they’ve done it’s nearly impossible to give my customers a good experience. Some people I’ve known for years have told me they love talking to me on the phone, but they just can’t put up with the poor product and terrible delivery times any longer.”

Steve nodded as she spoke.

“Believe it or not, I know exactly what you mean,” he said. “In fact that’s the reason I wanted to meet – I may have a way to help you.”

“Steve,” said Lisa, with a serious tone, “I hardly think you detailing cars is the same as me selling shoes.”

“They might seem different,” considered Steve. “But it wasn’t too long ago that I hated the work I did as well. I was doing 12-hour days, constantly having to stay back to fix the work my employees did during the day, cleaning cars and tinting their windows. Customer complaints were also through the roof. It was really terrible!

“Thankfully, that’s not where my story ended. The owner of the car sales desk we work with approached me one day and asked if I wanted to ‘improve my business so much that I enjoyed it again’. Of course, my answer was yes. I was on my twenty-first straight day and was more than a little delirious.”

Steve laughed at himself, and it made Lisa feel better too. He did look a lot happier, she thought, and that made her curious.

“The sales owner showed me a way – a way of streamlining things, making them easier, and standardising them so anyone can do it. I cannot begin to tell you what a huge difference it made. Most of my employees started working with the new streamlined standard, and the ones that didn’t, left. It even cost me less per car, so I could reduce my prices a little and beat my competition. Now I even get home on time, every day. It’s wonderful!”

Lisa beamed at her old friend. “Steve, that’s great!” she said. “But how does that apply to me? I don’t tint or detail cars. I just sell shoes in an online store call centre. And I don’t have employees – I’m not even the boss where I work.”

“That’s true Lisa, but there is one thing both our companies share, and that’s a process for doing things. The sales desk owner told me that everything has a process, and even though the processes are different, the way we fix them is the same.

“Besides, you can’t quit your job. What about your bills, your mortgage, and your family? I know you want to leave, but other jobs aren’t always easy to find.”

Lisa’s face sunk as he said the words, and reality slowly crept in. She was behind on most bills as it was. As much as she thought she wanted it, being unemployed wasn’t really an option.

Steve gave her a sympathetic smile. “If this works, it could really change your life for the better. What do you think? Do you want to give it a try?”

Lisa nodded. “Well if I can’t quit my job, Steve, I might as well improve it.”

“Great!” And the look on Steve’s face seemed to make the day brighter already. He paused for a moment in thought.

“You know, there are a few things we can do to get started straight away,” he said.

“How did I know you were going to say that?” Lisa said, and she smiled slightly and shook her head.

“I wouldn’t usually start so soon, but if we’re going to improve your job, we really need to know what your product is.”

“Well that’s easy,” said Lisa. “You already know I sell shoes. Wouldn’t that be my product?”

“Not always,” said Steve. “You see, your product is what brings value to your customer. And to find out what truly brings them value, you have to ask. Most people think they know, but when they ask their customer they often find a different answer altogether.

“Let me show you what I mean,” Steve continued, and he looked over his shoulder and shouted to the van mechanic under his car that he seemed to know so well.

“Hey Nathan!”

“Yeah?” the mechanic yelled back from under the hood of the car.

“What sort of flowers should I get for my daughter’s wedding?”

Nathan stopped what he was doing and looked out from under the hood. “How should I know?” he said, a little bewildered, and got back to work.

“Exactly,” said Steve pointedly as he turned back to Lisa with a smile.

“You wouldn’t ask a mechanic what to do for your wedding. And to find out what value means to your customer, you need to ask your customer.”

Lisa nodded her head as she took all this in. “Ok, Steve. I get your point. You know, I talk to enough customers during the day so I’m sure it won’t be too hard to ask them one more question, and find out what value means to them.”

Steve smiled. “And once we know that, we can really get started.”

Lisa looked down at her watch, and wrinkled her nose. “Time to get back,” she said.

“But you’ll give it a shot?” asked Steve.

“I’ll give it a shot,” Lisa nodded.

“Great!” said Steve, and he downed the last of his coffee in one gulp.

Selected chapters from the story within Five minute Lean:

Check out these selected chapters from the teachings within Five Minute Lean:

Lean Parable – Where Lisa Discovers a New Way

July 27, 2017Five Minute Lean Parablefive minute lean excerpt, lean book, lean parable, lean storyDavid McLachlan

Where Lisa Discovers a New Way

Lisa sat at her keyboard, enjoying a bagel before her shift started at 7am. As she flicked through her dozens of emails, meeting requests and other things that never got looked at or finished, she saw one that caught her eye:

>To: All Service Centre Employees

>Subject: Urgent Notice Regarding Your Employment

“As you all know, at the Shoe Emporium we have strived to be the first choice for passionate shoe buyers over the past five years.

Unfortunately, to remain cost competitive in a tough market, the board of directors have made the difficult decision to cease the employment of all northern service centre employees by the 14^th of next month.

If you are receiving this email, then this decision relates to you.”

Lisa stopped reading and put down her bagel. “Cease the employment?” She was being downsized! Lisa had known things were bad at the Shoe Emporium, but being put out of a job like this was the last thing she had expected, and the 14^th was less than four weeks away.

Lisa checked her watch, picked up her phone and dialled a number. If she timed it just right she would have 20 minutes before the call centre opened. The phone only rang once.

“Hi you’re on the phone with Steve,” said the perpetually cheerful voice on the other end.

“Hi Steve,” Lisa said, trying to keep her voice steady. “They just announced something big here. Can I meet you at the boardwalk?”

“You can, because I’m actually here right now,” said Steve, but he didn’t get to finish before Lisa hung up her phone and quickly headed down to meet him.

At the boardwalk near the bay, the people were blissfully unaware of Lisa’s news. As she made her way through the holiday makers strolling leisurely about, she saw Steve standing by a large sign, there as promised.

“These things are just fantastic,” said Steve as Lisa approached, and she looked up to see that the large sign he was looking at was in fact a map of the bay area.

“Steve, they’ve just announced they’re cutting costs,” said Lisa, slightly out of breath. “All the bay area call centre employees are going to be losing their jobs in four weeks, including me.”

“Cost cutting eh?” Steve furrowed his brow for a moment in thought. “Never a good sign. And even worse, I suppose, when you’re not on the end doing the cutting,” he added sympathetically.

“Steve, what am I going to do?”

Steve was silent for a moment, lowered his chin and looked across at her solemnly.

“Well, Lisa, you know we were both going to be doing this process improvement anyway,” he said. “If we were going to do it before, would you be willing to still do it now to save your job?”

Lisa paused to let the words digest. This certainly wasn’t the option that first came to mind. Save her job in four weeks? Surely it could not be possible. But… what was the alternative?

“Well,” said Lisa. “I guess I have no choice but to say yes.”

“You always have a choice, Lisa,” said Steve. “I know it might sound crazy, but I’ve seen this thing work wonders. There is a lot I have to teach you, but I think together we could do it.”

“Well I’ve got about five minutes now,” said Lisa, a smile finding its way to her face. “Will that suit?”

Steve laughed a deep, warm laugh. “Five minutes eh?” he said, obviously up to the challenge. And then seeming to remember something, he said: “Well we can start here, with this map.”

He looked again at the large map of the bay area. Printed down the bottom were the words: “YOU ARE HERE” next to an arrow in bold.

“This was the next thing I was going to teach you, Lisa,” said Steve. I came here for a reason, you see. Because if we want to get anywhere worth going, we first need to know where we are.”

Lisa looked at him sceptically. “Doesn’t that sound like something a monk might say, not a business owner? No offense Steve, but I’m about to lose my job here and I’m almost late for work.”

Steve laughed. “I promise, you will love this. Let’s head back to your building while we talk.

“You see most businesses don’t know or haven’t articulated their current processes – they just let their employees work and hope for the best. They can’t improve their business because they don’t even know where they currently are.

“You might say they are lost without a map.”

Lisa’s brow unfurrowed a little as she warmed to the idea. “A map,” she said, half to herself. “But what kind of map?”

“A process map, Lisa. A map of the things you do that bring value to your customers.”

“Oh, of course. And we all know value is determined by the customer,” said Lisa, in a mock sing-song voice.

“Aha! The perfect student – you remembered!” Steve smiled his unstoppable smile.

“You know how I remember that?” asked Lisa. “I actually took your advice and asked my customers what they like and want more of. And you know, I found out a few things I wouldn’t have if I’d just assumed.”

“Oh?” Steve raised an eyebrow, even more interested.

“I found out a lot of my customers would be willing to pay for faster shipping,” Lisa continued. “So that would add value. They would also pay for a longer return period. The majority of my customers tended to shop with us because we had access to really special, niche brands that others didn’t. But the main process, of course, was selling shoes.”

“That’s great! Wow, you’ve done a great job so far. And for all of those valuable processes, we can create a map.”

They sped up slightly as they passed a small boat at the dock. A young crew dressed in white polo shirts were passing boxes of inventory along a gang plank to each other onto the boat. It was a simple process, left to right, left to right until it got to the end.

“Take that boat crew for example,” Steve pointed to the crew.

“When we are creating our map, just like that boat we need all our team-mates to be on board or our boat won’t run. In other words, we need to include our team-mates from the front lines. And see how they’re passing those boxes along to each other? That is exactly how we draw in our processes – moving along from station to station, from process step to process step until it is delivered at the end to the customer.”

“I think I get it,” said Lisa, and she looked at her watch. Time was running out before the call centre opened and she needed to start work.

“Maybe it would be easier if you could see one,” said Steve. “If you’ve got a few minutes and a spare whiteboard, I’ll show you how to make a map now if you like?”

Lisa hesitated just a little. “OK, Steve, but we need to hurry.” And they entered the building.

Fifteen minutes later, the two were totally engrossed in the rough process map on the whiteboard they had drawn in a spare meeting room at the Shoe Emporium. It seemed simple enough. There was a box with a pointy roof on the left, an arrow moving down and then a row of boxed process steps from left to right.

A few arrows here or there indicated “redoing” a few of the steps, and underneath it all were some rough timings of the steps and queues in between.

“It’s amazing,” said Lisa, slightly slouched in her chair. “I can see the process. You know, Steve, this might actually help.”

“I guarantee it will,” said Steve. “But remember, include your team-mates and help get them on board. An important part of Lean is to take them on the journey with you and pass on your knowledge as you make changes. Also, you never know when you will need their support.”

Lisa gave him a worried look. “That’s the hard part. I don’t know anyone who cares enough about their job here to spend time on the process with me. Most of the people are out the door the second their shift is over.”

“That may be true, but you must find a way, Lisa.”

It was heartening, even if she didn’t quite believe it. And for a moment Lisa felt as though it could work. But the moment was broken by the door being flung open – no knock, just a loud crash as it hit the adjacent wall.

“WHO… IS… THIS?” said an overweight, red-faced man pointing directly at Steve. He needed no introduction to Lisa – his name was Robert, and he was Lisa’s boss.

Steve turned to the large man without missing a beat and smiled.

“I’m the repair man, your process is broken,” he said, arm outstretched for a handshake.

Looking slightly perplexed, Robert pushed aside his open palm and stepped out of the doorway.

“Get out of this office, NOW!” he yelled. And then directing his anger at Lisa, he said: “You are 20 minutes late, the phone lines opened at seven!”

Oh my God, Lisa thought. The time must have slipped away while they were doing their process map.

As they walked out of the office Robert said – voice still well above normal volume – “And you can make up the time tonight. We’ll be rounding it UP to an hour with no pay!”

The storm that was Robert the Boss then whisked away to berate someone else.

“I am so sorry about that,” said Lisa, as she quickly walked Steve out of the building. “But he’s right, I am late. I have to get back.”

She managed a half smile. “Thanks for meeting me. There’s a lot to take in but I’m sure it will help,” she said, not sure at all.

“You can do it, Lisa,” Steve said warmly.

With that, they said their goodbyes.

But as Lisa made her way back to her desk, her worry grew. With a boss like Robert constantly around to block any changes she tried to make, what could she do?

She would need some more skills if she was going to succeed.

Selected chapters from the story within Five minute Lean:

Check out these selected chapters from the teachings within Five Minute Lean:

Project Success

Giving you the tools for Project Management Success

Five Minute Lean – Use Pareto to Find Where to Start

Five Minute Lean – Use Kaizen and Kaizen Events to Help Stakeholder Buy-In

Five Minute Lean – Gather Direct Feedback and Indirect Feedback

Five Minute Lean – Create a Future State Value Stream Map

Five Minute Lean – Create a Pull System with FIFO, Kanban Triggers and Visual Management

Five Minute Lean – Eliminate the Eight Wastes to Improve Flow

Five Minute Lean – Go to the Gemba

Five Minute Lean – Value is Determined by the Customer

Lean Parable – Where Lisa Makes a Change

Lean Parable – Where Lisa Discovers a New Way