Value Added - Happiness as Your Business Model

Tara Hunt from Citizen Agencycreated this brilliant slideshow (RSS readers will need to open this article to view).  This really helps me get a picture of the mind of the customer.  Once we understand their minds, then we can ensure our process steps are creating value.

Slide 124 inspires me from a Lean perspective.  While there are some necessary non-value-added steps that have to be taken (especially in healthcare), look for the possibility to make it value added by giving the customer tools to personalize their experience.

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more about “Happiness as Your Business Model“, posted with vodpod

 

 

 

 

100 Posts!

Wow - I can’t believe this blog has 100 posts!  It has taken me about 7 months to hit this landmark but I have loved it.

I began this blog while interviewing for my Lean Data Consultant position and it has been fun capturing my thoughts and ideas during my training.  It is neat that I hit 100 posts at the same time as I begin in a value stream (realignment is later this month).  I hope to bring back my project management thoughts and how they relate to Lean projects during this next phase of my life.

I want to thank all of my readers from the bottom of my heart.  Just seeing that people are reading this keeps me going.  I also want to thank all of the blogs that have added my site as a link on theirs. 

If you are considering a blog for yourself, I highly encourage it.  It is a lot of fun and gives you an opportunity to reflect.  Everybody has a unique perspective and I would love to read your site!

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Tim Ferriss - Profitability & Pareto

Tim Ferriss wrote a great piece called The Margin Manifesto: 11 Tenets for Reaching (or Doubling) Profitability in 3 Months.  His suggestion to use the Pareto 80/20 rule for “Hyperactivity vs Productivity” is right on the money.  His comment about all the time spent firefighting makes me reflect on how lean can help remove the waste and variability that creates the fires.

If you liked this post, then try:

• Effective vs Efficient
• Book Comments
• A Dim Outlook

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Last Week’s Event

The team did an outstanding job last week.  A couple of their targets were to increase on-time starts for lab draws in the cancer clinic and create visual systems to see demand.  They met their targets and really caught the spirit of improvement.

One factor that made the workshop a success was having a patient’s parent involved.  The parent was able to come in and explain their experience and perspective.  Their participation created a lot of value for the team.

This event demonstrated the power of going to gemba.  A team-member commented how it always felt chaotic but could never pinpoint where the chaos was coming from until they observed and broke it up into pieces.

Last but now least, I saw how important data is for an event.  I am a data consultant so this was impactful to me.  Data in other events seemed to stop after establishing the current state of a process.  This team was looking at cycle times and percentage scheduled during time of day all week.  This helped them figure out specifically where to make improvement adjustments.

I had a great time and learned a ton!

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Deming’s Golden Rules

Mark Graban at leanblog recently posted DEMING’S GOLDEN RULES.  There are great principles and it is nice to read more about Deming.  I have read about him in relation to Lean and PDCA but have not delved to much more into him.

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Lean Hospital Japan Trip Blog

Seattle Children’s Hospital has a great blog Going To Gemba to show what they are learning about Lean from various trips to Japan.  The most recent expedition has team members from the Emergency Department, Radiology Department, Operative Services, Continuous Performance Improvement Department, Marketing Communications, and more.  Check it out.  I will add it to my list of links soon!

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Slow post due to workshop week

This will be a slow week for posts because I am in an improvement workshop.  I will post next week with the results.

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Value Stream Assignment

I am excited to be assigned to a value stream.  I have been learning our standard work as internal consultants at my hospital for the last few months and have just received my value stream assignment. 

I will now be working primarily in our Heart Center as a Lean Data Consultant.  The Heart Center team is full of great people and I am honored to be a part of the improvements that will take place.

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Effective vs Efficient

I think Lean practitioners should replace the word EFFICIENT with EFFECTIVE.

This thought has been ruminating in my mind since reading Timothy Ferriss “The 4-Hour Workweek“.  The book explains how you do not want to spend your time being efficient on tasks that are not effective.  It reminds me that we do not want to be efficient with non-value-added tasks, we want to remove those wastes. 

Lean is sometimes lumped into the category of “efficient changes” but it really goes deeper than that.  Lean is all about optimizing effectiveness.  Procedures will become efficient as a result of the attention to being more effective.  By stating our purpose to increase effectiveness, the efficiencies will follow.  Replacing a simple word has a deep impact.

I recommend Kevin Meyer’s post from Evolving Excellence about how this book can apply to Lean thinking: Productivity: Eliminate Before You Optimize.

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Seyi Oyesola: Rich hospital, poor hospital

This TED video made me reflect on the how much Lean is needed in hospitals around the world.  When we consider the challenges in our US hospitals, think about some of the images you see in the Nigerian hospital.

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more about “TED | Talks | Seyi Oyesola: Rich hosp…“, posted with vodpod

 

 

Added A Link: Lean Insider

I have been reading Ralph Bernstein’s Lean Insider via RSS for a few months and really enjoy it.  He discusses Lean and how it is being applied to varied industries.  His recent post Helping Schools Become Lean inspires me to think how Lean can be applied in new frontiers.

I added his great site as a link on this blog.  Please check it out!

If you liked that post, then try:

• LEAN Online Resource
• What Is Lean?
• Why You Should Use Google Reader

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Lean Healthcare Article

Toyota helps healthcare go ‘lean’ by Diana Manos from Healthcare Finance News. 

For hospitals already on the lean journey, there is nothing new in the article, but I think it is exciting to see Lean being communicated to a wider audience of many hospitals. 

I recently had a horrible experience in a hospital with a family member (I will post something soon about it) and it was clear they were not attempting Lean.  The more hospitals “drink the Kool-Aid” of Lean, the better.  Maybe I am an evangelist but I truly believe this with all my heart.  This article will help spread the word!

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How To Make Better Presentations

Project Managers and Lean implementers frequently have to make presentations.

Rowan Manahan has a great series Presentation Masterclass at Lifehack.org.

• Part 1: Introduction
• Part 2: 5 Key Questions When Planning Your Presentation

There was another great post by Phil de Kock published A Checklist for a Good Facilitation on pmhut.

If you liked that post, then try:

• Powerpoint Bashing 

 

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Where’s The Beef?

Remember the Wendy’s commercial from the 80’s where the lady kept looking at hamburgers and asking “Where’s The Beef?”  We need to take the same approach when assessing a process to determine where to begin our improvement efforts.

A Value Stream Manager advised me of a process problem they wanted fixed.  The symptoms were obvious and had tons of waste, but it was important to investigate to find where the BEEF was that was causing the problem. 

Similar to the 5 Why’s, keep pressing in to find the root of the problem.  Usually it is deeper than it originally appears to be!

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Lean Implementors: How Do You Describe What You Do?

I have been practicing Lean for 4 months now and love every minute of it. 

When I meet friends or strangers who ask what I do, I try to share my passion for Lean.  Usually my explantion is long-winded and technical which cause eyes to glaze-over.  When I try to be brief, they think I am a person who goes in and eliminates jobs.  Neither experience really captures what I do.

So I would like to question my readers for advice.  How do you describe implementing Lean in 60 seconds or less to someone outside of work?

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