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05/02/2011 10:57 AM
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Examine the participation in these groups and you will probably find that the majority, the vast majority including myself, are people who want to change someone else. I have not seen anyone who could be described as being from the Gemba, someone who actually does value-adding work. Now why is that? Is it because:
These forums are designed to exclude people from the Gemba as they are based on some obscure industrial caste system?
The language used and the unnecessary intellectualising that often goes on, puts off the people who could add most value to these discussions, the people most affected by our actions?
Regardless of pious proclamations and spam warnings, these are really showcases for consultants to present their wares and win more clients?
The people from the shop floor have visited these forums and, after some patient listening in, have silently decided that they have too much to do and none of this helps them?
Web 2.0 is all about "participatory information sharing", but it is a sad indictment of these forums that after so many years we have not created any significant "Pull" from the shop floor. This, in my opinion, distorts a basic principle of Lean which relies on people being encouraged to grow their own knowledge so they can eventually improve their products, processes and themselves, without the need for us Change Agents.
Discuss!
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05/02/2011 12:17 PM
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Owen,
I believe that I am speaking for more than just myself, but many of the contributers to these forums have experience in dealing with multiple Lean tools, using them in diverse areas (both manufacturing and the office environment). As such, there is a variety of experiences and learnings that are being shared.
If you don't have the change agents to help drive improvements, or keep the fire lit, then the efforts will wane and eventually peter out all together. This has been proven time and again. While it is true that the people that are doing a particular process should own those processes, they also need to be taught how to use the tools and concepts that are available to them.
I would also say that the vast majority of contributers to these forums aren't selling anything, but rather sharing ideas and advice, though there are a few exceptions.
Finally, these forums (IMO) are not designed to exclude anybody. Anyone who wants to contribute needs only to register with LEI and they can contribute away. Those that choose not to are doing that on their own.
Ken
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05/03/2011 12:54 PM
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Hi Ken,
I cannot disagree with anything you have said, but respectfully, I think you may have missed the point I was trying to make. Mea culpa. My apologies.
I don't disagree with the critical role of Change Agents and the role this and other forums play in allowing/encouraging people with skills and knowledge to share them. But Lean is over three decades old by my time clock. Three decades is a long time, long enough for it to become mainstream and to be the norm. But Lean is still on the margins of management thinking or do you disagree? For example, how many business schools across the globe teach it as a fundamental and core subject today, three decades later? Does, for example, Michigan's MBA treat Lean as its foundation? If not why not?
It is not getting through at the top, so is it getting through to the Gemba? Perhaps, but I don't see the people from the Gemba "Pulling" Lean knowledge from this or other forums. Why? Why in this age of mass and instant communication does a worker from the Gemba have to rely on her Change Agent to interpret what he has read in this forum? Why can't she talk to Ken directly and also to people from other Gembas in order to compare experiences?
Don't get me wrong, LEI and other forums do a goodish job (say 5/10), but not a great one: they have missed a trick. Perhaps it is not LEI's fault. Think how powerful this forum could be if A from one plant floor talked directly to B in an workshop in India, with perhaps Ken helping the dialogue with his wisdom?
I have asked this question before and I have got a response which suggests that LEI is either complacent or in denial. I apologies for having to say this but this is my perception. LEI built it, and they have not come. Why? I agree there is no bar to people from the Gemba, but they are not coming to the party. Is that an acceptable state of affairs or does it require someone with John Shook's reach (perhaps with help from his buddies in UoM) to look into it. Could be a good PhD subject for a keen Leanie.
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05/03/2011 03:23 PM
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Owen,
I think you raise several interesting questions. I have a few thoughts to share:
1) I'm not sure that LEI has any more responsibility for how the forum is used than the forum users. The forum is here - why not have shop floor people access it right now? What keeps us from doing that?
2) Perhaps I am unfairly characterizing, but I suspect that most of my shop floor people might not be comfortable utilizing the online forum. I think they are more comfortable engaging with people that they know and in places they can see. Again - this may be an unfair characterization.
3) The cynic in me asks how I can get my own shop floor employees to talk to each other more, much less engaging someone on the forum!
Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
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05/03/2011 04:14 PM
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Owen,
We are a small machining operations that allows a few of us to wear many hats. One of my "goals" for the past year or so has been to transition our shop floor supervisory responsibilities from departmental to one that is aligned with our three main value streams.
Unfortunately, this has not gone as quickly as I would have preferred, but we continue to make progress and are currently looking at developing cross-trained "regulators" (operators) who can shift between departments within a designated value stream to stabilize flow and hopefully gain some additional benefits such as increased communications.
Due to environmental considerations the equipment must be separated by department and we are not able physically align in a traditional work cell lay-out.
I read your posting after a value-stream meeting this morning and shared it with two supervisors to find out what they might ask the LEI blog about this transition. Hope you can appreciate this, but we kind of chuckled when we discussed what some of the operators would say if we asked them if they'd like to sit at a computer and review the forums and contribute to the discussions.
Here are some general questions from the supervisors. I won't share my responses to them, most of which we've discussed in the past:
A. What are the benefits of having a limited number of cross-trained operators that can rotate between departments? He / she probably won't be able to keep up with normal rates in both departments.
B. How will the regulators know when to shift between two departments?
C. Why do we want the operators to go to a "value-stream" supervisor who doesn't know as much about the machines as the current supervisor that has been here 20 years?
D. Why should the operators have to go to the other department to get an answer from a supervisor when a more knowledgeable one is right there?
E. How do we handle lay-offs when it's slow? By value-stream or seniority?
F. Since there will probably be one or two operators that will work in multiple value streams over time, who will be responsible for operator selection, training, discipline etc?
G. How are joint responsibilities within a "department" split when two value streams are involved? (i.e. housekeeping)
I've enjoyed reading different posts over time which have spurred several discussions and ideas. We posted a discussion about this a little over a year ago and had some nice feedback that we tried to use along the way.
In response to Owen's concern. There are several items that I would have liked to have posted but am hesitant due to possible confidentiality concerns.
Brian
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05/04/2011 04:49 PM
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Owen, I would guess that most people visit a forum for two simple reasons, They are either seeking answers to a particular problem they are having or they are just curious about what's being discussed. If they have a problem, they are then either looking for an answer some one might have offered in the past or they want the opportunity to ask a question and hope they get some meaningful answers. When they have a problem though, they usually need to find an answer immediately and therefore they are limited in the amount of time they have to find that answer. An Internet forum, or message board, being an online discussion site where people can hold conversations in the form of posted messages does take time to use to work through a problem, which is some cases would limit its use in short-term problem solving.
Based on this brief analysis, I would say that a forum's success is dependent upon the value of the responses that its users provide to other users seeking answers to their problems. A forum has no control over these resposes, other than a monitoring function to assure compliance to official rules of message reporting. So the value of using a forum is determined by the users.
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05/17/2011 10:00 AM
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test
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