Chapter 18

Ten Pitfalls to Avoid

In This Chapter

Thinking differently because Lean is different

Knowing what to watch out for

Avoiding the most common mistakes

Lean is different from traditional western-style thinking, organizational structures, and management styles, so keeping your bearings can be difficult. Traditional ways of working have force and momentum. Many people — some well-meaning, and some not so well-meaning — can quietly conspire, either accidentally or purposefully, to knock you off course and derail your initiative. Many large and well-meaning companies have fallen prey to one or more of these traps, and suffered mightily for it.

In this chapter, we fill you in on the most common causes of problems with Lean initiatives, and tell you how to avoid them. These issues are real — and they can be real trouble if you’re not careful. Pay attention to these pitfalls, and stay alert for signs of disaffection or discontent. Doing so can save your initiative and, ultimately, your organization.

Shiny Objects

There are multiple approaches to improvement. And new improvement ideas and tools constantly emerge on the landscape. What’s so special about Lean? What’s wrong with these other paths? It’s simple: Like fad diet and exercise programs, these other paths can distract you from your improvement journey. Although innovation is good — and many initiatives have something to offer — understand how best to include these approaches in a way that is consistent with your Lean principles and methods.

Take Six Sigma, for example. The statistical tools most commonly associated with Six Sigma can be very useful in the reduction of variation (mura) and the elimination of defects, but the approach and infrastructure of a Six Sigma initiative differs greatly from Lean. You can easily include Six Sigma tools within Lean, but because Lean is a fundamental methodology, it cannot be wholly subjugated into other methodologies or frameworks. Lean is a holistic and complete system. If you’re practicing Lean, be careful and thoughtful in how you adopt other methods and tools.

Why Do This? It’s Just Not For Us

You may find people in your organization have a preconceived notion or belief that Lean isn’t for them — or even for you. These people may have other ideas, or are used to thinking another way and don’t want to change. Or perhaps they think that Lean is strictly for manufacturing companies, like Toyota, and you are not a product manufacturer. Or, if you are a manufacturing company, they might think Lean is applicable only on the manufacturing floor and not in other processes like order management, invoice processing, or customer on-boarding.

It’s now proven that Lean applies everywhere — for enterprises in any industry and for all functions and processes. Remember that how you apply it is unique to circumstances: Lean isn’t formulaic, so everyone tailors it to how it best works for them. But don’t let anyone tell you “Lean? That’s not for us.” Because it is! You’ll need to help people understand why it’s the right thing to do and how each individual will benefit.

Complacency

Complacency is the number one killer of initiatives like Lean. It’s tough for people to really change their behaviors and stay the course. Even if things aren’t going well, it’s often difficult for people to change, take on a new initiative, and carry it forward; if there’s not a crisis, people often can’t see the compelling reason to change.

And even if you have a Lean initiative underway, people will naturally tend to think the problems aren’t theirs. After all, if it’s somebody else’s problem, why should they change?

In addition, because Lean is a continuous, incremental-change process, it’s sometimes difficult for some people or organizations to perceive the significance or the value of the small, continuous kaizen changes. And if they can’t see it, and if it doesn’t appear significant enough, they’re going to wonder why they should do it.

Resistance to change is natural to any change initiative, and it’s no different in Lean. But Lean almost intensifies this resistance through its incremental, baby-steps approach.

How do you get people to adopt Lean practices if they can’t readily see the results? You fight complacency with several weapons:

Customer awareness: People need to know what the customers want, how they are changing and what they say about your organization.

Communications: Have strong communicators who are unrelenting and convincing in the purpose and goals of the Lean initiative, as well as its proven, time-tested methods and tools.

Information updates: Be sure to communicate the results and benefits from Lean improvement activities as they occur — both in your company and elsewhere.

Competition: People need to know what your competitors are doing, what industry practices are, and what it takes to keep pace.

Lean measurements: Create performance measures that reinforce Lean behaviors.

Punitive measures: Sometimes, you have to use the stick. In every group, there are some who will not board the train.

Same-Old Same-Old Senior Managers

Like with any program or initiative, if the senior managers aren’t fully embracing Lean, you have a very, very difficult road ahead. Many in the industry would tell you that your chances of a successful Lean implementation are nil without senior management’s full commitment and action. Why? Because the initiative is so all-encompassing and life-changing, that without management’s active participation, it simply won’t happen.

Senior managers can’t go on living the old ways and expect a change in the way the organization functions. Senior managers must change how they lead the organization every day, if Lean is to become the way the organization does business. The management functions can’t be delegated or handed off; they must be practiced and performed by the managers themselves. All managers have to participate in kaizen events; they must take the gemba walks. They must focus on how results are achieved as much as the results themselves. They question and guide versus order and demand.

Furthermore, senior managers must regularly communicate the nature of the change to the business culture and practices, and reinforce why they have chosen to change to Lean. The senior managers must be visible and available to talk to people at all levels inside and outside the organization.

The revolving door of senior managers, particularly through merger and acquisition, has also been the source of Lean initiative failures. Replacing enlightened Lean leaders with traditionally minded ones has caused the demise of some very noteworthy companies in record time. You cannot have a successful Lean journey unless all the leaders understand and are committed to its success.

Stuck in the Middle Again

Traditional middle managers really are in the middle: They get it from both ends. The senior managers are forever beating on them to increase productivity and performance, and to “lower overhead” (that is, reduce headcount). Meanwhile, their subordinates are often like a herd of cats, who won’t always do what they’re asked to do and, furthermore, don’t necessarily like being “railroaded” into yet another new initiative that they didn’t ask for. They think of their immediate managers more as roadblocks than enablers.

Welcome to classic middle management — a lot of pressure, often in a thankless position, struggling to satisfy two disparate constituencies, and trying to make do with inadequate tools and insufficient support.

The roles of middle managers and supervisors are very different in Lean from traditional hierarchical, order-giving organizations and systems. In Lean enterprises, the supervisors become coaches and mentors. They relinquish considerable authority and decision-making to the employee teams, who find their own solutions to problems and challenges. The middle managers guide, question, listen, and enable their people. Their job is to break down walls that inhibit team success.

These roles of middle management and supervisors are different from traditional western-style systems. Managers and supervisors must be properly trained, equipped, and supported in order to perform within a Lean system. It’s not an easy transition for people. Some of them just don’t make it.

It’s a Quick Fix!

Do not sell yourself or your organization on Lean as a quick fix. You can realize short-term benefits and gain momentum through a special Lean project or a kaizen blitz event; however, the true success of Lean does not come through short-term special events. The true power of Lean is through continuous, incremental improvements over the long term.

If your organization is so severely damaged that you must take immediate action and slamma-jamma a miracle overhaul in order to dramatically improve results in the upcoming quarter, Lean is not a silver bullet. If that’s your situation, best of luck to you, but shop elsewhere.

Use Lean as a long-term solution. Use Lean to more patiently, orderly, and consistently change people’s thinking and behaviors, change the culture, and improve continuously and incrementally forever. You don’t create that kind of change overnight. You can make progress in the short term, but to truly change you need time.

Cherry-Picking

One of the most common faux pas of Lean implementations is the piecemeal application of individual tools. Companies who believe that a couple of tools will solve their world-hunger problems are grossly mistaken.

The piecemeal efforts always backfire. Because Lean is a complete system, picking up a few tools and hacking away is a recipe for disaster. Without the holistic understanding, adoption, and support of the principles and methods of Lean, the tools are out of context. Of course, you never implement all the elements of Lean at the same time, but keeping in sight the interrelationships of the all the elements in the overall system is critical.

The most flagrant abuses have lacked the Respect-for-People aspect of Lean, attempting to implement Lean tools within traditional management, accounting, and operations frameworks. It just doesn’t work.

With Lean, do it, or don’t do it. But don’t think you can do it halfway and sustain your gains.

Playing the Shell Game

Let’s say that a nugget of waste is sitting there on the table, under the shell of your organization. Your operations manager — fully trained in Lean practices — deftly pulls out two additional shells: one for a supplier, and one for a distributor. He starts moving shells around and, suddenly — presto! — the nugget of muda is no longer under your shell. It’s now under one of the others. He’s eliminated waste from your organization, and aren’t you the better for it?

You’ve just committee a Lean infraction: You’ve moved the muda. Moving the muda doesn’t count in Lean, because improving yourself at the expense of someone else isn’t really improvement. You’re all interconnected through the value stream. Ultimately, the aim of Lean is to improve the entire stream. You have to eliminate the waste — period.

The Grease Monkeys

Many people around you will happily pick up a tool and use it — Lean tools included. A new technique, a new form of analysis, a new software program — they’re all good. People love tools. They seem like toys. When you get a new toy, you get to play with something different that you haven’t had before. You look for opportunities to show off your new toy, er, tool. But you need to remember to pick the right tool for the job.

A carpenter cannot build a bookcase with just a hammer, and you cannot build a Lean organization with just a kanban card. One tool does not a transformation make. You need to figure out how to use the full compliment of tools in your toolbox and pick the right tool for the job.

Beans Are Beans

Do not expect traditional accounting methods and systems to reflect the improvements accomplished through Lean. Eventually, results will hit the bottom line, but even these results don’t properly account for the whole picture. Of all the nemeses to befall Lean initiatives, this is perhaps the most insidious: Believing that the old ways of accounting for the business are the only ways to account for it.

A Lean implementation will redefine boundaries, breaking down traditional functional walls and changing the nature of how you define cost and value in the organization. They will further change how people’s contributions are measured, incentivized, and rewarded. Floor space will be reduced, flow will be improved, and cycle time will be faster. You cannot make all those changes operationally and continue to perform accounting the old way — all the numbers don’t overtly show up with traditional cost accounting.

The accounting managers may tell you how difficult it is for them to change, or even wave the risk flags (think Sarbanes-Oxley). Help them understand how they can be part of the solution instead of the problem. Show them the results, and challenge them how best to account for the improvements you make. Bring them onboard, and they can make a key difference!

Busy Bees

Activity ≠ Progress. Everyone knows that people can be busy — very busy — without being at all productive. Bureaucracies are replete with useless activity, wasting people, time, and effort without producing anything of value. Make sure that the Lean improvement activities you undertake really add value.

When you have kaizen events, make sure that they’re well organized, with defined objective and teams creating lasting results aligned with your long-term vision. Be certain that managers are participating in them, to ensure people with authority and accountability understand and support the results. For example, if the objective is to free up floor space, then make sure it is freed up in usable, collective areas, rather than isolated pockets that don’t create value for anything.

Busy bees should be busy making honey. Make sure your bees are making honey, too.