Author Archives: jadetrillium

What is ”Operational Excellence”?

ProcessOperational Excellence… a term that we all use regularly, but what does it really mean? Despite regular usage there may not be clarity or agreement on what each individual means by the term.  This is also reflected in the literature where there are many different and conflicting definitions.  Just as a quick example, here is the current definition in Wikipedia:

Operational Excellence is an element of organizational leadership that stresses the application of a variety of principles, systems, and tools toward the sustainable improvement of key performance metrics.

Much of this management philosophy is based on earlier continuous improvement methodologies, such as Lean Manufacturing, Six Sigma, and Scientific Management. The focus of Operational Excellence goes beyond the traditional event-based model of improvement toward a long-term change in organizational culture.

This definition seems kind of vague (IMHO). A big reason for this lack of clarity is that, in a large number of cases, Operational Excellence is a term consultants use to sell a tool program that they would be happy to teach anyone. (Note, I am not criticizing consultants, they serve many useful purposes.) When you move away from the consultants (or at least toward a different set of consultants), the definitions tend to move away from “tools” and more towards cultural definitions.  My own inclination is that Operational Excellence is a culture and as such is not tool based or an adjunct of Continuous Improvement, lean six sigma, Total Quality Management or any other set of acronyms.   The tools are there to help achieve the metrics but concentration on the tools will not enhance innovation or effectiveness.  I firmly believe that it is these innovation and effectiveness aspects that is both the strength and a critical aspect of Operations Excellence.  With this in mind, here is the definition I would propose for Operations Excellence:

A corporate culture where the strategy / tactics / metrics spectrum is aligned and clearly understood by all members of the organization leading to an inclusive environment for continuous improvement, innovation and collaboration between all stakeholders (both internally and externally ).  This means that everyone in the organization understands the why and the how of what the organization is trying to accomplish and is encouraged to not only do their best but to actively contribute to change and improvement in all organizational processes.

What this means is that management must communicate clearly to the organization what the corporate strategies are, how they see these strategies affecting the day to day tactics and ensuring that there is a clear and measurable connection between the strategies and any metrics at use in the organization.  Management must also support cross training, process training and bottom up innovation at all levels of the organization.  The goal of doing this is to create a culture of continuous improvement, quality products & processes, cost control, and customer centric thinking.  The firmer this culture takes hold within the organization, the better all their processes (operational and back office) should become.  As with all “cultural” initiatives however, there is really no finish line to this.  Instead it is a vision to aim for that will change over time as circumstances and environmental factors change.

If you would like to discuss more about Operational Excellence and how to embed it in your organization, I would be more than happy to meet with you and to explore this in more detail.  Please feel free to contact me at edwhite@jadetrilliumconsulting.com.

If you would like to read more about this and other topics check out the other posting on my website – http://jadetrilliumconsulting.com

COMMUTING AND PROCESS ANALYSIS PART 4 – SUMMARY

car4Welcome back and I hope the previous 3 posts gave you some things to think about.  I have been talking about how to apply some of the principles of Process Analysis to the commuting process.  The reason for picking that process was because most of us have at least some experience with it but mostly to show that the various Process Analysis and Supply Chain tools can be applied to any process.  It just requires a flexible mind set and an understanding of how the tools can be applied.  I have deliberately stayed at a very high level partially because most people jump right in at a very highly detailed level, partially to keep the size of each of the posts shorter and partially because this is a very complex process when you get more detailed.  In the first post I talked about the key question to start any Process Analysis with –“What, ultimately, is this process meant to accomplish?” and suggested an answer – The purpose of the commuting process is to move people and products from one point to another point as effectively as possible using the minimum of resources possible. From there we moved on to a discussion of what that answer meant which led us into an exploration (in Part 2) of some of the resources required for the commuting process.  This was then followed up (in Part 3) with a discussion of some of the tools we could use to analysis the process and surface some possible solutions or improvements.  From all this we can definitely see that the more complicated the process the more important it is to start at a high level and then progressively “peel the onion” to more and more detailed analysis.  In this case you would also need to consider the synergies and conflicts between the various competing processes within the larger Commuting process.

One last point about process analysis, sometimes, rather than making the process faster it is better to make it smaller.  In this case trying to speed up the commute or add more resources is both painful and expensive.  If we could reduce the number of people requiring this process it might be easier to make it more effective.  The trick of course is how to do that?  It may not be possible at a macro level but perhaps some progress could be made at a grass roots level.  Think of this as an exercise in culture change and perhaps some push by the government (who are ultimately in charge of the financing of commuting resources) would be helpful and cheaper than new resources.  One potential way to reduce the number of people commuting would be a growth in telecommuting.  I realize that most production facilities actually require the people to be at the plant but most big plants have already moved out of the downtown areas so they are not part of the worst commuting areas anyway.  Instead, most of the downtown organizations are service based operations such as head offices.  As a cultural issue, while the technology exists for many more people to telecommute, most companies are not prepared to allow the majority of their workers to be out of sight (and direct control).  The good news is that telecommuting does not need to just mean working from home.  The technology exists so that telecommuting just means working from some place other that the main office.  One way to keep both sides happy might be for large inner city companies could set up small satellites in surrounding communities that people could work from or meet with clients at.  This way neither of them would need to commute into the city.  Maybe they come to main office once a week on a staggered basis but most meetings would be electronic.  The advantage to the company is that they could reduce the square footage of that very expensive downtown facility and replace it with much cheaper square footage at the satellite office while still maintaining a prestigious main address.  Of course they would need to ensure that all required documentation is available electronically so it could be accessed from any of the sites but that is relatively easy to do.  The advantage to the employee is a much shorter commute, more time doing what they want rather than sitting in a car or bus every day and a better work / life balance.  The advantage to the customer is easier and faster access to people they need to visit with all the time saving that comes with that  This leads to happier customers which is also a benefit to the company.

Thank you for reading these posts.  I hope you have enjoyed this series of posts and that it has given you some new points to think about.  If you have any thoughts or questions please feel free to comment on the posts and we can see what sort of conversation we can get started on it.