Created a new vision and win/win management style
Devoted to Operational Excellence
Situation
A major retailer and manufacturer of durable goods used in hotels and homes needed to implement methods of operational excellence to make the company profitable. Mentoring and coaching services were needed for team members reporting to the CEO: CFO, COO, Senior VP of HR, SVP of Marketing, SVP of Sales, VP of Legal, and VP of Communications. The goal was to move the group away from historical silos of excellence into an operational excellence team with sustainable results to reduce costs and improve organizational functioning.
Action Plan
Executive Education Program
Created executive education program with hands-on coaching on Lean rapid continuous improvement methodologies. Designed a two day off-site educational hands-on program for the leadership team.
Situation Analysis
Leadership team read a book and completed homework about their individual functions. This included data collection used during the course to identify potential projects and champions. Each leader identified projects of $250,000 or higher within their function that would contribute to cost reduction through rapid continuous improvement.
Aligned Methods to Vision
After the two-day course, educated the entire management team and cross functional groups to ensure all leadership understood the methodologies to achieve the CEO’s vision for the company.
Daily Metrics
The leadership team used visual management boards or centers to understand daily metrics. The CEO measured the effectiveness of how his team was utilizing visual management to understand the operations and the effect each of them had on their functional groups.
Value Stream Mapping
Each functional leader built an end-to-end value stream map of their process and responsibilities. These maps were connected to study the value stream of the customer from receipt of orders to delivery and payment.
MARIS Implementation
Educated leadership at all levels to create a win-win relationship with the management team by coaching them through our Methodologies of MARIS: Mobilization, Assessment, Redesign, Implementation and Sustainability.
Results
Hands-on coaching provided insights into each functional area and facilitated identification of projects likely to delivery substantial results by the CEO and management team. The greatest result came when the team understood that the effects of changes within their functional areas might be good for them but could create unneeded costs in other functional areas. To ensure the success of a new vision created by the CEO during his initial coaching sessions, the team became more collaborative. The team embraced the mission to create continuous improvement rapidly by utilizing a simple methodology driven by visual management. The team now meets weekly as the steering committee of operational excellence and continuous improvement.