Continuous Improvement Blog

We’re human. We can strive for perfection, like Lean dictates, but we’ll never be inherently perfect. As someone who has always been weighed on heavily by her potential, I have always been anxious to be perfect. I have to get good grades, I have to make my parents proud, I have to outshine the rest of my peers. With school starting up again in just a mere 17–I repeat, 17–days, the stress to be perfect is much more real than it has been all summer. After coming back from the Michigan Lean Consortium’s annual conference (which was awesome by the way) in Traverse City, MI, my life was quickly turned upside-down. This week has been a tough one, and I feel that I’ve been terrible in the sense of being a continuous improvement practitioner. I have found myself behind on my work, my bedroom a disaster, all my laundry dirty, and impending tuition payments on my doorstep–I’ll admit it, I kind of freaked out and bogged myself down…

But then I remembered something–Lean is a journey. I am still human. These things happen and setbacks are to be expected. I remembered how hard Lean was when I first started back in December; I couldn’t even really wrap my head around it back then. The culture confused me and the tools seemed to be described in a different language (unfortunately none of the ones I know). I was told it would be difficult and that there will be days where I would want to throw away all of my post-its and flashcards with random Japanese words on them… But here I am.  I have grown and learned more than I could have ever hoped to in this position in just a few months. I have networked, become more professional, and become part of the best team of practitioners a young lady could ever ask for. Lean is not about where you will get to, it’s about taking that next step that matters. You can’t expect to succeed without failing a few times and that has been one of the hardest lessons for me to learn–and continue to learn. Even though this week has been tough, and I am a bit disappointed in myself, I know now what I need to do to be better and will do so! Here’s to fixing what we broke, starting fresh, moving forward. We aren’t perfect, but we can certainly strive for it one baby step at a time.

Have you ever noticed how going on vacation is simple and coming back to reality is a challenge? There’s no weening into relaxation, you kick your shoes off and leap into a comfortable position, and that’s how you remain for your entire vacation. Yet, when it comes time to go back to your routine it takes some progressing.

This is a concept we are all familiar with, regardless of the length of our “vacation.” I am especially familiar since I just got back into the office last week from being a counselor at a girl scout camp. It was a wonderful week to simply be engulfed by songs, kids, and adventures, but it also took my mind away from being a lean practitioner for seven days. At first I tried to catch close calls, but with 100+ people I gave up pretty quickly and my lean mind was put in the shadows. Once Monday rolled in and I had to dive back into my usual routine, I found myself absolutely dumbfounded and bewildered. This was overwhelming and stressful because I felt as though I had lost my touch. Stepping away from a lean mindset didn’t only affect my work, it affected my everyday life beyond the office as well. This happened because I have been working on implementing lean into everything that I do and when my “core” was removed everything else felt as though it crumbled around me, which made me feel vulnerable, exposed, and distressed. Although I felt as though I lost my touch, I still had lean lurking in the shadows of my hibernating mind and I figured what better experiment then to see if lean really does work as well as it’s argued and to see how important sustainment is to the idea of continuous improvement. This became my first practice with lean since arriving home and I can say, yet again, I am in awe of the power of lean. Before I recognized that this could be an experiment, my apartment was a disaster and flipped upside down, my car became a “enter if you dare” zone, my notes from my classes were disorganized and irrelevant to the material, and my concentration at work was befuddled, all happening in a matter of three days. Now (only a week later), my apartment is no longer chaotic but rather rearranged AND labeled, my notes have been rewritten and deciphered, and my work is on task and on time.

From the start of my lean journey about five months ago, I could tell right away how powerful lean was, and I’ve shared this many times through previous blog posts. However, I hadn’t had enough time for my practices to fall apart and for me to appreciate lean for all that it is, nor did I really understand the importance of sustaining the changes or sustaining a mind to continuously make changes. I came into the Office of Continuous Improvement with no previous knowledge or comprehension of lean; I remember asking Nate what “kaizen” meant and him shaking his head. However, now lean is like the friends I made when I started college–one of the most important things in my life that has only been a part of it for a short period of time, but has made the largest impact thus far. Just like my new friends, I plan to continue to kindle my relationship with lean so that it will never burn out on me entirely.

In Zen Buddhism they have this concept known as “shoshin” or the “beginners mind”. The beginner’s mind is one of endless possibilities and connections to be made. It is the biases we learn over time that limit our ability to think outside the box.

I am currently in the beginning of my Lean journey and I want to always keep it that way. From here, I see an infinite set of paths to be followed that will lead me to success and the continuous improvement of both my professional and personal self. When striving to be successful, there are a lot of mental roadblocks that can get in your way. Fear and worry are natural occurrences, but it is what you do with these feelings that really matters. If you go forth with excitement, using these feelings as motivators instead of detriments, you will find yourself doing things you never expected to do (climbing that mountain, boarding that plane, nailing that proposal!).   The brain is something that can always be rewired, so if you spend your time going forth positively, new connections will be created and you will spend less of your time anxious about things that cause you more harm by overthinking about them than the actual task itself.

Growing up I was taught to live my life by the Wiccan principle known as “The Power of 3”. This is the concept that whatever thoughts/energies/ideas/actions you put into the world will come back to you threefold over time. Think outside of the box! If you put creativity out there, you will find yourself feeling more creative in the future. Put understanding out there and you will find yourself being understood (even if it needs a little explanation). If you find yourself always moving forward, you will find yourself leagues ahead of the competition.  Lean is a journey, as is life. If you’re always curious, always live in a shoshin-like state, new things will be discovered every day.

Above is a quote that I stumbled upon recently. When I saw it, I became aware of a change within myself. I couldn’t look at this simple statement from Tom Ford without feeling as though “lean” was leaping from each word.

With the recent holiday weekend at a close–a celebration of the United State’s independence from Great Britain–I found myself reciting the Pledge of Allegiance. The part that I’d like to highlight is the closing line, “with liberty and justice for all.” Liberty meaning that we are not to be enslaved by another nor are we to enslave another. Justice for all, meaning that each individual person is given an equal opportunity to succeed. I’m aware that the Pledge of Allegiance wasn’t written about or for lean, but I do know that it was written under the umbrella of structured common sense which happens to be a part of lean. These concepts along with the concept of striving for perfection have created (what I feel) to be an appropriate depiction of the lean culture.

Before taking on this job as a process improvement coordinator I would’ve classified myself into many variations of personalities, however, obsessive would not have been in the mix. I think that the reasoning may be due to a negative connotation regularly associated with the idea of being obsessed or “perfect.” I was no exception to this stigma until I began working here in the office of continuous improvement. I will say that I now would classify myself as having an “obsessive personality” simply because lean, continuous improvement, and the utilization of waste elimination has taught me that striving for perfection is not condescending, but rather commendable.

Without coincidence, I’ve found that all of the factors for this change are rooted from lean, whether it be from the abundance of tools, the endless room for growth, the “personalities” within lean itself, or simply the growth of a culture. These have all had an active role in how I view the world now compared to how I viewed it months prior. It’s irrelevant as to how I’d describe my personality traits, however, as I briefly mentioned before, lean also has a personality. To me this personality shines through in it’s encouragement of devotion, improvement, and above all it’s accountability regarding respect. These three areas are the specific root causes of why and how I have transitioned from the negative norm to thinking outside of the box to get whatever the day’s job is done in the most precise and efficient manner.

… This is plastered on a sign taped to the front of my desk and they are words I live by. PDCA is a tool that every lean practitioner should use on a daily basis. Plan Do Check Act is used primarily when tackling projects or completing tasks in a timely, orderly fashion. However, I have recently found that it does wonders for your personal life.

I am a social butterfly. I pride myself in my ability to surround myself with genuine, caring, successful people… and a lot of them. However, sometimes it grows overwhelming to be this social all the time and I find that I spend less and less time caring for myself, because others tend to be more important to me. Eventually, I found that I was being walked on, that I wasn’t acting my normal happy-go-lucky self. PDCA saved the day! Now, I try to incorporate it into my daily routine to balance my tasks for the day. I plan my day out thoroughly and analyze each task, as well as how I am feeling, as I do them. After all of my necessary tasks are done (which now also includes thorough self-care) and I feel satisfied with myself, then I try to incorporate other people into the plan. At the end of the day I check how I am feeling again and go over the events of the day to see where things went wrong. Now I act by adjusting my plan for the next day, if need be!

So far this has been a great system of checks and balances for me. I highly recommend everyone PDCA all aspects of their life, not necessarily just professional. I myself am slowly learning that life will be more efficient and your time will be spent far happier if you pay attention to how you are feeling and adjust accordingly.

With the start of a new semester upon us and one behind, I got to thinking about how Lean can be implemented into finals week to not only help the stress of the student, but also their grades.

When finals week rolls in students can be found in just about every nook and cranny on campus. Whether they’re stressing over studying or stressing about not having enough time to study, students can be found with a frazzled look on their faces, myself included in this norm. This stress comes from the lack of organization of material, time, and areas to apply focus. Being in an environment of disorganization and structure simply adds to the stress and in turn takes a toll on both the student and sometimes their academics.

During the spring semester,  I began my own studying for finals about a week earlier then most. While studying I began noticing that I wasn’t getting very much done in my drawn out hours in the library. I had a textbook open in front of me and I was taking notes, but I wasn’t sure what I was trying to learn let alone how to get there. I quickly realized that this wasn’t going to go very well especially because I wasn’t sure what it was that I was trying to achieve. I realized I was wasting my time and energy  and I also noticed that this waste likely wasn’t going to have a desirable product, my grades. Thankfully I am familiar now with Lean and Continuous Improvement and was able to resolve this in a timely manner by implementing lean and 5s into my studying habits to achieve as much value added as possible. By implementing Lean and remembering improvement tools, I became more productive, organized, and stress free.

Using the idea of 5s allowed me to discipline myself to SORT out what material I knew and didn’t and also what seemed like it’d be important or not. After sorting through the material I was then able to STRAIGHTEN up how I was studying, I made a study schedule and also marked where all of the material I needed to study was in my textbook and/or notes. SHINE was next where I was continuously modifying the study schedule I had made to be able to stay on track and accomplish a lot at an attainable level, this changed a handful of times and  continued to be modified up until the day before my exams. Finally, I STANDARDIZED the previous steps several times to make sure I was utilizing the most of my studying, and then I SUSTAINED. Through the previous steps, I was able to organize my studying to a simplistic schedule that provided a lot of depth for grasping the knowledge in a stress free environment.

As a result, my scores on my finals provided satisfactory results that triumphed well over what I had even hoped to achieve.