The Process Ninja

Hooray hooray it's a ninja holiday

Hi all, I'll be taking a break for a holiday with my family from Scotland over the next 3 weeks. I'll be back with more posts on 20th April.

Take care,

TPN

Has the time come to fix your band-aid processes?

We have one of those hot water taps at work where you press the button and you get instant hot water.

Well this week it broke and after 3 days no-one seems to be able to fix it. In the meantime half of the floor have to trudge to the kitchen on the other side of the floor every time they want a cup of tea or lunch, etc.

I set about calculating the productivity cost of this and it goes like this:

50 Staff

3 visits to the kitchen per day on average

$50 per hour average staff cost

3 days of no tap.

15 seconds extra time (each way) or half a minute.

Total cost = $189 over 3 days.

Now this isn't a lot of money, but it shows how a simple break in normal process can add extra cost. Over time we often find breaks in process that are patched up. These "workarounds" or "band-aid" solutions often are simply adopted as long term solutions.

What if we never fixed the hot water tap? What would it cost per year? 

$15,750.

Now just think about all those band-aid solutions that your company might have put in place over the years that have remained - and think about the true cost to your organisation.

Is it time to peel back those temporary fixes and cure the processes for good?

How to make process change smoother – 5 simple communication tips

Process does not operate in a vacuum. Process is not all about systems. Process is about people. People need communication.

 

Here’s how to oil the wheels of process change:

 

1.    Plan

 

Before you do anything, draft a communications plan. This should include the messages you want to communicate, the mediums you will use to communicate and the timeframes for the communications. But who are you communicating with…?

 

2.    Identify your audience.

 

Who will be the process owners? Who is involved?

You need to ensure that these people feel loved from day 1. More communication is better than less. Explain to them what you are trying to do, what help you need from them and how you are going to perform the work.

 

3.    Start off big.

 

You may think that by identifying your key audience that you have covered all your bases, but be sure to expand your communications to as many people as you can (within reason). There are always people who are left out of the loop who feel that they should be involved. It’s important to make these people feel that their opinions are being heard or they can inflict negative PR on your process change. Remember, however, that the bigger the audience for communication the more general your communication should be.

 

4.    Build Rapport.

 

By this I mean that you should get to know your audience personally. The more you can break down barriers and understand personality types the more likely they will be to co-operate with you. Don’t be afraid to ask them about their lives outside of work. They may even start to think of you as a human being!

 

5.    Make it regular, consistent.

 

Whatever communications you are performing you need to make sure that it is regular. This is because it often takes time for a message to sink in. The world is so filled with communication “noise” that it may take a number of communications before people start to “get it”. This is why the communication needs to be consistent, in order to hammer home the message. It’s like beating a drum over and over – eventually people will hear it and start to walk in step.

 

Using your iPhone to save time and money at the supermarket - a review of Shopper by MidCentury Software

After my recent post about how to save money and reduce time spent at the supermarket I decided to have a look online at the apple web store to see if there was anything that could improve the efficiency of my shopping process (after all, a paper template is so 1985).

Lo and behold I found an app called Shopper  by MidCentury Software which is specifically designed to help make your grocery shopping experience faster, more efficient and even help you to save money (although this part of it takes a bit of work). 

Having used it yesterday I can say that this is a truly fantastic little app. It allows you to either select items from a series of "categories" or to add your own items and assign them to categories. You can even add photos and prices to the items (adding prices lets you see how much your shop will be prior to doing it so you can budget more effectively). The thing that I like most about it, however is the ability to drag and drop the categories into the same order as at your supermarket - this makes the whole process really efficient.

To summarise: if you are the person in your household who does the weekly grocery shopping and you own an iPhone, you simply must buy this application. At only $3.99 (AU) it's as cheap as chips and will save you time and money when you go to buy those chips...

Has my iPhone improved my life?

I wrote an article a few months back called "Will an iPhone improve my life" There was some heated discussion from both camps on it but in the end I decided to buy one. It has been a few months since I got it so it's time to look at what it has done to improve my life from an efficiency and process point of view:

Consolidation.  I no longer use a phone and an iPod. I can now sell my iPod and generate some cash and I am also using less electricity (which is good for the planet).

Flexibility. I can pretty much do anything from anywhere now as I have the web and e-mail at my fingertips. The web access and e-mail on my old Nokia was so painful to use I never did.

Information. Not only can I look up anything in a few seconds, my contacts are always up to date as they synchronise over some mysterious cloud thing onto my phone...

Synchronisation. The iphone syncs everything "over the cloud"  - Calendars, contacts, web bookmarks, etc. My wife also has an iphone so if she adds a contact or an event to the calendar it syncs with our mac at home and my iphone so we can be really efficient at organising our time (with 3 kids under 3 you need to be organised!)

Efficiency. Having the GPS saves heaps of time (I'm forever getting lost) and helps you to find things you need that are near by. I find my bank's ATM locator application really handy. The camera on the iphone is really good quality - I use it for taking photos of work I have drawn on whiteboards (process maps, etc.) then I simply e-mail them to my desk. People I work with seem to find this highly impressive although I don't really understand why.

I was amazed to see that there are already 25,000 applications available for the iphone. This is one of the great things about it - that people are continually developing new applications. Anything is possible it seems and already there are some fantastic apps to improve productivity.

So yes, the iPhone has improved my life - and it will continue to improve my life as new applications are developed. It's going to help me organise my time better, be more productive and keep everything in sync.

But let's not forget one very important thing: it's also bloody good fun.

The Benefit of Hindsight and Why We Shouldn't Take the Media Seriously

I came across this magazine lying in our lunch room at work. The fact that our only source of entertainment in the lunchroom is a magazine from December 2007 is an altogether different topic for discussion. I just found this cover to be hilarious (with the benefit of hindsight) and another classic example of why we shouldn't believe everything we see, hear or read.

I pushed a girl and I liked it (or a tale of non-process compliance in modern day society)

Yes, it sounds horrible but today I pushed a girl. 

She wasn't even a big girl, she was a small, Asian girl of tiny stature. But you know what? It felt good! 

Why?

Well there are rules in society - and rules are processes that we all follow. Some we are bound by (laws) and some are unspoken rules, like politeness and "doing the right thing".

In Sydney, on any train there is a rule that you must let all passengers alight from the train prior to boarding. Not only do Cityrail staff constantly remind customers of this, but it's just common sense and decency. So when I was walking off the train today (with a long queue of people behind me and in front of me getting off) I couldn't believe that this pip-squeak thought it was her right to barge onto the train right in front of me as I was trying to get off. I was so surprised I paused for a second to give her the opportunity to rectify her obvious mistake, but she continued to try to shove past me!

Big mistake. Let's just say that she received not only the most grumpy, oh-so not a morning person tongue lashing, but that she probably still has the imprint of my right shoulder festooned on her tasteless garb.

This person broke the rules; she tried to short-cut the process. And like any good process there have to be controls in place. Today I was happy to be that control!

The Danger of "Getting Used to it"

I was installing a new tumble dryer in the laundry yesterday. After our old 3.5kg tumble dryer died we bought a new jumbo 6kg one, but not before we had to spend a week hanging out the washing. You will not be surprised to know that this brought on yet another process epiphany!

Over time we had gotten used to using this tiny little dryer. We jam packed it full of all of the family's clothes including a million items of the kids clothes, bibs, etc. It used to take FOREVER to dry anything as we crammed it so full and we used to use it excessively as it was just easier to throw everything in the tumbler rather than to walk around the house and hang the washing on the line.

But looking at this lovely shiney new beast yesterday I realised that we had been forced into a change that would improve our lives and change our habits. We had gotten used to using the machine even though it was too small. We had also goitten used to being lazy and not hanging out the washing. When we were forced to hang out the washing we realised it wasn't so bad - it dried quickly, saved us money and saved the environment to boot.

We also realised that rather than running our current 1 star machine for two hours we could probably run the new 2 star machine for 1 hour - saving more money and more of the planet. Also, with the machine being bigger we could run two loads at once without cramming it all in. That way it is more efficient and also the clothes come out less crumpled, which means less ironing (and again less energy usage). We also decided that we will continue to hang out the clothes when we can in order to save money.

OK, so here's the process moral of the story. It's easy getting used to something not being quite right, but we have to continually challenge and question the way things are done. Continuous improvement is all about setting up regular reviews where we need to ask some hard questions. Don't be afraid to tear up a process and start again. A lot of the time companies are forced into process change by a disruptive event, but this can be avoided by making a commitment to continually challenging the way things are done - even if it's just your laundry process...

A Process Joke

It's pretty rare to find a joke with a process theme so I thought I'd share this with you...

A lesson on how consultants can make a difference in an organization.

Last week, we took some friends to a new restaurant, 'Steve's Place,' and noticed that the waiter who took our order carried a spoon in his shirt pocket.

It seemed a little strange. When the busboy brought our water and utensils, I observed that he also had a spoon in his shirt pocket.

Then I looked around and saw that all the staff had spoons in their pockets. When the waiter came back to serve our soup I inquired, 'Why the spoon?'

'Well, 'he explained, 'the restaurant's owner hired Andersen Consulting to revamp all of our processes. After several months of analysis, they concluded that the spoon was the most frequently dropped utensil. It represents a drop frequency of approximately 3 spoons per table per hour.

If our personnel are better prepared, we can reduce the number of trips back to the kitchen and save 15 man-hours per shift.'

As luck would have it, I dropped my spoon and he replaced it with his spare. 'I'll get another spoon next time I go to the kitchen instead of making an extra trip to get it right now.' I was impressed.

I also noticed that there was a string hanging out of the waiter's fly.

Looking around, I saw that all of the waiters had the same string hanging from their flies. So, before he walked off, I asked the waiter, 'Excuse me, but can you tell me why you have that string right there?'

'Oh, certainly!' Then he lowered his voice. 'Not everyone is so observant. That consulting firm I mentioned also learned that we can save time in the restroom.

By tying this string to the tip of our you-know-what, we can pull it out without touching it and eliminate the need to wash our hands, shortening the time spent in the restroom by 76.39%.

I asked quietly, 'After you get it out, how do you put it back?'

'Well,' he whispered, 'I don't know about the others, but I use the spoon.'

How big firms are taking advantage of the global financial crisis

I'm starting to get really f*cked off listening to all this whinging about the "global financial crisis". I know it's horrible and people are losing jobs and so on but the media are really loving it aren't they? What on earth would they be babbling on about if we didn't have this crisis?

Anyway I wanted to give my two cents on the whole issue because I'm getting increasingly annoyed by some of the bullshit that's going on by big firms.

Employees are being taken advantage of. There's no doubt about that. I have "a friend" who works for a prominant telecommunications firm in Sydney. This firm have just asked all contractors to take a 10% pay cut. If they don't accept then it's farewell...the company's point of view is that there are plenty of desperate people out there. This is the same company that announced that there would be no bonus this year, even though the actually made more money this year than last year (and last year they got a bonus). This is the same company that is sacking employees hand over fist whilst the GM's chums at the top keep getting given new highly paid positions. Sucks doesn't it?

The "crisis" is the perfect excuse for guys at the top to cut out all the things they've really wanted to cut for many years. The staff drinks, the lunches, the marketing events, the IT spend, the HR dept. Now they have the perfect reason. If they had tried to do it before they would have been seen as monsters, now they are pitching themselves as the saviours of firms by chopping the easy targets.

They are so far removed from what goes on "on the floor" that they don't see the true impact - the loss of morale, the sabotage and the brain drain when the best employees decide they don't want to take it any more. But what's worse is the short term chop shop men are happy when they see their costs reduced - they won't see the real picture until it's too late - the poorly built systems with revenue leakage, the drop in quality that loses customers, the lack of skills that causes major errors. They will see it eventually and they will see it starkly and they will wonder how they got it so wrong.

There are better, smarter ways for businesses to save money, but that's the subject of an altogether different post...