Lean For Everyone

How a burnt out light at the Dentists office gave me a better teeth cleaning

What happens when you try to do your job but have very little visibility?

The dental hygienist flicked the switch on the overhead lamp and nothing happened.  The  bulb had finally burnt out after 4+ years.  So now what?

The hygienist had never changed a bulb before so she went and got a co-worker who located a replacement. 

That person wasn't sure how to change the bulb because it had been a long time since she had to do it.  

While I was sitting in the chair I offered to do it.  I'm mechanically inclined and the lamp housing and bulb were similar to other things I've fixed before.

In a about 3 minutes we had light again and this is what I found really interesting.

 

The hygenist said "It's so bright now, I can see so much more.  I never realized how dim the other bulb was before"

My brain was spinning around this.

• How long had the bulb been deteriorating?
• How many people didn't get the best cleaning because of a dim bulb?
• If the bulb hadn't burnt out would I have had a less than adequate cleaning?
• What is the standard for testing the luminescence of dental chair lamp bulb?
• How many other jobs/industries  have this same issue but don't realize it?

 

What's my take away from all this.

1. Without a standard you can't tell when something begins to deteriorate
2. If you can't see a problem you can't fix it
3. Preventative maintenance should always be done...especially on CTQ (Critical to Quality) equipment
4. Next time I clean the house make sure I have exceptional lighting when I do it and my wife has poor lighting when she checks my work.

 

For those of you interested in dental lamps and how bright they can/should be I've attached this pdf with illuminated teeth images  from a company called Sirona that produces halogen and LED lights.

 

 

VOC: Understanding your customer and making Halloween Pancakes

My customer is my 2 yr. old daughter D.  She wants pancakes and what I want is for her to eat them.

Making pankcake shapes was a huge pain.

 

My cousins Tom and Amy gave us a set of holiday pancake molds for a gift one year. 

 

The first time I used them it was a huge mess.  The pancakes stuck to the molds and I had headless ghosts, wingless bats and a pumpkin missing a lower jaw.

 

I tried again and finally got a bat that looked like a bat and my daughter went nuts over it.

 

 

Understanding the stated and unstated needs of your customer.

When breakfast was done it was decided that ghosts taste better then bats but not as good as pumpkins.

More importantly she ate everything on her plate.

 

Dilemma:  Go back to making pancakes that she didn't eat or improve the process to make holiday pancakes she will eat?

I'm a lean guy so of couse I improved the process to meet my customers needs. 

After a couple more tries I was able to troubleshoot why the batter was sticking to the molds and set up a process that was simple to do and produced perfect pancakes every time.

• Set the heat to 4.5 and heat pan
• Spray the mold with Pam
• Put the mold in the pan and fill 1/3 way with batter
  
• After a minute trace the mold with a toothpick to seperate it from the pancake
  
• Lift off mold (no longer needed)  and then flip pancake
• Cook and serve!!
  

The only significant amount of added time is the cleaning of the pancake molds which is well worth the extra time.  The dishwasher takes care of that part...(which has already been leaned in my house)

More important was that instead of trying to convince my customer that she wanted regular pancakes I spent my time changing my process to exceed her expectations and with little extra effort on my part.

 

Breakfast is now fun for all of us.  D. looks forward to Saturday pancakes where she can eat her spooky breakfast.  Of course everyone needs a "butter bath" before they are eaten but isn't that expected?

The word “Just” should never be used in describing a person

I was at a balloon jam the other day and someone asked me if I also did magic or face painting. I said "no..I don't incorporate that into my show"…the reply I got was oh …"you just do balloons".  Ouch!  That hurt.

She meant no offence but I suddenly remembered how terrible of a word "just" really is when used in describing a person.

Try an exercise with me.

1. Pick your profession "manager, waitress, mom, dad, gas station attendant, nurse"
2. Now add the sentence…"Oh, you're just a.." in front of it.

Now think about how that word minimizes what you can really do and how it limits your future possibilities?

Lean thinking requires you to eliminate the "just" in describing your life and others. After removing that word from your vocabulary the future becomes wide open where creativity and innovation can flourish.

I've seen managers use this word constantly…."he just does the prep….she's just a histotech." It's that type of thought process that will limit your staff and drive them away from your company.

A growing company looks to its employees as thinkers and not "just" a pair of hands or a warm body to do the work.

Next time you go to say the word "just", make sure it's the correct fit…as in "Just In Time (JIT)" processing.

For me….I'm just:

• the inventor of the scented pen
• a balloon artist
• a lean consultant
• a biotech geek
• a husband
• a dad
• whatever I choose to be

In this clip from the movie Finding Neverland Johnny Depp sums up why "Just" is ..well just wrong.

 

5 lean things your accounting dept. can do immediately to help cash flow.

Money is needed to finance your operations…so why are you waiting so long to collect what is owed to you?

1 - Eliminate paper billing

Many companies accept invoices via e-mail. You just need to ask your client if they will accept an invoice via e-mail. This saves a 0.44 cent stamp, an envelope, paper and ink to print the invoice and the effort to stuff the envelopes and mail them.

More importantly it eliminates the 3-4 days for it being "In transit" via the USPS, the possibility of it being lost, the time it takes to receive the invoice and have it delivered to the accounts payable department at your clients office.

 

2 - Send out your invoices when you ship

Why wait to send the bill? If possible your shipping department should be directly connected to your invoicing process. If you're really progressive the shipping team should be trained on how to invoice customers.

 

3 - Don't batch your credit card collections

I've seen many a small company strapped for cash because they run the credit cards every Friday. Run them as soon as you've provided services or shipped the product. Are you so rich that you can wait to get paid?

 

4 - Before you ship check so see if the customer has any outstanding bills

Don't keep selling products and services to clients who aren't paying. Next time an order comes in, check to see if there are any outstanding bills and call the client up immediately. Say "New policy…we can't ship if the account has an overdue bill." It's amazing how fast you can get paid when the customer needs their product and starts asking their own accounting department why they haven't paid the bill yet.

 

5 - Pick up the phone, call the client and ask to speak to accounts payables

Sometimes getting a person on the line can help expedite an overdue payment. Remember that e-mails, faxes and letters are all open to interpretation by the receiver. If you eliminate the possibility of miss communication you simplify the process and speed up things overall.

 

BONUS HINT - Get a big red stamp that says "Past Due" and stamp the invoice and the outside of the envelope.  Then send it to the owner of the company.

Nothing gets action faster than those big red words on the outside of a letter. If the owner or CEO gets it…it will help expedite matters. (Caveat: Use this sparingly….it can create some animosity toward your company in the clients accounts payables department.)

 

Remember:

Your goal is to fund your company…not to give short term loans to your customers. Stop wasting time, get that cash and grow your business.

Lean at the Movies: Armageddon and the use of SMART Goals

I realized yesterday that most of my favorite action movies utilize SMART goals in their plot lines.  Armageddon ranks high on my personal favorites for this.

SMART (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Time Bound)

• Specific:  You need to land on an asteroid, drill a hole, drop in a nuclear bomb and detonate it.
• Measurable: You need to drill 800 feet
• Attainable:  You are all deep core drillers and you have the equipment (ok I smiled while typing this one...attainable is relaitive in the world of fiction)
• Realistic:  It's the movies...everything is possible...ergo...it's realistic. Note:  See attainable above.
• Time Bound: In 18 days all life will end on the earth if we don't complete this job *excellent motivational technique*

The goal in this movie is very clear to the movie goer so the plot is very easy to follow.  This allows Michael Bay to do his thing and add in all the action...as long as he stays true to the SMART goal.

Like most projects/goals...there are always a few minor issues to resolve however that's what makes a good story. 

Do you remember the SMART goals of "Smokey and the Bandit"?

 

Pigs get slaughtered: If you try to take on too much, you accomplish very little

It's the same phenomena in large corporations and family households..the small project that turns into a big project that never gets completed.

 

Complexity kills-

If you need to patch a hole and paint a small area on a wall,  then do it first.

DO NOT overdo the project by deciding to paint all the walls a new color, resurfacing the floors, adding crown molding and getting new drapes.

I promise that if you go the complex route then you will have a hole in your wall for years. 

 
 

It's called scope creep and big companies make the same mistakes.

What started out as a request for a new field to annotate a Fed-Ex shipping number turned into a 2 year project to scope and implement an entirely new system.

The new system was to "solve everything", and allow the tracking from raw materials through assembly and into order fulfillment.

It was also to integrate into the accounting system to make reconciling accounts payables and receivables simple. It was also going to bring world peace and cure cancer.

 

What was delivered after 2 years?

• The costs ballooned
• The time lines were pushed out
• IT launched a product that was 2 years out of date and not in tune with current work loads
• The system was not "seamlessly integrated"
• The accounting system need to be upgraded so it would link with the new system
• The new system didn't track everything so everyone was required to update the old and new systems causing redundancy and increasing the workload
• IT now had to support both systems
• None of the current computers could handle the new system so everything had to be upgraded
• Lastly….there was no place to put in a Fed-ex tracking number. The new system didn't support it.

Next time...think twice about what you really want to get done....patch the hole...and then cure cancer.  You will accomplish more in the long run.

NOTE:  During the implementation process is was discovered that the old system did actually have a field for Fed-ex numbers.  There were so many bells and whistles that it was overlooked.