I had a great time at this MLC event and now understand the power of Hoshin Planning
Les really knows his stuff.
Les is a Lean Six Sigma Coach for the Operations Department in the US Federal Government’s Housing and Urban Development. He also helped design and implement Fords global lean system.
Most importantly he's enjoyable to listen to and a great presenter. He had several real life examples to draw from which made for a great seminar.
The attendees were mostly from healthcare but we had a good mix.
There were about 25 of us in total and I think about 60% were from a variety of hospitals in the area: Cardinal Health, University of Michigan, Henry Ford Health System and St. Mary's just to name a few.
We did have several consultants, and others from ATT, Atlas Oil and even Lazy Boy. this made for a good mix which always makes for good discussions.
Items that I took away:
- Hoshin helps to bridge the gap between upper and lower parts of the organization.
- For Hoshin to work you need systems thinking on all levels of the organization.
- Hoshin is about implementing and managing change.
- Policy deployment does not instantly change the current work.
- You need leading and laging indicators to guide your growth.
- You need to have "double loop learning" if you want to fix your problems.
- Understanding the 5 phases of Hoshin planning.
- Performing a SWOT analysis (Strength's Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats)
- Creating Break Through Objectives (BTO's)
- How to perform a Force Field Analysis.
- Nemawashi - getting buy in from everyone before implementation
- Catchball - the give and take negotiations that are used to align policy from the top down
We even had time to break up into 3 teams for a workshop on how to use some of the Hoshin documents.
We broke up into 3 teams and and started by filling out an X-matrix and creating: BTO's, Annual Objectives, Improvement Projects and Metrics.
We utilized a Balanced Scorecard for Measurement Selection and then tracked Key Performance Indicators using a monthly bowler chart.
I am no longer confused by Hoshin Planning
I tried to learn this on my own however I couldn't grasp the complexity of the X-Matrix diagram. Les made it much easier to understand and where there was once a cloud of confusion there is now enlightenment and understanding.
About the Michigan Lean Consortium
For those of you who are not familiar with the Michigan Lean Consortium you should really check them out. I paid for an annual membership for only $40.00 and I've been to many of their training sessions and benchmarking events.
The people are great the organization is solid and it's filled with many experts who just want to share their knowledge with others who want to learn and make Michigan a great place to work.
I hope to see you at the next MLC event.
