When any company starts down the improvement path, they set goals for what they hope to achieve. Stated in the simplest terms, these goals represent “What You Want” from a change initiative. They are usually quantitative in nature (more tons, lower costs, higher throughput, fewer or shorter delays, etc.) and are more often associated with changes in process steps and process tools that we can see and touch like key measures, trend charts, flowcharts, procedures, etc. I call these process tools the “mechanics of change.”

The gap between “what you want” and “getting what you want” is the difference between where you are today (the baseline) and what you would like to achieve (change in equipment performance, costs and culture). This gap is made up of potentially hundreds of small projects usually linked to the mechanics of change. It is here that change efforts can be sabotaged…

The “mechanics of change” usually begins with identifying opportunities to improve the bottom line. Once validated, these opportunities become projects that are ranked by dollars (opportunity costs) with the highest value projects listed first. The application of process tools used in DMAIC (design, measure, analyze, improve, control) lead the user through the change process with the expectation that the “control” step will sustain a gain.

You might be thinking “What’s wrong with this stream of work? We have used it at my company for years.” If I asked how many change initiatives you have been through in the past 10-20 years, how many would you list? If you listed several, why did your company continue to search for new proven tools and methods? If your company has been through multiple initiatives, it probably did not get the value expected from them. There are only two reasons for this:

  1. The process work was substandard or did not meet the needs of the departments involved, causing benefits to fall short of expectations.
  2. The process work was excellent and met the needs of the departments involved, but the benefits still fell short of expectations or were not sustainable.

If your company falls under #2, this article is meant for you.

Barriers to change must be removed before improvement can be achieved or sustained. This sounds like a “no-brainer”. Won’t barriers be removed by “mechanics of change” processes? Yes, but not all of them

There are two types of barriers to change.

  1. Barriers in processes and systems in the form of gaps or poorly designed process steps. Once processes are streamlined using the “mechanics of change” to remove these barriers, work is easier for everyone and chances for sustainability are good.
  2. Barriers in the management system or within the management team. Because both of these barriers live on the outside of production and service processes, they are often overlooked, not included in the scope of work, or are viewed as something that cannot be changed. If management barriers go unaddressed, you can create perfectly designed processes with a perfect implementation plan, train everyone perfectly and still have the same problems you had before you started your change initiative.

Remember…Getting What You Want is only possible if management barriers are removed. It would be interesting to track the problems solved solely by removing management barriers, then determine a new baseline and begin process work. Immediate culture change would occur and expectations about the path to sustainable improvement would change dramatically as new management beliefs and behaviors delivered big returns, sometimes bigger than quantitative project work.

Thought for the month: Management barriers cause conflict and confusion that interferes with sustainable performance improvements and prevents culture change from occurring. These barriers can be eliminated by helping management see their world differently and make better choices.

Author: Kay Sever CMC, CQIA, Sustainable Improvement Consultant and Coach. Kay Sever is a leader in sustainable improvement for mines and plants. She combines 29 years of mining experience with a common sense approach to improvement that raises awareness about lost opportunity and hidden barriers that prevent improvement success. http://www.miningopportunity.com/