Lean Summit
Africa 2008 has come and gone: the memories and lessons must now bear
fruit. Whether you were there or not,
you may be a beneficiary. Please read
on.
If you were there
you will know of the many interesting and rousing moments, not least of all at the
question following the presentation Experimenting
with Lean by Doctor Gio Perez, Director: Metro District Health Services in
Health Department of the Provincial Government of the Western Cape (PGWC). The question from the floor was along the
lines of, ‘How can we get this approach applied across the whole country?’ It was asked with a sense of excitement and
hope. Doctor Perez had just shown us
that the PGWC Health Department had seen enough from their 4 or 5 lean
initiatives to now want to roll out lean more comprehensively
Of course in
the National Prosecuting Authority presentation we saw that lean is being
applied in other challenging government service delivery environments. So, we have growing South African evidence
that lean can and does deliver for
service delivery. With a sense of
excitement and hope, we are, I am sure, all hoping we see more of this!
With respect to
under-delivering healthcare systems, we are not alone. It is common knowledge that public health
systems are in trouble in most countries.
Ironically, this is particularly true of developed countries like USA and UK.
The aging populations and spiralling costs of medical technology are
colliding to create untenable futures.
The pressure is on authorities to ‘do something.’ Jim Womack in the USA has observed to me that both Messrs
McCain and Obama are making extravagant claims that they will fix the
problem. He is sceptical of success, no
matter who enters the White House in January.
No idle
scoffer, he and Dan Jones are collaborating to offer help! On 5 and 6 November, i.e. starting the day
after voting day, they are convening a by-invitation-only Lean Healthcare
Summit in Boston. They are inviting key players to review the
evidence from lean healthcare initiatives.
Over the past several years there have been a number of hospitals in USA, UK,
Canada and Australia
(amongst others) that have experienced significant progress through lean
initiatives. The evidence will be
presented to catalyze a debate along the lines of ‘No one has the answers, but
there are indications as to where the right direction may lie.’ Helen Zak, Jim Womack’s Chief Operating
Officer and convenor of the Summit,
has promised to update me on both the process and outcomes of the debate.
Furthermore,
Dan Jones has expressed willingness to let us into the delivery of his work, on
the ground, in the hospitals, with the National Health Service in the UK. LIA’s membership of the Lean Global Network
promises to keep us informed of the latest thinking and practice in lean
healthcare. However, one only learns
lean by doing: we must leverage this into local initiatives on both the
provincial and national level.
The healthcare
challenge is a special case of the challenge facing all organisations which
have had initial success with lean initiatives: how do we transform the whole
organisation to work this way? Several
organisations I have visited recently are taking up this challenge. It is very different from ‘Can lean work for
us?’ It in fact goes to the heart of the
top management vision for the enterprise.
And, how to operationalise that vision.
In part it
comes down to asking top management, ‘How do you want to manage?’ That is a favourite question of John
Shook. This past month (October) the
Lean Global Network welcomed the publication of his new book: Managing to learn. I believe it holds much promise to help
enterprises make the transformation from ‘we have pockets of success with lean’
to ‘management consistently supports frontline staff in ways that help the
enterprise as a whole achieve its strategic objectives.’
If the latter
is the way you want to manage, I strongly suggest you take a look at Managing to learn. The book on its own will not achieve
much. It speaks rather to a process of
coaching, which when consistently followed, transforms the way managers work
and think. My favourite definition of
lean/TPS is ‘it is a system for creating thinking people.’ I believe with John Shook that it is easier
to get people to act their way into a better way of thinking than to think
their way into a better way of acting.
In the book, and the middle management use of the A3 tool it describes, lies
a practical path to just that: creating thinking people via thinking managers.
Our website
will be up soon!
Our next e-letter will
tell you about that and other LIA developments.
For now, keep up the good lean work.
