- How to discuss ideas constructively with employees - How to prioritize ideas (and if that's even necessary) - How to assign responsibility for improvement work - How to create time for improvement - How to track improvements

1. Mark Graban
VP of Customer Success
mark@kainexus.com
Congratulations, You Have Lots
of Employee Ideas! Now What?
Dr. Gregory Jacobson
Chief Product Officer
greg@KaiNexus.com
(Skip to slide #59 to watch this webinar)

2. About Gemba Academy
• Producers of Online & DVD Based
Lean & Six Sigma Training
• 500+ Videos (and growing)
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Individuals & Organizations
(Skip to slide #59 to watch this webinar)

3. Don’t Let This…
A Flood of Ideas(Skip to slide #59 to watch this webinar)

4. … Turn Into This(Watch this webinar)

5. Or is this our starting point?(Watch this webinar)

6. Can we turn it into this?(Watch this webinar)

7. Or, better yet, this?(Watch this webinar)

8. And then prevent this?(Watch this webinar)

9. Starting This Journey
• … toward a culture of continuous improvement
• It will not happen overnight (or in a month)
• It takes discipline and consistent leadership
• If you do it right, you’ll get a flood of ideas
– Nice problem to have!
(Watch this webinar)

10. Characteristics of a Culture of
Innovation & Improvement
Effective
Leadership
Systematic
Methodology
Enabling
Technology
(Watch this webinar)

11. The Right Amount of “P”
(Watch this webinar)

12. This is Not a Cycle
• Strive for perfection over time
• Get better over time
• Don’t expect to start perfectly. Don’t.
Plan Plan Plan Plan Plan
(Watch this webinar)

13. In the beginning…
(Watch this webinar)

14. Note: # of people involved = 12
(Watch this webinar)

15. (Manufacturing)
Note: # of users grew from
16 to 100
over this timeframe
(Watch this webinar)

16. (Healthcare)
Wave
River
Desert
Note: # of users was 372
(Watch this webinar)

17. Your Employees WILL Ask
“How do we know our
leaders won’t get bored
with this?”
(Watch this webinar)

18. Preventing an Idea Drought
1.Discuss ideas constructively with employees
2.Prioritize ideas (and if that's even necessary)
3.Assign responsibility for improvement work
4.Create time for improvement
5.Track improvements
(Watch this webinar)

19. Discuss(Watch this webinar)

20. Ask – In the Right Way
• Engage and inspire people
• Don’t just demand improvement
• Don’t set quotas or targets
• Don’t just ask for cost reductions
(Watch this webinar)

21. Audience Questions
What’s the way to motivate the people to do a
Kaizen idea?
How do you approach or manage the employee
WIIFM factor? (i.e., What is In it For Me?)
(Watch this webinar)

22. Problem and Idea(Watch this webinar)

23. Be Collaborative
• Don’t just accept or reject
• Make sure the right problem is understood
• Discuss the proposed countermeasure
• Brainstorm alternative countermeasures
• Coach, don’t nitpick
(Watch this webinar)

24. (Watch this webinar)

25. Positive Cycles
Discussing
Ideas
Implementing
Ideas
Generating
Ideas
(Watch this webinar)

26. What to Do with “Bad Ideas”
1. “Blow off” the idea and don’t talk about it
2. Just tell the employee idea is rejected
3. Talk about why it’s not being done now
4. Implement something that at least partially
addresses the underlying problem
Worse
Better
(Watch this webinar)

27. Key Point
• Communicate, communicate, communicate
– Face to face
– In team huddles
– Electronically
(Watch this webinar)

28. Prioritize(Watch this webinar)

29. Why Prioritize?
• What is the problem statement?
• We have too many ideas, so we have to choose:
– The most impactful?
– The biggest cost savers?
– The easiest?
– Those that help us achieve this year’s goals?
(Watch this webinar)

30. Low Effort High Effort
High Impact
Low Impact
KiboshPossible
Implement Challenge
(Watch this webinar)

31. The Problem With PICK
• If something is “high effort,” do we:
1. Put it on hold? Cast it aside? Kibosh it?
OR
2. Find an alternative that’s less effort?
(Watch this webinar)

32. Key Point
• If we:
– Distribute the improvement workload more and
– Find smaller, simpler things to implement
• Then:
– We don’t have to prioritize as much
(Watch this webinar)

33. Assign(Watch this webinar)

34. Shift the Model
Manager
Implements
Them All
Everybody
Implements
One
(Watch this webinar)

35. Shift the Model
• Or, at least, many people implement a few each
Manager
Implements
Them All
Everybody
Implements
One
(Watch this webinar)

36. Assigning Improvement Work
• Who can:
– Investigate?
– Collect data?
– Brainstorm countermeasures?
– Get input from others?
– Test countermeasures?
– Evaluate countermeasures?
(Watch this webinar)

37. But I’m Scared…
• What if all of my people aren’t capable?
• It’s the manager’s job to develop them
• They can likely do more than you think
• Recognize differing capabilities in your team
(Watch this webinar)

38. Key Point
• Don’t let the manager be the bottleneck
• Don’t let a key staff member be the bottleneck
(Watch this webinar)

39. Create Time(Watch this webinar)

40. From Excuse to Problem
• “We don’t have time for improvement”
• Is that an excuse?  Stop and give up
• Is it a problem?  Figure out how to solve
(Watch this webinar)

41. Intentionally Create Time
• “Nobody will criticized for taking 20 minutes
away from their regular work to work on
improvement work. I assure you of that.”
– Transplant Institute Chair
(Watch this webinar)

42. Toyota’s Answer
• “If we have an idea and our leader thinks it’s worth
working on, they’ll approve overtime for us.”
– TMMTX Tour Guide (Hourly Employee)
(Watch this webinar)

43. Key Point
• It’s often easier to create a little bit of time for
many people than it is to create a big block of
time for one person
(Watch this webinar)

44. Audience Question
• How do you balance “do the work” and
“improve the work?”
• Right now there is a sense in our environment
with KaiNexus that OIs must be worked on,
but we also have to “do the work” each day…
(Watch this webinar)

45. Track(Watch this webinar)

46. Track Ideas
• “Our biggest problem is we
forget to follow up on ideas.”
– We can’t worry about sustainment
until we get implementation
(Watch this webinar)

47. Audience Question
• How do you ensure that the project champion makes it
a priority to implement & complete the project?
• We have implemented a employee suggestion program
for the past six months, and have been successful,
however the "struggle" has been to get the designated
project champion to ensure that the project is
completed.
(Watch this webinar)

48. Track Results
• Categorize and Quantify
– Safety
– Quality
– Customer (Patient) Satisfaction
– Employee Satisfaction
– Cost / Revenue
– Time Savings
(Watch this webinar)

49. Audience Question
We have successfully implemented a Quick and Easy Kaizen program.
The problem I run into is in the submitting the problem and tracking
the savings. Is it common for employees to say how much time they
save for each of their ideas?
And do organizations often tie a dollar to the time savings? Are their
pitfalls I should be aware of? (example: Sally makes $12.00 an hour.
She improved her process by one hour a day, so the total time savings
is $12.00 an hour with an annual savings of $12.00 x number of work
days left in the year.) Are their different ways to calculate the savings?
(Watch this webinar)

50. Key Point
• You must show progress at first & over time
• More improvement, more quickly = more impact
• Progress = more ideas = more improvement
(Watch this webinar)

51. (Manufacturing 1st 60 days)
Note: # of users grew from
16 to 100
over this timeframe
(Watch this webinar)

52. (Manufacturing 6 months)
Note: # of users grew
from 16 to 240
over this timeframe
(Watch this webinar)

53. (Manufacturing 9 months)
Note: # of users grew
from 16 to 457
over this timeframe
(Watch this webinar)

54. (Watch this webinar)

55. 360
150 “lost” OIs
x $620 per OI
= $93,000
(Watch this webinar)

56. (Healthcare 60 days)
Note: # of users grew from
7 to 265
over this timeframe
(Watch this webinar)

57. (Healthcare 180 days)
Note: # of users grew
from 16 to 467
over this timeframe
(Watch this webinar)

58. Make ideas flow like a river(Watch this webinar)

59. Congratulations, You
Have Lots of Employee
Ideas! Now What?
To learn about what to do
with all those awesome
employee ideas, check out
this free webinar:
Watch Now

60. Other Resources
Upcoming Webinars
KaiNexus Blog
Continuous Improvement
eBooks

61. Thanks!
• Web:
– www.kainexus.com
– blog.kainexus.com
• Past Webinars:
– www.kainexus.com/webinars
• Social media:
– www.twitter.com/kainexus
– www.linkedin.com/company/kainexus
– www.facebook.com/kainexus
Mark Graban
KaiNexus
@MarkGraban
mark@KaiNexus.com
Dr. Gregory Jacobson
KaiNexus
Chief Product Officer
greg@KaiNexus.com