Using the Ideal Condition to Describe Perfection

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One of the elements necessary for transformation of an organization that often gets overlooked is the need to think in terms of the ideal condition.  Describing a process or system in terms of its ideal provides clarity and direction, and creates a framework to guide improvement activities and breakthroughs.

Although lean is based on the concept of continually improving to the point of perfection, many people have trouble understanding what perfection really means to their jobs and the company.  They know too much to think the company could ever reach perfection.  After all, humans aren’t perfect so why would we ever think an organization could reach an ideal state?

Breaking the Path to Mediocrity

In reality, a company will never reach perfection, but without a picture of what perfection looks like and continually challenging whether activities help or hinder the move toward the ideal, the company's improvement efforts will be mediocre, at best.

The more you clarify and emphasize the ideal condition in real terms, the better your chances of getting people to work together to move toward it.  Although you most likely will never consistently achieve the ideal, keeping the organization moving toward it will get you a lot closer to it than just letting things happen naturally.

An excellent example of an ideal condition appeared in a recent FORTUNE article (link) about Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer. In the article, Meyer stated that she wants to make Yahoo, “the absolute best place to work.”  Is Yahoo recognized as the best place to work today?  If you can trust media reports and glassdoor.com, the answer is no.  Will Yahoo ever get there?  Maybe or maybe not, but if Meyer is serious about the statement as an ideal condition, she and her team will begin to implement changes that will greatly improve the company’s workplace and reputation.

In another example, I used to work with a company where the order-to-shipment lead time for the main product line was 23 days.  Customers did not like waiting so long for the product but, since our quality was good and our competitors were delivering no faster than we were, our sales volumes were okay.

Recognizing the potential increase in revenues we could get if we reduced our lead time, I defined the ideal condition as same-day delivery for the product.  I knew this was a huge stretch for the plant, given the current long lead time for the product, but I wanted to set a clear direction for improvement activities.  To assure that changes represented true improvements, I also made it clear that reducing the product's lead time did not mean increasing costs, lengthening the lead time for other products, or reducing quality levels.

Some people had trouble taking the idea seriously but most bought into the idea right away.  We began to track product lead time on a daily basis, discussed it in all planning meetings, and posted the metric in several places throughout the workplace.

Within one year, the product's lead time was reduced to 12 days.  Besides a 23% increase in revenues, the improvements that enabled the reduction in lead time also led to decreased costs and improved quality in other product lines as well.

It's About the Gap

Once an ideal condition has been identified, the next step is to determine the current situation, or where the process, system, or organization is relative to the ideal. The difference between current and ideal is the gap to be reduced rough improvement activities.

Moving toward ideal.

The idea is not to attempt to close the gap in one step. Attempting to take on too much in one step can lead to frustration and disappointing results.  Instead, kaizen activities should become focused on chipping away at the gap, moving toward the ideal at a continual and steady pace.

Success in business obviously requires much more than merely identifying the ideal conditions, but doing so provides the guidance that is invaluable for improvement activities.  When a leader defines the ideal as something he or she truly believes in, provides the tools and method to enable improvement, remains patient, and gets out of the way, the results can be stellar.

Fighting Organizational Complacency

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NOTE:  This blog is moving.  Please read future posts at: http://leadingtransformation.wordpress.com

Applying lean requires a significant shift in thinking for most of us.  One aspect that I have found to be particularly difficult for people is the notion that anything less than perfection is acceptable. There seems to be a natural tendency to accept that things are good enough - and when people in the organization reach this point, complacency sets in and the improvement process begins to die.

One of the warning signs of organizational complacency is a passive resistance that shows up in statements like, "we can always improve, but . . . "  The "but" is the tip off that a person does not truly feel things can get much better.

Believing Your Own Press

Over and over again, I have seen periods of significant improvement followed by a return to mediocrity fueled by a belief that the most significant problems facing the organization have been solved and further improvement is not necessary.  In one instance, I worked with an organization that, over a period of several years, achieved marked improvement in product quality while increasing inventory turnover fivefold.  As the company became recognized as the industry leader, however, arrogance began to creep into its culture - which was not surprising given the remarkable turnaround that occurred during the previous period.

As is often the case, the arrogance was accompanied by complacency, and signified that people were satisfied with the current level of performance.  Within two years, the company's improvement efforts stagnated as inventory levels increased, quality declined, and profitability suffered.  The CEO who led the company during the period of growth (and was since promoted to a higher position within the parent company) returned to the organization to re-establish a continual improvement mindset.  After several years, humility and a drive for perfection began to return to the culture.

Some of the articles on the problems faced by Toyota a few years back point to organizational complacency as a potential cause.  Although much of the accelerator issue was eventually blamed on driver error, the company's rise to number one in such a short period of time, along with the significant increase in stock price, caused a loss of focus and made it difficult to maintain the motivation to improve.  Recognizing this as a problem, Akio Toyoda has said on several occasions that the company's future success requires a return to the basics - something that, at least from the outside, it seems to be working.

Perfection is the Only Acceptable Result

People in companies that appear to sustain the process over long periods of time tend to exhibit an obsession with improvement.  The drive to improve is integrated to the point where any resistance to change is quickly identified and repressed to prevent it from creeping into the culture.

As written in a previous blog (link), the notion behind the use of the term countermeasures rather than solutions is meant to keep anyone from thinking that there is an end to improvement efforts.  When the goal is perfection, there can be no such thing as a “solution” to a problem.

Continually striving for perfection can be tiring, so it is important to celebrate successes along the way.  While recognizing achievements, however, it is important that everyone understand that achieving and sustaining success requires never letting go of the idea that perfection is the only acceptable result for the company.  And a culture that continually strives for perfection has no room for the word, “but.”