Lean Connections

1. “Customer/client focus for the sake of the customer/client;
2. A habit of collaboration;
3. A focus on the medium-to-long term, on relationships rather than transactions;
4. A default stance to transparency, except where illegal or injurious…”

So what might this look like in terms of the day-to-day interactions you have with your (trusted) executive search advisor?  Ask yourself these questions: 

1. Does my executive search consultant (ESC from now on…) focus on me and my needs – professional and personal – or on himself? How do I know that?
2. Does my ESC seem motivated by his internal drive to do the right thing by me, or instead by his firm’s internal metrics and performance carrots and sticks?
3. Is my ESC competitive and innovative in that he’s constantly looking for better ways to deliver service, as contrasted with simply competing with other search providers for my business? Is he continually bringing new knowledge and fresh insights and experiences to me?
4. Does he demonstrate a belief that continued focus on defining and solving my problems is more important than just filling in boxes on my organization chart?
5. Do the ESC’s systems, processes, procedures and operational models effectively meet my needs or requirements ( a means to a successful recruiting outcome), and if not, are they discarded or reformulated until they do?  Is he continuously learning and improving his own professional skills and expertise in order to be able to do that?
6. Perhaps most importantly, does he listen to me, seek to clearly understand the issues I’m facing, and deliver strategies for creating solutions that will positively impact the growth and profitability of my business?

I love my Amazon Kindle!  The technology, the design, the utility – this baby defines value for me, the customer.  And as great as this product is, I’m constantly on the look-out for hints and rumors that might provide some insight into what kind of awesome value I should be expecting from the next generation Kindle.  Hey, it’s in my blood – I’m a continuous improvment kind of guy.

Well, Fast Company’s blog this morning suggests “7 Ways Amazon Could Make the Next Kindle Awesome.”   Check it out.  My most desired feature would be the addition of a WiFi connection.  But of course, I’m still a pretty conventional thinker in terms of product design.  I bet the wizards of Kindle are already way ahead of me in coming up with some innovations that will deliver an even more amazing experience next time around!

And that’s the way I see it.  Adam Zak

PS.  I’m conducting an executive search for the person who will head up quality for the Kindle team.  Position title is Director, Product Quality.  If you know of a passionate Lean quality leader who might have an interest in exploring this role with me, please ask them to connect with me directly.

I coined the term “Kaizen Kowboys” a few years ago (Lean Culture: Collected Practices and Cases).   Since Bill Wadell was kind enough to reprise its use in his blog yesterday I thought I’d provide a little historical background.

The company involved was a new executive search client and they were running into problems with their Lean implementation.  Turns out they had been working for over a year with an outside consulting firm to assist them in the transformation process, but they didn’t seem to be making any real progress.  And they weren’t really sure why that was the case. My client contact, the CEO, called me in to discuss the problem and propose solutions.

Part of the standard work I do when beginning a new search (I created a trademarked search methodology called pdcaSearch(R) in which we use Lean principles to drive the executive search process) is to uncover the root cause of the problem I’m being asked to solve. In this case it became very clear that there were ”multiple internal owners” of the Lean initiative, but there was no clear accountability for its success or failure.  The VP of Manufacturing had a small team of the outside consultants assigned to his “projects” and so did the VP Engineering. As did the VP of Supply Chain; and the VP Finance, and so on. 

The CEO had given each executive broad latitude and they were running with it. But all too often it seemed that an “improvement” in one area of the business soon became undone as another “improvement” elsewhere changed the overall operational dynamics of the organization. What Manufacturing improved became “unfixed” by the latest Kaizen event conducted in Engineering the following week. So naturally, Manufacturing Kaizen teams came back to the same area in subsequent weeks for a do-over.  This had been going on for almost a year and had devolved into an embarassing “Keystone Kops-like ” effort which I initially dubbed “catch-and-release Kaizen.”  The trout fishing devotees among you will immediately know what I mean.

Well, I fixed the company’s problem by recruiting a new VP of Continuous Improvement, an individual skilled in the principles of operational excellence and policy deployment. He quickly helped align objectives, resolved competing priorities and turned the focus of the improvement initiative onto value streams instead of functional silos.  Kaizens became more strategic, value-added events.  The new Lean VP continued to rely on a select group of outside advisors who could complement his own expertise, but he very rapidly sent the majority of the Kaizen Kowboys packing back to the ranch from whence they had come.

And that’s the way I see it.  Adam Zak