Lean Production. John Black

with a process for making the changes. I told him I’d be back in three months with an answer.

      I researched and read everything I could find on Japan’s management methods, including the application of those methods in European and North American companies. My background proved useful for this sort of undertaking: Before starting at Boeing in 1978, I had served with the U.S. Army at Headquarters U.S. Army Europe. In my last military assignment, I’d been responsible for developing human resources training for the army in Europe. I later worked on developing the first training designed to help pave the way for expanding the role of women in the military. From these responsibilities, I had absorbed many lessons on the importance of leadership, the ramifications of management behavior, the challenges of cultivating a new culture, and how to “make it happen” in a large organization.

      A model for employee involvement

      Three months after my conversation with Fenn, I made my appearance in his office with a four-foot by six-foot cardboard model I’d put together at home. I have since used this model with a number of variations and improvements.

      “This is it,” I told Fenn. “This is our process for increasing employee participation, and we should get to work getting it implemented.” He agreed. The model became a plan, the plan became a handbook, and the handbook in turn became a process that permeated Boeing’s 757 production program to various degrees. The model eventually traveled with me for implementation at other organizations as well.

      Enduring principles for a more participative culture

      I supplemented the cardboard model with a memo to Fenn and other Boeing managers. That memo was titled “Overall Division Productivity Improvement/Quality Of Work Life (PI/QWL) Strategies For Your Approval.” It outlined the following recommendations for getting started. These principles endure.

      1. Integrate productivity improvement/quality of work life (PI/QWL) programs into normal planning and control systems. PI/QWL must become an attitude, a way of doing things. Don’t just tack PI/QWL onto existing systems. The approach is not a fad but a long-term investment with potential for significant dollar returns.

      While discussing this principle, I’d like to clarify a point about terminology. Throughout this book you’ll see references to programs — productivity improvement programs, training programs, and so on. The word “program” has become a dirty word for those trying to implement quality improvement, and many companies make a conscious effort to avoid it, for good reason. Too often, the label suggests a temporary activity, a short-term solution, or even a distraction from the daily business of making products and satisfying customers. As noted in the first principle above, to be successful, quality and productivity improvement initiatives must be perceived and implemented quite differently — as a way of thinking and operating, as an integral part of everything the company does. But don’t get so hung up on terminology that you lose sight of what you’re trying to accomplish. Employees recognize euphemisms when they see them, and management actions speak a lot louder than clever or fashionable labels. Whether your efforts toward a lean, world-class production system are called programs, initiatives, or culture changes is less important than how you develop, implement, lead, measure, and talk about them.

      2. Accordingly, communicate and reinforce the idea that PI/QWL is not “just another program,” but an attitude that must pervade all your plans, methods, and systems. All efforts, teams, and individuals must work toward greater productivity.

      3. Ensure that directors and managers are committed. If you limit thinking and action on productivity to middle managers, staff, and others outside senior management, the program will lack the long-term support it needs to survive.

      4. Don’t equate boosting productivity with cutting costs. Increasing productivity will likely decrease costs, but the two are distinct.

      5. Consider productivity and quality of work life together. A high QWL is necessary to productivity: It’s an upward spiral and a mutually reinforcing relationship. When employees are happy and feel they can influence outcomes, their productivity will rise. When that happens, QWL will rise farther.

      6. Study the many facets of productivity. For example, examine the ratio of output to input, not only for labor hours, but also for capital investment, materials, and energy.

      7. Build training into the program. The workforce must learn what increased productivity really is, why it is necessary, what units or measurements will define it, how measurement will be performed, what are the incentives for improvements, and so on.

      8. Look closely at productivity and profitability — the two are distinct but related. If you adopt a productivity program solely for the purpose of raising short-term profits, it may fail. You can increase profits in the short term, but perhaps not with any assurance of long-term profitability.

      9. Continue to design and tweak the program to suit the unique needs of the organization. Every organization has its own idiosyncrasies and personality. Case histories and examples can be inspiring, but slavishly following a case history from another division, company, vendor, or sister organization can be a trap resulting in failure.

      10. Resist the urge to diffuse the program too quickly. If a pilot succeeds in manufacturing, for example, that doesn’t mean you should necessarily implement the same program everywhere by next week.

      11. Set realistic goals. Communicate to the workforce: “There’s no free lunch and no overnight success. We must work together as a team.”

      Bruce Gissing, who was Boeing’s first executive vice president of operations, continuous quality improvement, has said, “It is important to make sure that everyone knows that this is a continuous quality-improvement effort, not a miracle clinic. One of our initial mistakes at Boeing was our creation of an implied promise to make big changes in a short time. In fact, we didn’t set any expectations at all, but when we talked about the possibility of great improvements in the future, quite a few people thought we meant tomorrow.” Big improvements take years of work, and you don’t want anyone getting frustrated or disillusioned and giving up too soon.

      13. At the appropriate time, bring union managers into the act. You don’t need an active in-house adversary, and the program will work better if everyone pulls together.

      Improving productivity from the ground up is a major undertaking at any company. When you’re trying to build a new generation of airliners — such as the 757 — it’s even more of a challenge. Designing and building a new plane consumes years of deadlines and tight schedules, with little room for delays or errors. The product must be released on time, within budget, and according to specs.

      Putting the principles into action — one step at a time