The Economy and Quality: Is It Time for Quick Hits?
Advice from Joseph A. De Feo, President and Executive Coach & John Early, Executive Vice President
When the business cycle slows, as it is doing today, some companies abandon their long term improvement efforts in search of faster solutions. Some call these faster solutions “just do its.” There is a place for “just do it” when the root cause is already proven or irrelevant – such as selling off excess equipment. But, unfortunately, “just do it” is too often the slogan for jumping directly to a solution without the inconvenience of collecting data and diagnosing the true root causes of the problem at hand.
If your organization is confronted with the apparent choice between doing it right or doing it fast, consider that there are ways to do both at the same time – quickly implementing the right solution that delivers real results on a sustainable basis.
We have all seen the failures of the “ready, fire, aim” approach, but in times of urgency, our old instincts for “action now” seem to rise to the fore and suppress our better judgment. Recall from your own company’s experience examples such as:
- The training program to fix a persistent quality problem that had no impact because the problem was in the process, not the skill of the people
- The added inspection steps to catch and eliminate deficiencies that made only a small dent in the failure rate and added substantial cost
- The economy drive that eliminated customer service positions without addressing the issues that led to customers’ contacting service in the first place, with the result that service backlog rose, customers demanded more attention from Sales, and revenue fell as the sales force spent more time mollifying customers and less time making new sales, while existing customers went elsewhere
The good news is that we can avoid these “just do it” failures and still achieve results very quickly. The right fast results do not come from abandoning the methods we know work. We can achieve the needed outcomes quickly by observing the fundamentals, but adopting “quick hit” accelerators.
In both good times and bad, the fundamentals of achieving breakthrough improvements in performance are the same. Paradoxically, in times of urgency, it is even more important to observe these fundamentals because the consequences of failure are more severe. These fundamentals include:
- Identifying and quantifying the right opportunities – namely the improvements that are most important to company performance
- Using information to prove the real root cause of the problem
- Developing a solution that best eliminates the root cause within the capabilities and culture of the organization
- Holding the gains through optimal design and control
Here is an outline of accelerators that can achieve quick hit results without sacrificing effectiveness and sustainability. When selecting the business opportunities that will be addressed follow these guidelines:
- Give higher priority to problems that surface as if they were golden nuggets just lying out in the open ready to be picked up at first sight. Frequently, these can be addressed with simple tools and diagnosis. In these cases, root causes are often traced to a good process that is not being followed correctly. Leave larger, tougher problems for later.
- Increase the priority for projects that directly address issues related to the current economic slow down.
- Consider doing multiple short projects with quick results that in aggregate may have more impact over the urgent time horizon than the big-hitters that require months to solve.
- As projects are proceeding, encourage the teams to “fast-track” the solutions for any root causes that they have already proven that seem to have easy remedies so that some benefit appears immediately. Other parts of the solution may take longer, but don’t delay acting on what is already known.
- Set more aggressive timelines for project completion, supporting it with more team resources to get the job done more quickly. If the problem is urgent, put the resources on it to achieve urgency.
- Try a Juran Rapid Improvement or “Blitz Project” in which the full rigor of real quality improvement is done in a matter of days rather than months, with dedicated resources and strong facilitation.
- If the opportunity relates to lead times and waste, it may be a good candidate for a Lean Value Stream Rapid Improvement Event, which again starts generating results within days.
- Assign your best and most trained individuals to leading and supporting projects.
- Get outside help.
- Wait…do not launch a major change program if it is not the right time to do so.
These accelerators are especially useful in times of urgency. But most of them work in “normal” times as well – although one might wonder what is “normal” any more. However, once the short-term urgency has abated, the primary accelerators that one will want to set aside are those related to giving higher priority to short-term and crisis-focused opportunities. You will then want to return to assuring that some projects are focused on the long-term strategic results for the organization.
Past business cycle contractions have taught an important lesson. The companies which survive a downturn and then jump to leadership on the upswing of the business cycle are those that do not abandon the principles of breakthrough performance. They continue to apply the principles even more carefully, but adapt their targets and tactics to the current climate.
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