Continuous Improvement is the non-stop effort for the improvement of products, services or procedures of any department, organization or ...
Continuous Improvement is the non-stop effort for the improvement of products, services or procedures of any department, organization or corporation. The enhancement could be in terms of go-to-market time improvement, cost reduction, quality management, customer happiness, better operational SLAs, quick response time, fast production rate, reduced fault rate, Six Sigma Compliance, electricity conservation and several other domains.
Quality management gurus think, that there are three kinds of improvements;
- Continuous Improvement: The Improvement which is at a linear rate.
- Continual Improvement: The Improvement which is at gradual rate.
- Breakthrough: A giant leap resulting in major changes in one particular domain or multiple domains, executed once or in step.
Below is the recommended strategy for the Execution of Improvement Process:
- Baseline the current performance of Products, Services or Procedures.
- Identify areas of improvements.
- Review available ideas with subject matter experts or management team
- Consider Fishbone diagram, Cause Effect diagram. Perform analysis by doing breakdown of bigger problem into smaller problems.
- Seek feedback and recommendations from Management Consultants
- Seek advice from Managers, Field Employees, Stake holders, Subject Matter Experts.
- Consider customers' / End users' feedback about quality of products and services.
- Make final list of options to execute. Consider associated risks with each execution. Consider Mitigation strategies for these risks.
- Perform 'lab test' by executing the options one by one on a small scale in a controlled environment based on risk mitigation strategies.
- Prepare the observation register and list down the lessons learnt.
- Review the observations with managers, senior management, SMEs (Subject Matter Experts) and stake holders.
- Implement the change on large scale and set new standard.
- Celebrate and reward.
- Go back to Step one for Continuous/Continual Improvement
