My Stretching program

I want to be able to access this anywhere. Sorry if your connected to this blog.

Meeting; Endeavor

A couple of things that happened this week;

1-I was in a meeting and Art said "oh good I can use that part for this order" I said, "that's an option but that's not a solution to why that part was produced wrong." I hope that drove the point home that we need to get to the bottom of things instead of just getting things done.

2-in that same meeting I asked the question "do we know that the exception process actually happened in this department?" This prompted the supervisor to ask the lead hand to send someone to the meeting so that we can drill down on every exception process to ensure that it took place. I'm looking forward to seeing how this plays out.

Daydreaming and Self Discipline

Daydreaming
I daydreamed that I was listening to someone while they were talking to me....that was bad. I need to stop daydreaming or being distracted. I need to focus more on what the heat of the moment is.

Self Discipline
I have a few rules for myself.....not too many. Let me see what are they?
-Always wear a belt
-Don't salt my food.
-Don't lend money to people.
-Don't watch raunchy movies.
-Don't buy extra warranty.
-Always take a shower in the morning and brush your teeth while you're there.
Come to think about it, I need to making a few more.

A few that I think I need to make are;
-read the Bible and pray before you go to work.
-do some stretches before you go to work.
-go to bed by 10:00
-Don't sleep in on the weekends
-make breakfast on Sundays
-don't eat more than a small serving of food for any meal.
-don't be late for work not even 2 minutes

I'm going to work on a few of these over the next few months. I'm not going to say that I will implement them all but I need to start on a couple of these. I think in some small way this will make life better in some small way.

Alibis, excuses and responsability

"Placing blame and making alibis is really not much more than a simple bad habit. It is not something you really want to do. It is merely something you do. Good players lose this habit, and good players learn not to look for alibis. They learn to accept resonsibility. They learn to look inward . They learn to ask themselves. " What could I have done better ? "Placing blame and making alibis is really not much more than a simple bad habit. It is not something you really want to do. It is merely something you do. Good players lose this habit, and good players learn not to look for alibis. They learn to accept resonsibility. They learn to look inward . They learn to ask themselves. " What could I have done better?"

I don't know where this quote came from but it intrigues me. In a past post I talked about what I think people see what I do as whining. I also do this too...I place blame also try and make alibis. Here's how I make alibis;

"I thought you said.........."
"I thought _________ was going to happen first"
"I didn't have time"
"I forgot"

I need to dedicate some time to thinking about how to respond instead of with these statements. I also need to think about how I respond to people when they give me these responses.

Here is something that I am trying

November 23

So this week was a good one. Some celebrations, The tier 4 team knows that I have engagement on my team, I hosted a celebration breakfast where the team was really engaged and we really broke the ice...I felt.

Another thing that I Learned was to meet those that are complaining with a question that brings the accountability back to them.

"What are the risks" is another great question when someone is presenting a new approach to something.

I was brave enough to ask one of my associates what they thought I needed to work on. She came back with something that I've identified is a weakness of mine. My facilitation skills. I don't know what questions ask to get to the bottom of things. I also have a really hard time listening. I find myself daydreaming when people are talking. It's awful. That will be the focus of my next blog.

Progress

So today, I had the plant manager ask a couple of things....what is our containment?

A few different ways that I can ask that question are like this; "What are we doing that gives us assurance that the processes are successful? How do we know that when we hand something off that they are complete and accurate?"

Here are some of the thoughts that I have that I can use to answer this question.
-We have to first establish a clear expectation of what the process should be. Then we need to ensure that it is repeatable and consistent. Then we need to identify what the triggers are, meaning; How does the next process in line identify that they are missing something or how do I as a supplier identify that my processes have been complete and accurate? The second component of that question is the preferred method. It's better for me as a supplier be able to identify what's missing then for my customer does it. It's just like Ikea, when you go and buy a dresser, you don't want to have to go back and tell them "You missed a few screws and a drawer face". That's just bad business. But there is a slight difference here, the two processes that I am thinking about are 2 highly integrated functions and ultimately a line. It will make more sense to have which ever department has the capacity to so the "check" and then create the necessary feedback loop.

My answer to the above question tomorrow will be: We've created a report that will tell us when a date is complete and when you should be expecting the parts. We will distribute this report daily. Further to that, we currently have a reports in the system that tell us what the open orders are and the difference between the 2 is what we need to follow up on. The reports will require time and updates to standard work.

Evidence that I made a small change today in the way I communicate to my piers was this; Instead of saying "We need a task to make sure that we can Cancel orders and Expedite for customer requests"...I changed that to "There is a risk still outstanding that we cannot cancel orders and we cannot expedite for customer requests." I think that there is a huge difference in the 2 ways of saying it. Oh...there's another question I can ask to delve deeper into processes or problems..."What are the risks that you are currently aware of or that may arise?"