Geting your team to continue to perform

One of my recent posts I discussed what makes a successful change team.

so, you've formed a team and you know they will go through the stages of chaotic, formal to mature but how can you get them there and ensure they continue to perform at a stellar level?

Team Reviews

To move from the chaotic stage to the mature stage, the team must build on its experiences.  It is commonly believed that you learn from experience.  Actually, you gain understanding from reviewing and thinking about your experiences.  You can then draw appropriate conclusions and plan to modify your behaviour in the future.
You learn by doing and understand by reviewing

The Learning Cycle
There is a procedure for conducting a team review.  It is a skill that should be learned and practiced.

Procedure
Start by analysing your team results
• did you achieve the task?
• what aspects of the task did you do well?
• what aspects of the task did you not complete satisfactorily?
• did individual roles, contributions, activities and attitudes benefit the team?


REMEMBER, your analysis should be factual and honest.            

Analyse why you performed the way you did
You need to shift the focus of the review from ‘ what happened’ to ‘WHY it happened!’  Your analysis should cover both task and process related aspects - how your team approached the task; how you as team members worked together.

Having focused on the causes you can now identify what strengths you can maintain and develop and what weaknesses you need to overcome

Again, this should include both process and task related aspects of your performance.

It is important at this stage that you adopt the ‘Pareto Principle’.  Try to concentrate on the ‘significant few’ factors or weaknesses - the ones that are causing you the most problems.  Once you have eliminated these, you can then move on to the lesser concerns.

REMEMBER, do not try to change everything immediately.  Instead, use the Continuous Improvement principle of aiming for steady, continuous progress rather than risky wholesale change.


Plan for improved performance in the future

Try not to forget, a good review is just as concerned with the future as it is with the past.
You are not carrying out a review as a ‘post-mortem’, you are attempting to understand what you have done in the past so that you can improve in the future.

Having carried out your review you can develop a plan which:
• maintains and builds on the strengths of the team
• overcomes the weaknesses identified

Most importantly, your plan for improvement should be:
• feasible
• practical
• understood by everyone
• able to identify who will do what
• clearly directed and agreed by all for the next task.

This completes the learning cycle.







If you enjoy reading my blogs, please take a look at my many other on-line resources,

Website, http://www.beyondlean6sigma.com/
Blog, http://leansixsigmauk.blogspot.co.uk/
Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/leansixsigmacert
Follow me on twitter, https://twitter.com/DrLeanSigma
I have also recently launched a new range of Lean Six Sigma on-line training courses which you can read about here, http://www.beyondlean6sigma.com/programmes/


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The different stages of your change team

In my last post, we looked at the early stages of forming a team and in this post I’ll discuss the ‘formal’ and ‘mature’ stages:

Formal Stage
The formal stage is likely to be more successful, but this success will be limited by inflexibility.  The team at this stage of its development tends to be too regimental and fails to utilise the full capability of all its members.  This is due largely to over-rigidly defined roles within the team.  Probably the worst case of this being that far too much dependence is placed on the leader to co-ordinate, plan, make decisions as well as to control.

Typical characteristics of formal teams include:
• strong likelihood of overreacting - becoming too formal in procedures and roles
• strong leadership often seems the answer to problems of the chaotic stage - the leader is often criticised for failure to be strong enough during chaotic stage
• formal/specific roles (timekeeper/secretary etc.)
• poor flexibility
• not making use of capabilities of members


Mature Stage
Gradually, the team begins to develop out of the formal stage and starts to take ‘liberties’ with its own procedures without slipping back into chaos.

This progress to maturity is not guaranteed however.

If the team rebels against the rigidities of the formal stage too early, it can easily slip back to the chaotic stage.

On the other hand, some teams get stuck in the formal stage and never quite reach the mutual understanding and trust needed to move to maturity.

The breakthrough to the mature stage usually occurs when the team realises that some parts of their formal procedures are of no use to the particular task they are doing.  The team cuts corners and finds it can cope.

Typical characteristics of mature teams include:
• procedures for objective setting, planning, discussions etc. that are agreed and based on the task or situation
• procedures that are flexible rather than rigid
• team roles that are more relaxed, with members contributing on the basis of what they can offer in a specific situation, not according to rigidly defined responsibilities
• communication that is good within the team. (ideas and suggestions are given freely and are listened to and built on)
• leadership style is more ‘involving and participative’ as the situation dictates

The team in its mature stage of development is likely to be very effective.





If you enjoy reading my blogs, please take a look at my many other on-line resources,

Website, http://www.beyondlean6sigma.com/
Blog, http://leansixsigmauk.blogspot.co.uk/
Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/leansixsigmacert
Follow me on twitter, https://twitter.com/DrLeanSigma
I have also recently launched a new range of Lean Six Sigma on-line training courses which you can read about here, http://www.beyondlean6sigma.com/programmes/




#leansixsigma, #beyondlean, #leansixsigmacertification, #leansixsigmatraining lean six sigma, lean six sigma training, lean six sigma certification, lean six sigma

What makes a successful change team?

I’ve been asked by many of my clients "What’s the best way to pull a successful change team together?"
Now, there are many views on this kind of thing out there but I like to keep it simple! As Bruce Lee once said "simplicity is genius"

Firstly, you need to look at the type of person you want to entrust with improving your organisation – Attitude is everything! A positive, can-do attitude wins every time for me over any number of MBA qualifications, so let’s take a look at teams………

There are lots of definitions as to what makes a team.  One of the better definitions states:
‘...... a team is a group of people who co-operate and work together to achieve a goal in a way which allows them to accomplish more than individuals working alone could have achieved.’

Ideally, they will all be working together towards commonly understood, shared and achievable objectives.

Obviously, when a new team is formed, it is very rare that it will perform effectively from the start.  There is a development process that each successful team must go through.

This development process has three distinct stages:

• chaotic
• formal
• mature

Chaotic Stage
The chaotic stage is the very first stage that a new team goes through.

As the name suggests a team is the chaotic stage of development will exhibit typical characteristics.  These include:

• inadequate planning
• not enough time given to setting clear, agreed objectives
• making too many assumptions, particularly about objectives, targets and team roles
• underestimating problems
• no clear procedures, agreed ways of working or development of understanding
• poor communication within the team.  (during discussions, some team members will dominate while others will not be able to get their ideas heard)
• everyone tending to talk at once.  (this, coupled with poor listening skills, will lead to ideas that are lost)
• leadership is either non-existent, unclear, too heavy-handed or not accepted by the rest of the team

It is easy to see that teams in the chaotic stage will fail more often than they succeed.  However, these failures will be ‘explained away’ and ‘glossed over’ instead of being analysed objectively.

Chaotic teams will be fun for a while. Team members will tend to overcome uncertainty by diving headlong into the task without really giving thought as to what they are doing or how they are working together.

Eventually though, the team will begin to react against the chaotic stage by becoming more formal in its approach.  There is a danger however, that the team will overreact and introduce formal procedures that are too rigid and restraining.

I'll discuss the formal stage in my next blog.



If you enjoy reading my blogs, please take a look at my many other on-line resources,

Website, http://www.beyondlean6sigma.com/
Blog, http://leansixsigmauk.blogspot.co.uk/
Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/leansixsigmacert
Follow me on twitter, https://twitter.com/DrLeanSigma
I have also recently launched a new range of Lean Six Sigma on-line training courses which you can read about here, http://www.beyondlean6sigma.com/programmes/




#leansixsigma, #beyondlean, #leansixsigmacertification, #leansixsigmatraining lean six sigma, lean six sigma training, lean six sigma certification, lean six sigma

The One Secret to Successful Lean Six Sigma

Many of my clients and colleagues are forever asking the question “How do we assure sustainability for a Lean Six Sigma Project.” This is by far the most difficult part to achieve and it is all about the people.

Based on my personal scars and experience, any improvement activity is 20% about the tools and 80% about the people and it is people that determine the sustainability.. so, what determines whether change ‘Sticks’ or not ?

The beliefs, behaviour and actions of individuals all form part of the make up of the ‘Culture’ of an organisation and it is this ‘Culture’ that determines the sustainability of your Lean Six Sigma project, Programme or Transformation.

In order for anything to remain in place, it has to be accepted as ‘The norm’ or the ‘Modus Operandi’, or put quite simply, “It’s the way we do things around here”. The change must become part of the culture of the organisation. If it doesn’t, it will always be “The stuff we have to do as well as our day job” and will be dropped at the earliest opportunity.

So, what exactly do we mean by Culture? Associated words and phrases….
• Way of life, customs, traditions
• Society, background, ethnicity
• Conduct, behaviour, habits, manner

Definitions……
• “…relating to the cultivation of the mind or manners especially through artistic or intellectual activity…”
• “… the norms and values that people live by…”
• “…unwritten rules that define what is expected of people and how they should behave…”
• “…the way we do things around here…”

And that leads us to our next question, what do we need to change the culture?

Firstly, we must begin to change the behaviour, values and beliefs of the leadership. To do this successfully requires skill in building rapport, influencing and sales, as the first step in any change of ANY kind is, DESIRE !

Then we need to find Change agents within an organisation who exhibit a “pioneering spirit”. We need to define a ‘picture’ and ‘feel’ of the desired future and plan a strategy and roadmap to make it happen.

Involve as many people as possible who will define it, create a plan and take the actions necessary for it to be realised. And finally, Effort, skill and patience.

What do we need to do to go about creating the desire, which will in turn allow us to begin to change the behaviour, values and beliefs of the leadership? Firstly, answer the following questions:

• Who has a need that I/we can & must satisfy? – either a business or a specific person
• Who do you know who is respected by the people you need to influence?
• Who do you know that you suspect might be respected by the people you need to influence?
• If you don’t know anyone then what research will you need to do to find out?
• What chains or links between people can you create?
• What value could you create for the person/people in the chain?

Ok, so we’ve covered what we need to do to make Change stick but to be honest, that’s the easy bit.

Now we get into HOW we go about changing the beliefs, behaviours and actions of the key people connected to the change programme. This can only be achieved by influencing, negotiating, demonstrating the benefits and getting the stakeholders to WANT to do things differently – Creating the DESIRE !

Some say these are the “Soft skills” or the “Fluffy stuff” or “People skills” and that some people have these as a natural ability but they can’t really be taught to people who don’t ‘Have it’.

That’s absolute garbage! This is an exact science, as exact a science as physics. It’s common name is …… SALES

Or, how we use these exact techniques to build solid relationships with high degrees of rapport and trust in order to get our stakeholders to actively want to exhibit the desired behaviours and actions that will in turn, shape the culture into one which embraces the changes introduced, as the new NORM.

This is too big a section to be covered extensively in this blog post but is covered in our black belt syllabus at http://www.beyondlean6sigma.com/programmes/black-belt/

Or, to really become an expert in this field, we run a 5 day consultancy masterclass, which covers the “People” side of Lean Six Sigma in great depth, get in touch with me.




If you enjoy reading my blogs, please take a look at my many other on-line resources,

Website, http://www.beyondlean6sigma.com/

Blog, http://leansixsigmauk.blogspot.co.uk/

Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/leansixsigmacert

Follow me on twitter, https://twitter.com/DrLeanSigma

I have also recently launched a new range of Lean Six Sigma on-line training courses which you can read about here, http://www.beyondlean6sigma.com/programmes/




#leansixsigma, #beyondlean, #leansixsigmacertification, #leansixsigmatraining lean six sigma, lean six sigma training, lean six sigma certification, lean six sigma