Rapid Process Improvement
A mission statement
or quote about the
firm.
or quote about the
firm.
ProjectTraining.com
| Providing Project Management and Process Improvement Training for over 20 years |
3-day Workshop
Crow Development Corporation uses a highly interactive, fact-based approach to
process re-engineering. This approach utilizes the strengths of the organization's
members to analyze, design, and implement significant improvements in the
work processes of the organization. Underlying our approach is an assumption
that virtually every process contains waste - activities that do not directly add value
to the organization’s customers. Finding and eliminating as much of this waste
as possible is the goal.
The Rapid Process Improvement model we use is based on the simple idea that
the people best suited to improve the way work is done are the people who do the
work. With this in mind, a typical Rapid Improvement Workshop is usually
presented to a group of employees - from all levels of the organization - who have
intimate knowledge of the process, its inputs and its outputs.
In order to begin, agreement is needed from the entire Senior Management Team
regarding the purpose and goals for the initiative. Specific, measurable, targets
for improvement are developed. These commonly include targets for
improvements in cost, schedule, and quality. These targets are used at the end of
the engagement to determine whether the desired improvements have been
achieved.
While each workshop is custom-designed for the organization where it will be
presented and the issues it will address, a typical short-version workshop follows
this general pattern:
Day One:
Day Two:
Day Three:
Follow-up:
In the weeks following a workshop, there is follow-up work that needs to be done.
The process needs to be implemented and monitored. This usually includes fine
tuning the process, cleaning up the documentation, measuring progress toward
goals, etc.
In these workshops, we don’t do the work for the client; we show them how to do
it more effectively and efficiently whether participants are senior or middle
managers, supervisors or front-line associates. And, speaking of front-line
associates, we believe that the knowledge, ideas, and energy of the workforce are
a vast, untapped resource for improvement. We can show how to combine top-
down direction with bottom-up initiative to make huge improvements.
Crow Development Corporation uses a highly interactive, fact-based approach to
process re-engineering. This approach utilizes the strengths of the organization's
members to analyze, design, and implement significant improvements in the
work processes of the organization. Underlying our approach is an assumption
that virtually every process contains waste - activities that do not directly add value
to the organization’s customers. Finding and eliminating as much of this waste
as possible is the goal.
The Rapid Process Improvement model we use is based on the simple idea that
the people best suited to improve the way work is done are the people who do the
work. With this in mind, a typical Rapid Improvement Workshop is usually
presented to a group of employees - from all levels of the organization - who have
intimate knowledge of the process, its inputs and its outputs.
In order to begin, agreement is needed from the entire Senior Management Team
regarding the purpose and goals for the initiative. Specific, measurable, targets
for improvement are developed. These commonly include targets for
improvements in cost, schedule, and quality. These targets are used at the end of
the engagement to determine whether the desired improvements have been
achieved.
While each workshop is custom-designed for the organization where it will be
presented and the issues it will address, a typical short-version workshop follows
this general pattern:
Day One:
- Introductions
- Review of purpose and goals
- Education on basic improvement concepts and team dynamics
- Development of an “as is” map of the current process
- Education modules on waste, continuous-flow, and the “value stream” to
the customer - A simulation is used to show how significant improvements can be made
Day Two:
- Education modules on process improvement, now using the candidate
process as an example - The large group sub-divides into small groups to work on development of
a “vision” of the improved process. This “vision” is not a process design.
Rather, it is a set of specific characteristics (quality, speed, cost, etc.) that
the new process will have. - Sub-teams address specific areas of the process
- Integration meetings occur as needed where the sub-teams come
together to share progress, ideas, discoveries and, to get and give
feedback
Day Three:
- Sub-teams continue to develop the process in more detail
- By day’s end, the basic structure of the improved process is in place. This
usually includes:
- The steps in the process
- The work inputs to each step
- Detailed descriptions of the work done at each step
- The tools, guidelines, forms, templates, etc. necessary to do the
work - The skills needed to do the work
- The outputs from each step
- Estimates of the time required to complete each step
- This information is captured on a very large wall chart. If available,
a documentation team is used to translate the wall charts into a
working document. The goal is to develop sufficient information to
allow the improved process to be implemented immediately.
- Final “bugs” are worked out of the process
- General “test cases” are used to check the process
- A presentation of the results of the workshop is developed for presentation
to management
Follow-up:
In the weeks following a workshop, there is follow-up work that needs to be done.
The process needs to be implemented and monitored. This usually includes fine
tuning the process, cleaning up the documentation, measuring progress toward
goals, etc.
In these workshops, we don’t do the work for the client; we show them how to do
it more effectively and efficiently whether participants are senior or middle
managers, supervisors or front-line associates. And, speaking of front-line
associates, we believe that the knowledge, ideas, and energy of the workforce are
a vast, untapped resource for improvement. We can show how to combine top-
down direction with bottom-up initiative to make huge improvements.
"The Crow
Development folks
helped us clean up our
new product
development process
and cut our
development time
almost in half. We also
ended up with much
better visibility or
what's in our project
portfolio (we cut the
number of projects in
process by over 70%
as a result of their
development of
criteria to help us
determine which
projects actually had a
possible profitable
outcome) and we’re
making much better
utilization of our
limited resources on
high-priority projects."
Ed Gillespie
Vice-President of
New Product
Development,
Danaher Tool
Group
Gastonia, North
Carolina
Development folks
helped us clean up our
new product
development process
and cut our
development time
almost in half. We also
ended up with much
better visibility or
what's in our project
portfolio (we cut the
number of projects in
process by over 70%
as a result of their
development of
criteria to help us
determine which
projects actually had a
possible profitable
outcome) and we’re
making much better
utilization of our
limited resources on
high-priority projects."
Ed Gillespie
Vice-President of
New Product
Development,
Danaher Tool
Group
Gastonia, North
Carolina
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