All out civil war. Not quite what I had mind when we began an internal best practice exchange exercise. But here we are with my shopfloor and back office in a turf war over Six Sigma.
The story began last March. We decided to beef up our CI programme with some formal Six Sigma training. We are a tier II supplier to major aerospace manufacturers so raising quality standards is critical.
Around 30 of our operators were trained up as Six Sigma yellow and greenbelts. Over the summer, all began Six Sigma projects to reduce variation in the aerostructure components made at the plant and their work resulted in a stunning £400,000 saving.
The senior management team wanted to take the success into our back office. So we decided to run an exchange between the shopfloor and support functions. Both parties spent time in the other’s area and were asked to present feedback. That was when things took a turn for the worse.
A team leader got up and began to lambast the way the sales office ran. Chief complaints were that paperwork had backed up when a line manager was off on holiday as only they could sign it off. He’d witnessed colleagues sitting arms length apart exchanging multiple emails to make a decision instead of talking one another. And he’d sat in on an ambling two hour minute meeting. Summing up, the team leader said that if his line ran to like this then we’d be lucky to make a single product by next Christmas.
Retaliation was swift as the sales manager described the factory as ‘cultish’ with strange squiggles on boards and ritualistic behaviour. She said the Six Sigma might work down there but it would fail in the more sophisticated surrounds of an office.
We had to restrain a couple of employees at that point as the cat calling began. We seem to have brought out the worst of old rivalries out. I know Six Sigma can work beyond the factory floor but how do I get the office guys on side?
CI solution Jane Seddon, chair of Six Sigma training provider, Process Management International, gives the expert view
Firstly, congratulations on your £400,000 savings. You’re entitled to be pleased with this achievement. I recognize the euphoria there must have been and the idea that the Six Sigma approaches could be valuable in non-production areas is absolutely sound. However, the effects of your strategy to spread the benefits I’m afraid, will take a lot of unravelling.
I think that your troubles are rooted in the theories we often hold how we respond in the change environment. My guess is that the work place exchange you describe, was viewed less as an opportunity to learn from each other and more as a manipulative, judgement exercise. When you add to that, latent tension between operations and support functions you provided the perfect opportunity to surface lurking discontents.
Perhaps the enthusiasm following the successes made us forget that the best way to understand the effect of this exercise was to consider how we ourselves might have responded in the same circumstances. Given that you now have distrust and defensiveness, your effort to spread the improvement mind-set is severely hampered. So, what to do now?
Critically you must carefully look at the issue and re-think your assumption that your aim is to ‘get the office guys on side’ with Six Sigma. Six Sigma compliance was a problematic aim before the conflict and it certainly should not be the aim now. Your number one priority now is alignment. Alignment towards a higher business purpose and on the way, if this is done well, a cultural metamorphosis.
The good news is that you do have passion and energy in the business albeit currently towards a negative end. The task now is to harness this energy towards a positive end.
The bad news is that this will be virtually impossible to bring about by the internal continuous improvement team. You and your colleagues are implicated in the situation and you have to be part of the healing process.
Actually, situations like this are not uncommon and in my 20 years of helping organisations to improve systemically, I have helped groups came through such conflict. And although, it takes careful and compassionate facilitation, the outcomes are some of the most rewarding and effective I have experienced in the business improvement domain.
Harnessing and redirecting the current negative energy and feelings towards building an improved business we genuinely want to work in, is the key to going forward. Rather than a setback, such exercises can create a stimulus for the business to re-energise.
So my advice is to resist the temptation to persuade people to change their minds. Engage the senior leaders in a thorough analysis of this situation and enable them to support the remedy outlined. Anything less, I’m sad to say could result in a loss to the business that makes £400,000 looks like ‘small change’.
