Nov 7 2018
Where Problem-Solving Goes Wrong | Gregg Stocker | Lessons in Lean
“[…] Whenever someone asks for input on a problem-solving A3, I tend to look for the red flags or areas in each section where help is most commonly needed. The key is to help people understand that the process is about investigating, reflecting, and learning, not filling in the form. It is far too common, especially early in a person’s development, to force-fit information into the boxes just to appease someone else and show that the process was followed. […]”
Sourced through Lessons in Lean
Michel Baudin‘s comments: Companies use forms to make teams answer every question. Filling out forms, however, often degenerates into the formalism Gregg describes. Instead of reviewing content, managers just check that the team has entered something in every box.
Gregg also says nothing about immediate countermeasures to “stop the bleeding.” Assume, for example, that customers start returning defectives. The first step is to prevent more defectives from escaping. Meanwhile, you investigate root causes, implement permanent solutions, and validate them. The point of the process is to go beyond immediate countermeasures and dismantle them once they are no longer useful.
November 8, 2018 @ 6:02 pm
I absolutely agree, Michel. You can lose a lot of money and customers if you don’t stop the bleeding first. I’ve found this to be less of a problem for people than looking for and addressing the root cause. Many people think of the immediate countermeasures as problem-solving, thereby never removing the immediate (and often costly) countermeasures or the root cause.
December 30, 2018 @ 9:09 am
Improvement is definitely about taking action, whether short term (countermeasure) or long term (to address deep causes). The same applies to another post from Michel following his discussion with Cecile Roche “Vade retro Pareto”. In both cases we could refer to paralysis by analysis and also the fallacies of “visual” management (showing things that please your eyes but lead to no action).
Overanalyzing without taking countermeasures is like taking blood samples from a patient in the Emergency Room, doing nothing and knowing the next day why he died.