Friday 29 January 2010

CLT will be discussing Systems Thinking, or Lean as some people call it on Monday. So I thought I'd share some my views on the subject with you today.

The big differentiator with systems thinking method is that it starts with obtaining knowledge about how your organisation is actually functioning. Other methods assume that the problem to be solved is known. But people working inside organisations often have a fragmented view of their work, unaware of how the complete system functions. They are also unlikely to have accurate data on the exact level of overall service their customers are receiving. These two factors mean that without better analysis the correct problem will not be identified.

People who have worked for many years in an organisation are naturally sceptical when it is suggested to them that they do not fully understand how their own business works or should work. It is this challenge to your assumptions about “good management” that is the hardest thing to accept. It is counter-intuitive, requiring leaders to experience it through normative learning first hand. You can’t lean this from reading.

The starting point is to assume that your organisation is full of waste. The need is to identify this waste so it can be removed. This removal of waste is how the apparently conflicting goals of cutting costs, improving service and having happier staff are achieved.

While there are many different types and flavours of management, the dominant model in the UK’s public sector can be termed ‘command and control’. This approach does work but it is inherently very wasteful. If you have spent your working life in a command and control environment you will probably assume there is no other way to manage. It then is logical for you to try to improve results by just being better at ‘command and control’. Unfortunately applying more of the same usually makes matters worse.

The key difference is that “command and control” organisations are driven from the top. A goal is set of say 3% cost reduction (Gershon Review, 2003) or of using IT to improve efficiency (Varney Review, 2006) and the organisation is obliged to respond to achieve the arbitrary target. The problem is that the target is set by people separate from the work and with no knowledge of how the work is carried out. Instead of engaging the workforce, a premium is placed on their compliance and how they perform against the target. This channels their ingenuity away from serving customers to achieving the target. The staff constantly look upwards for direction rather than outwards to their customers. This is the root cause of much bad service and low levels of innovation in the public sector.

Systems Thinking is a profoundly different way of seeing the world that is diametrically opposed to command and control, reductionist approaches to management. Seddon (2007) summarise it like this:


This systems thinking approach is continually developing, having evolved from over 20 years experience of interventions in the private sector and 10 years experience of public sector service organisations.

Organisations and people who become interested in systems thinking have discovered it to be a powerful method for radically transforming the way that they work. Many have found this journey to be the most stimulating experience of their careers.

Systems thinking can often seem controversial and uncomfortable as it challenges many of the core paradigms of management. This is because once a new way of seeing things that works has been learnt, it is impossible to accept management mythologies that have never delivered.

Thanks for reading. Have a good weekend and talk again next week,

Carlton.

Friday 22 January 2010

Now the snow has gone, our Highways Team have the challenge of fixing the numerous pot holes and other road defects that occur when water gets into the surface of the road and freezes - breaking open the road. There is a lot of poor press, both national and local at the moment with the condition of the UK roads. In Wiltshire, our four depots have filled at least 1,800 potholes in the last three days. This is a tremendous performance, and truly customer focused as we seek to address the issues caused by the bad weather. The Highways Team have been conducting a Systems Thinking or Lean review of this part of the service over the past year. The service has been redesigned against customer purpose and customer demand which has led to the elimination of waste and this incredible performance. Well done and thank you to the whole team!

As an organisation, we need to expand this approach to performance improvement and quickly move on with all services adopting a similar approach. It works very well, results in delighted customers and better performance and most importantly will deliver the cultural shift that we all want in our new organisation.

I met with around 50 staff from planning earlier this week to explain some of the detail around the Harmonisation Programme; that is the harmonisation of staff terms and conditions. It's always good to meet large groups of staff and hear the questions they have direct. I just want to reiterate that every member of staff will be having the opportunity to meet with their manager face to face, in their teams before February 10 to go through the details of this important work. If you don't know when your session is, please ask your managers quickly.

Thanks for reading. Have a good weekend and talk again next week.

Carlton

Friday 15 January 2010

Another snowy week but at least it appears to be going now. Well done to all our staff who have performed so valiantly; keeping roads open, schools open, vulnerable people supported in their homes; operating our call centres to the public, paying benefits and a thousand other key roles. It has been interesting and satisfying to see the press reaction to all of this. There seems to be a widely accepted view that the Council did a great job. Well done everybody.

I visited the Bradley Road Hub this week. It was a good turn out with about 12 managers present. First we discussed Team Wire, focusing on the harmonisation programme of terms and conditions. There are over 40 terms and conditions to harmonise so it's going to take most of this year to get to a negotiated recommendation that the organisation and unions can put to staff. All staff will be having a face-to-face team meeting with their managers over the next four weeks to discuss the details of the harmonisation programme and to address any questions or worries that staff may have. It's worth repeating here that this process affects all staff, even those that are currently on the old WCC terms and conditions, and it's also not about cost reduction. The pay bill is likely to increase due to harmonisation.

I spent the rest of the afternoon with the Revenues & Benefits "lean" team at Bradley Road. This teams comprises members from all four hubs. They are coming to the end of their review of Council Tax and will be presenting their findings and recommendations to senior management, including the members next month. I was very impressed by the enthusiasm and knowledge that the team had built up. Their radical recommendations on service redesign will deliver significant performance improvements to our customers and reduce our costs.

Thanks for reading. Have a good weekend and speak again next week.

Carlton

Friday 8 January 2010

Happy New Year. I hope that everybody had a good Christmas break and are back at work a little more relaxed than we finished last year. I had swine flu for the first half of the Christmas period which was an experience...

2010 has started with the weather dominating our business this week. I spent some time with the Customer Care team yesterday understanding our plans to cope with the number of calls coming into the business, and earlier in the week I visited Dave Small and his team at the Middlefield Learning Disability Centre in Chippenham. This is the centre that we plan to co-locate into the Chippenham leisure centre later this year. I have to say that I'm always blown away by the professionalism, tenacity and overall customer focus of our teams and staff. Both teams really bring to life the vision and ambition that we have for this new council. I know that with people like this on our side, we can achieve everything we need to this year and in the future.

January is always the time when we are finalising the budget for the next financial year. This years process has been the smoothest that I have known here in Wiltshire -well done Finance - and I'm pleased to report that we have a balanced budget which we will be reviewing with the Executive during the next few weeks. This is a great position to be in given the uncertainty nationally that we all hear and read about most days.

Thanks for reading and talk again next week.

Carlton