Informal Learning

Informal learning is becoming much more of a factor in workplace learning as the digital age progresses and yet the benefits of face to face knowledge transfer remains important.

More and more people expect and need to be able to find the information they want, when they want it and in a format that makes it accessable. We are being constantly bombarded by information in many forms and that means that it is important to find ways to have that information filtered to make it able to be accessed.

As a learning organisation we understand the value of inofrmal learning and minimise the time that is spent in a formal learning situation for several reasons.

1. Formal learning isn't the most effective way for most people to learn. Especially in a Manufacturing context many people are Kinestheic learners. They like to get their hands on things and try them out so get a feel for how they work and what value they have.
2. Trainers are not the only people possessing knowledge. One of the fundamentals of lean manufacturing is an understanding that everyone has knowledge and understanding to contribute. Action learning projects allow trainers to support learning in the workplace where others can also contribute.
   
3. Informal learning can be cost effective and available on demand if managed. Due to it's cost formal training usually requires a group of learners to be assembled which usually means that some are waiting for information they want and others are in a class they don't yet see a need for.
   

An interesting site I stumbled across has a couple of quizzes looking at informal learning. Not in the manufacturing context but interesting anyway I think.

Informal Learning

I found it interesting seeing some of the options laid out the way they have. SIRF Roundtables are certainly a valuable form of informal learning and we are working to see how we can add more value with other information and collaboration tools.

Benchmarking study of Australian Management

A reserch project has just been released by the Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research benchmarks management practices in Australian manufacturing firms against the global best. The project was undertaken by a research team from the University of Technology Sydney, Macquarie Graduate School of Management and the Society of Knowledge Economics, and is part of a world-wide study led by the London School of Economics, Stanford University and McKinsey & Co. The findings suggest that while some of our firms are as good as any in the world, we still have a substantial ‘tail’ of firms that are mediocre, especially in their approach to people management.

This is a key differentiating factor between Australia and better performing, more innovative countries.

The research also finds that there is a clear link between the quality of management – scored across 18 dimensions of people, performance and operations – and enterprise productivity.

Link to the report

The report finds that the quality of managment has a measurable impact on labour productivity as will as sales and the number of employees in firms.

As a result, a single point increase in the management score – a measurement derived from the 18 management characteristics in our scoring grid – is associated with an increase in output equivalent to a 56% increase in the labour force or a 44% increase in invested capital.

The report goes on to list a number of key findings including:

• Flexible people management is shown to be a key element of successful management, and well-managed firms tend also to exhibit superior innovation capabilities
• High management scores are positively correlated with various measures of success including: sales, productivity, employee numbers and market valuation
• Just as in other countries, Australian management tends to overrate its own performance against the benchmarks
• While the findings relate to manufacturing firms, there are implications also for services-based firms and organisations, which reflect their growing significance in the economy.

It appears from the study that many Australian enterprises are stronger in operations management than people management. While they are able to link employee performance with clearly defined accountability and rewards, they lag in their deployment of advanced people management practices.

These include attracting, developing and retaining talent, and identifying innovative but practical ways of developing human capital to improve performance and add value to organisations. To improve, Australian managers must give more attention to building their people management skills and the relationships within their organisations

The report is worth a look. I'm particularily interested to see that it includes not just the adoption of Lean Manufacturing but also the the rationale for the adoption as two of the 18 management dementions.

The dimentions are grouped into 3 areas.

• Are we good at managing the operations of our business?
• Do we mange business targets proactively?
• Are we good at managing the talent of your people?

How well would the leaders in your business rate?

The LEAN Rt competitive manufacturing program covers these three areas so get in contact if you'd like to talk about us helping you to implement lean manufacturing and lift the management performance in your business.

Productivity Places Program

2009/10 Productivity Places Program for Existing Workers
Lean Leader Certification Program
SIRF Roundtables has put in a funding application for the latest round of South Australian Productivity Places funding. Our application is to run a Lean Leader Certification Program incorporating Recognition of Prior Learning where appropriate and a series of targeted workshops to extend skills and knowledge. The participants when qualified will be awarded a valued certificate IV in Competitive Manufacturing based on Lean manufacturing managment principals and tools such as Visual Management, 5S Workplace organisation and Root Cause Analysis. This program is designed for people with a level of existing skill in these areas. Our Recognition of Prior Learning process will assess existing skills and then be followed by a series of on-site workshops and tailored projects to overcome any skills gaps identified in the upfront assessment process.
Potential Participants The Certificate IV in Competitive Manufacturing qualification is designed for leaders in all areas of Manufacturing: Team leaders in operations, reliability, quality, supply chain or support Supervisors in operations, reliability, quality, supply chain or support Managers in operations, reliability, quality, supply chain or support Continuous Improvement and 6 Sigma specialists Criteria Normal traineeship funding criteria do not apply. Participants will be eligible for funding if they: Work more than 1 hour a week Reside in South Australia Have an existing level of understanding of lean/competitive manufacturing principals and tools Cost Due to the funding under the PPP program the Lean Leader certification program is available at a nominal cost of $400 per person. The workshops will be hosted on-site so the cost of morning tea/lunch should also be considered. –
	NOTE: The PPP program is designed to recognise current competence and provide gap training. SIRF Roundtables and LEAN Rt also delivers Competitive Manufacturing training as a part of a full business improvement program which supplements training with Implementation Coaching with training to assist businesses in the early stages of implementing lean/competitive manufacturing. This training program is cost neutral as it is fully government funded for eligible trainees.

Understanding the 6 Human Needs

Leaders need to be aware of the basic human needs that we all have. Awareness of your own helps you as you naviagate your career and also helps to understand what is going on with the people you are leading and why they don't always behave in logical ways.

If you are having difficulty with the adoption of your improvement innitiatives then consider if the basic needs of the people working for you are being met. The thing to understand is that our needs are not black and white or off and on. We need them all to a certain extent but each individual has a different level of need and they can vary at different times in our lives.

For example if you are having difficulties in your family life and there is a lot of uncertainty about the future then you will probably have a higher need for certainty at work to help compensate.

Then you have people like my Aunty Marj and Uncle Arthur who despite their names have a low need for certainty. They are in their late 60's and are backpacking through Iceland, Russa and most of the rest of europe for two months. They don't speak the language and have only their first night of accommodation booked.

Let's look at the needs in a bit more detail.

Certainty

We all like to have a degree of certainty in our lives and change programs can have an impact on the degreee of certainty that people have, espcially if they feel the change is imposed upon them. This leads to push back and reverting to the old " tried and true" methods even if they are a step backwards.

Strategy

Find ways to put more certainty into the new way of doing things

• work with the people impacted on a detailed plan
• negotiate the new way as a trial that will only continue if it is a better way
• make it comparitivly more certain than doing nothing - highlighting the danges of sitting still (dangerous if you don't get this right as it may just increase anxiety levels overall)
• take it a step at a time so people have time to adjust
• establish or maintain routines as much as you can

Variety

Often your top performers and most creative and innovative people will have a high need for varity. If they don't get that need met they will leave. These people regard certainty as being boring and like to live on the edge. They make great change agents but need to be mindful of other peoples needs as they will often get frustrated if the pace of change isn't fast enough for them.

Strategy

Find ways to provide variety in their jobs

• engage them as continuous improvement champions but ensure that there is a robust PDCA or other loop closing methodology otherwise they will leave a trail of loose ends behind them
• don't try to keep them in one job role even if they are excellent at it, provide a development pathway that lets them to get lots of variety.
• ensure that they can engage with cross functional teams such as RCA investigation teams or Green Teams to help break up routine and make use of their creativity

Love and Connection

This refers the the sense of belonging of being part of a group. People with a strong need for love and connection are generally great team players. They will be aware of the needs of others and go out of their way to help. They will also often have a lot of difficulty with performance management and frank conversations with others if they are not doing the correct thing and are much happier to look the other way. Often team leaders who have been promoted from a team struggle with the loss of connection in their new role.

Strategy

Find ways for discipline to be maintained without people feeling that they will be alienated

• Establish a visual performance management system to make it easier to talk about performance
• Focus on team performance and make expectations of team members very clear
• Provide ways for team leaders to have peer group connections to replace the team connections when they step up into their new role

Significance

We all want to be seen as special in some way and to be noticed as individuals. We can come to resent it and feel unappreciated if we are never singled out for recognition. The challenge with this is that different people have different ways that they want to be recognised. Some love to be the centre of attention where others would rather die than to walk up the front of a group of people to accept a reward or certificate. This is why it is so important that leaders walk the floor so that you can spot the right behaviours and give someone a quiet word or acknowledgment or even just greet people by name.

Strategy

Find ways to make sure that people know that their individual efforts are recognised

• Have a reward and recognition scheme but beware paying cash or large prizes is a very difficult thing to get right and can be demotivating if you don't
• Have social events like a monthly BBQ or other activity where people can talk
• Get managment out into the factory and learn peoples names
• Provide an opportunty for peoples improvement efforts to be recognised - a Kaizen board, report to management or in the internal newsletter

Growth and Contribution

The needs to grow and contribute can be extremely powerful if the basic needs are being met. However if people are feeling under threat or unappreciated then the growth and contributio needs are suppressed and it's every man or woman for themselves.

In a way the culture of an organisation is developed by how well peoples individual needs are met. If people feel secure and have enough variety to make the work interesting, there are inclusive teams and they are recognised for their efforts then you are likely to find that they are interested in learning new things and are willing to contribute beyone the minimum of what they are paid for.

Strategy

Support your people to grow - Toyota says "You can't grow your business without growing your people." and make it easy for them to contribute.

• Have an improvement suggestion scheme and make sure that there is rapid feedback to the individual for all suggestions. You don't have to implement every suggestion, people don't expect that but they do expect their suggestions to be acknowledged and if not able to be implemented they want to know why.
• Have a career path available to people so they know what they need to do to grow within your organisation
• Involve everyone in continuous improvement so that everybody, everyday have the opportunity to contribute to improving the business.

What else are you doing within your organisation to make sure that your people are getting their basic human needs met?

Visit the LEAN Rt website www.sirfrt.com.au/lean for more information about implementing lean competitive manufacturing