The VP over the Model Line and I had the pleasure of hosting Jon Miller, a friend and Sensei from Gemba Research join us for a Gemba walk this last Monday. If managed correctly having regular site visits can be a valuable opportunity to recognize staff and gain feedback from an outside set of eyes. In this case we were able to achieve both objectives and hopefully added some value for Jon as well.

We started out with our standard process of providing a high level overview of our journey as an organization thus far as well as a more detailed discussion of our objectives and tactics with the Model Line. We then spent two hours on the floor where we visited two different teams as part of the VP’s standard work on gemba walks. It was a great opportunity for me to get back out on the floor with the VP and witness firsthand how far he and his organization had developed. Almost a year ago we began the process of gemba walking and neither of us had a clue what we were doing, but we went out any way and did our best (with support from our Sensei). During the early walks the VP was always uncomfortable with both being in the gemba and attempting to teach and the teams were uncomfortable with him being there. By the time I was redeployed he had come a long way and the teams were responding very positively. This Monday he showed how much he had advanced since then. I had to stop and reflect that here is a VP over 650 employees who has made it his number one priority to teach all of his employees PDCA thinking. He has mastered the content and gained their confidence and the results are speaking for themselves. How foreign to traditional management, yet, how powerful.

At the conclusion of the visit we gathered for a debrief and exchanged ideas and feedback. I was impressed by how much Jon was able to pick up during the brief exchanges we had with team. He pointed out that the VP needed to provide a standard for each team in advance so that they could hold him accountable to his process. In other words, the VP needed to practice what he was out to teach and share with teams his purpose and process and then have them evaluate if he was able to hit his intended outcome. Additionally, Jon pointed out that the teams seemed ready for a suggestion system and that we should benchmark Toyota to understand their processes around empowering employees to PDCA their work. Both great ideas that we will move forward with implementing.

Its always fun to have friends come to the Gemba!