Theory of Constraints Handbook - James Cox Iii [702]
It has been my experience that by the time we get through this process, most of the resistance to change has been overcome and the client has ownership of the solution.
However, in this case we had some additional reservations. As mentioned before, Norris had a history of adversarial relations between management and the union and there was an awful lot of distrust. There was also distrust between Norris and AOT. We decided that our normal approach would not work because information flows through relationships and those relationships were clogged with numerous erroneous negative assumptions. So, while the physical constraint was heat treat, the real constraint that made it a complex system was mindsets/relationships within and across plants. We needed somehow to add learning experiences that would suffice to break through the distrust issue.
What We Did to Implement the Change
Relationships, purpose (includes processes that achieve purpose), and information flow form culture, and the existing culture at Norris needed a change.
We considered the most important part of this particular implementation to be the selection, nurturing, and guiding of the implementation team. We also figured we had one shot to get it right.
To get a cross-functional team of those directly involved in forging, we figuratively went to the forges and walked outward, touching those we met. We met:
Operators
Mechanics
Production foremen
Maintenance foremen
Process improvement engineers
Schedulers
With a list of possibilities of team members, we sat down with upper management and human resources and selected a Norris implementation team of 15 people. Things we considered were:
Formal and informal leaders
Union representation
Folks from each shift
People with positive attitudes
Once the team was selected, education began. Process and technical education included a typical 2-day synchronous flow workshop and a 1-day hands-on workshop on Lean. The knowledge we hoped to transfer included:
The concept of constraints
The issue of protective capacity
The relationship among capacity, dependency, variability, and inventory
The strategic location of a constraint
Ideas and tools (such as setup reduction) to gain “cheap and free” capacity
TOC measures, such as Throughput, Inventory, and Operating Expense
Other appropriate operations measures.
The leadership/relationship education and experience included:
Individual assessments of behavior, values, and skills relative to projects, systems, and people
A one-on-one session with an executive coach to review the assessments
A 2-day communications workshop
The knowledge we hoped to transfer in this 2-day workshop was:
Each individual of the team to better understand themselves and how their style affected others. This knowledge gives the individual the choice to adapt their behavior in order to improve information flow (remember that culture thing).
Get to know their fellow workers/managers better to begin to build relationships based on respect and trust.
The team was now ready to head for Canada.
“Oh Canada”
Can you imagine the logistics of taking a team of workers to Canada, many of whom had never left Oklahoma? Just getting passports in a timely manner was an ordeal. I would like to pause here for a second and have us ponder the support given this project by Dover management. Some executives may have rationalized that they could have gotten the same results without the expense of sending the team to Canada. Dover executives had the wisdom to realize that this was a significant event that would send a powerful message to both companies.
AOT did a wonderful job of hosting the visit. In addition to plant tours and briefings, the joint Canadian and U.S. team had lots of food and entertainment together. The Norris team observed and participated in forging setups and other operations events. The visit accomplished:
1. A deeper appreciation by the Norris team for AOT accomplishments with respect to