Today, organizational culture is a top concern for many business leaders. This is because they have realized that to sustain growth and remain competitive, a culture in line with the strategic objectives is necessary. Financial results are significant, of course, but getting to the next level depends on building a high-performance environment in which innovation can thrive.

Team members may be able to talk about how they experience the culture. Of course, the experience of individuals is essential, but what defines culture is the patterns of behavioral norms in an organization. 

Long-term business survival requires constantly re-assessing and improving business processes. Continuous process improvement allows for businesses to become more agile, efficient, and innovative. Continuous improvement is one of the common traits of successful modern companies.

Six Sigma and Lean manufacturing are business methodologies focused on improving the quality of goods or services an organization produces by reducing variance in the production process. Leaders know that when a production process lacks the stability to create high-quality output consistently, it will continue producing defective products until someone intervenes and improves the process. Reducing variation requires constant monitoring and measurement as systems tend to erode if not kept in check.

Over the years, Six Sigma and Lean practitioners have developed a set of workplace organization techniques and tools that address control, problem-solving, and improvement to eliminate defects and waste. Here are a few of the most essential.

Quality management programs are often associated with large organizations, such as automotive manufacturing or large healthcare systems. These organizations often have teams dedicated to quality control, and they may leverage specific business process methodologies such as Lean or Six Sigma. While that level of sophistication may not be possible or even necessary for your business, there are still many continuous quality improvement tools that are easy to implement and can have an enormous impact on your organization, no matter its size.

Some of the following tools have been borrowed from Total Quality Management, Lean, and the Toyota production system. Still, they can be used independently of these methodologies to accelerate improvement in any organization.

Company culture is what makes one organization different from the next. The team's shared values, goals, and expectations contribute to a thriving organizational culture. Leaders who are dedicated to continuous improvement make it the cornerstone of their organization's culture.

The 5S technique is part of a broader set of management practices known as visual management or visual control. Although these tools are often used by organizations that employ Lean management or the Toyota Production System, they can be used by any organization seeking to optimize workspaces and processes. 5S can be implemented without technology to support it, but our clients have found that the digital approach can smooth the process and amplify the results.

Listen to this post or subscribe to the podcast!

Most leaders will agree that a culture of accountability and ownership is essential if the goal is to achieve operational excellence. Unfortunately, many organizations don’t take the steps necessary to build accountability into the day-to-day practices of individuals at every level. Like everything else that has to do with organizational culture, accountability will not happen by accident. The good news is that leaders can take some simple yet powerful steps to bake in a sense of responsibility and positive engagement. 

I joined KaiNexus because I was looking for a fresh start and to learn more about the technology side of Customer Success. After beginning my career as an elementary school teacher, I spent several years working in Client Services within an education company. It quickly became apparent to me that this company could have achieved so much more had it had the needed tools to work with. At KaiNexus, I am able to help other companies work towards their goals more quickly and efficiently. And in doing so, I have grown professionally and advanced my own goals.

When leading a Lean transformation, a consultant’s most important job is to help plant and grow a culture of continuous improvement in an organization.

Planting a seed takes careful nurturing and dedication to actually grow the plant. Once a plant starts growing, it can't be abandoned. A plant gives warning signs if it is in trouble. If a plant starts to brown, it might need more sunlight. If the plant starts to wilt, it might need more water.

Speaking with many consultants, I find that one of their biggest worries is that when they finish an engagement, they will come back a few months later to find that plant that they worked so hard to grow is wilted and dying.

An improvement culture cannot be created with a “drop and grow” approach; it needs careful maintenance to grow strong. However, it isn’t easy to measure the health of an improvement culture with spreadsheets or SharePoint files. While a plant gives warning signs in multiple ways, a spreadsheet does not. The only way to know if a culture is failing is that the spreadsheet won’t get filled out.

Listen to this Post or Subscribe to the Podcast:

For consultants, bringing a continuous improvement software platform into their repertoire gives them the ability to conduct health checks on their clients without even being in the building. Software keeps track of due dates, engagement, and participation rates, giving consultants and improvement leaders added tools to keep growing their culture.

Specific boards and reporting capabilities partnered with powerful filtering features within continuous improvement software give the ability to see not just an entire organization, but to dive down into specific department or location levels.

Three types of metrics will give you and your client insight into the health of improvement culture: activity metrics, engagement metrics, and impact metrics.

Long before COVID-19 disrupted everyday life across the globe, the shift to a more distributed, flexible, and agile workforce was well underway. In 2019, more than 4.3 million Americans worked from home at least part-time. Virtual work has grown by 115% in the last decade. The pandemic transformed remote work from an option to a requirement for millions of more workers overnight.