Quick Glance Case Study: Metrics

“Our Lean future state will result in significant financial and non-financial benefits, allowing us to provide a more effective service to our customers without the need for additional cost and resource” 

After completing a ChangeWise Lean Practitioner training course, one candidate submitted the following work-place project to gain their qualification to LCS Level 1c.

The Business Challenge

In order to justify and create business cases for various customer processes, our organisation collects vast amounts of data that is then analysed and distributed. Existing systems could not cope with the volume of data produced and therefore, could not store it. The data was essential for projects and the justification of strategic business cases.

A Lean review was required to ensure data was accurate, stored appropriately, produced efficiently and available when required.

Photo by Jan Antonin Kolar on Unsplash

Key people involved from client site

A strategy group including members of the Leadership Team and Process Owner Team were included in the Lean review.

Lean Methodology Employed

DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyse, Improve, Control)

Various Lean methodologies were employed including, SIPOC, Root Cause Analysis, Cause & Effect, Value and Non-Value Add Analysis, Waste Analysis, 5 Whys, FMEA, SECAR, Future State Mapping.

Lean Activities & Current State

Current State Process Maps were used to analyse the current state of the process and establish value adding, non-value adding and mandatory non-value adding steps.

Current state mapping revealed only  22.22% of the overall process created value:

• Data only collected from one trial; so not representative of overall market.
• Additional data from a second trial not stored anywhere within the business and therefore difficult to access.
• Data summarised and emailed by a 3rd party on a weekly basis. This was a summary of results and detailed data has to be requested on an ad-hoc basis.
• Detailed data not provided in a user-friendly format.
• The data summary received only provides a percentage of metrics gathered per month, over a 3-month period. Although this gives an indication of success, the results did not give a forecast or trends.
• A critical requirement of the data collection is to show that the data can be collected routinely and efficiently – this was not the case.
• Data volume was too large to be routinely sent, received and analysed to fit the business purpose.
• Limited access to raw data due to an inefficient request process.
• No storage of data within our organisation (access only via external request).
• Increased risk of errors due to lengthy process required to process and cleanse data before it could be used.
• Data not reported regularly due to current reporting method.

The team applied the 5 Whys technique to better understand both the CTQ (Critical to Quality) Metrics, and the root cause of issues.

Why do we need a solution?

We need to gather data from the trials to show results through analysis.

Why?

The analysis of the data proves the business justification if the results are positive.

Why?

The current reporting process does not allow analysis, just high-level outcomes.

Why?

High level results do not allow for data distribution and therefore further benefit analysis.

Why?

Further benefit analysis is required to justify and use within BAU and therefore submission of a business case.

Following the 5 Why’s exercise, we completed a Cause & Effect diagram to  further examine the issues and understand what other effects and gaps exist.

Benefits & Outcomes

The SECAR method was used to assist in the creation of a Lean Future State:

SIMPLIFY: Minimise manual intervention and allow filtered data selection as and when required. This will allow for specific data searching and selection and reduce lead time for data.

ELIMINATE: Remove human error and processing time when handling raw data prior to presentation and analysis. This acts as a level of quality assurance, enhancing the system and further reduces lead time.

COMBINE: Create a single data storage platform to centralise data from various sources. This allows for consistent source to locate data.

AUTOMATE: Remove data cleansing and processing so that required data can be viewed quickly and updated regularly to the platform. This acts as a level of quality assurance, enhancing the system and further reduces lead time.

RELOCATE: Bring the data storage in-house, this removes the need for data extraction requests from external contractors. This gives the customer more control of the data and quicker access when required.

Photo by Edu Lauton on Unsplash

In Summary

The Lean review has allowed us to remove wasteful process steps and create more value-add time to analyse data outputs. This has been achieved through removing the data transfer stages, automating the collection and formatting process steps, and bringing the process back in-house. Our Lean future state will result in significant financial and non-financial benefits, allowing us to provide a more effective service to our customers without the need for additional cost and resource.

Interested in looking at how Lean can help you do more with less? Contact us at info@changewise.co.uk and let’s talk about how we can help.

ChangeWise believes employee engagement is the foundation for successful Change. Training and coaching your people to use simple continuous improvement techniques will enable your organisation to continuously adapt and stay ahead in a constantly changing and challenging environment. 

For updates and interesting Lean Change insights, connect with us on LinkedIn.