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Quick Glance Case Study: Processing Centre Checks

“The new Lean health check process will allow a significant increase in improvement opportunities, ensure we are focused on the right assignments, and support the team in identifying issues early on – before they become expensive and resource intensive”

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

A health check process has been completed at one of our processing centres in the public sector for a number of years. The aim was to collect data on the on-site assets and processes in order to enable optimisation and efficiency saving schemes that can be completed at the site.

In recent months, there had been a noticeable reduction in the number and quality of the health checks completed.

Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash

An end-to-end Lean review was required to assess the health check process, including the value added to the business.

Key people involved from client site

Employees responsible for processing the health checks, along with the resolution team responsible for following-up on outputs and issues identified were involved in the review.

Lean Methodology Employed

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

The candidate completed a full Lean review of the end-to-end current state process.

Various Lean methodologies were employed, specifically Gemba Walks, Value Stream Mapping, Value and Non-Value Add Analysis, 7 Wastes, Gap Analysis, Root Cause Analysis, Cause and Effect diagrams, Poke Yoke and FMEA.

Key Current State Findings

Gemba walks conducted with the team identified various wastes, including overproduction, over processing, defects, inventory and waiting:

  • From 35 possible opportunities identified in a cycle, only 2 opportunities were being taken forward
  • 39% of completed health checks had data quality issues
  • A further 6% of health checks completed were not used due to being unreadable
  • Stakeholders were experiencing end customer issues as a direct result of the health check process
  • Duplication of effort between data collection team, processing team and those completing the health checks

Photo by Med Badr Chemmaoui on Unsplash

Benefits and Outcomes

Various Lean techniques were applied, including brainstorming, root cause analysis and cause and effect methods. This enabled the team to achieve some quick, simple wins:

  • Substitute: Simplification of the health check form to ensure only value-add data is collected
  • Combine: Creation of a single, common form for all health checks
  • Adapt: Removal of unnecessary data processing steps
  • Modify/Magnify: Target specific processes in more detail to gather all information needed to work up opportunities
  • Purpose: Ensure feedback loop so that end-to-end team can see improvement suggestions – and also understand why some suggestions are rejected
  • Eliminate: Reduction of form length – remove non-value add elements and any non-value-add processing steps.
  • Reverse/Rearrange: Review improvement identification process to ensure we are targeting best opportunities
  • Solution: Health Check Lite
  • Poke Yoke: Computerise forms to remove data errors and over processing from hand-written forms
  • FMEA: Identify sites to have health check completed at instead of allowing teams to choose sites based on their relative risk, opportunity and value profiles

In Summary

In addition to a number of efficiency and cost improvements, the predicted benefits of Health Check Lite include a maximum 250% to 1000% increase in time input and a potential saving of 10% across included sites. This will increase the volume of opportunities identified, ensure we are focused on the right improvements, and support the team in identifying issues early on – before they become expensive and resource intensive.

Interested in looking at how you can increase your bottom line and improve customer experience though embedding a culture of continuous improvement? 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.

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