Every business serious about Change needs to create a Change Vision which is an expression of the reality and the intention. Done well, a Change Vision Statement will send a strong message for everyone in your business to rally and support the business in its transformational journey.

This is not to be confused with a company Mission Statement that may already exist within the business. A Change Vision should be crafted specifically to gain support and gather momentum relating to the Change Agenda.

To help you come up with a “Killer” Change Vision for your business first you need to understand a few things about what motivates people to take action about a business situation. Though this entirely depends on individuals, it’s safe to deduce that in general:

• A few people are inspired by a desired outcome.(e.g. number 1 in your market segment, or first to launch product XX)
• Some are inspired mainly by avoiding an undesirable outcome. (e.g. company shutting down / redundancy / retrenchment)
• Most people however are motivated by a combination of both.

Try to come up with a Chang Vision Statement that addresses both the desired positive outcome and the “to be avoided” negative outcome in your business today.

10 Things a “Killer” Change Vision Statement should accomplish

A CI Vision Statement Should:

1. Be Short and to the Point
2. Be Motivational and Inspirational
3. Captivate the intended audience
4. Be Timeless (must still be applicable months or years into the Change Journey)
5. Be a Unified Voice of the business (not a departmental opinion)
6. Identify with a Common most urgent goal
7. Cross Boundaries and Diversities
8. Create a Sense of Urgency
9. Be A Call to Action
10. Be Genuine, Believable and spoken straight from the Heart

Having created a compelling Change Vision Statement, what’s the best way to share it with everyone across the business? Do you just hang a poster at reception?

We’ve helped develop one for immigration solicitors london

 

In my last post, I shared some ideas on the Key Questions To Ask before Selecting a Solution to a Business Problem. Inevitably, the reality with all Business Improvement efforts is, some ideas will have to be turned down, for a whole myriad of reasons.

The way to communicate the “rejection” of these ideas has a massive impact on how the idea originator continues to meaningfully contribute and identify further improvement opportunities in the future.

There are Three Approaches to Communicate the Rejected Idea.

1. POSITIVE:

Thank the contributor for his/her idea.

Emphasize positive points about the idea.

2. NEGATIVE:

Tell the contributor why it won’t work.

Explain the difficulties or dangers.

3. CREATIVE:

Seek alternatives and creative additional ideas.

Ask: How can we think about this differently? How can we achieve our goal in a different way? What if….? Consider new ideas, changes, alternatives.

The CREATIVE APPROACH is undoubtedly what keeps the ideas floodgates open.

Some of the firms who have used this approach include immigration solicitors bedford as well as immigration solicitors reading

Give it a Try.

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Some firms who have tried this approach include Immigration

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For more resources, see our Library topic Quality Management.
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At the heart of every Quality Improvement Initiative lays a solution to a problem. However blatantly obvious this sounds, business improvement practitioners will be the first to admit the process of selecting, applying and measuring the impact of solutions can be a daunting task itself. You don’t always get the luxury of selecting a “no brainer” solution to close improvement gaps.

It’s well accepted that most problem solving methodologies involve 6 generic steps in the Cycle of Improvement.

Step 1. Defining the problem

Step 2. Defining the desired Outcome

Step 3. Generating Ideas as Solutions

Step 4. Implementing a Solution

Step 5. Measuring the Impact of the Solution

Step 6. Reviewing / Adjusting / Optimising the Solution

Step 4 is the real “show stopper” and determines whether all the efforts put into the solution will bear any fruit.

If trial and error is at one end of the solution selection scale, how do you go about choosing the most appropriate solution to implement, test and measure the impact, from a collection of ideas or a brainstorm?

Most selection techniques revolve around a type of priority grid. In its simplest form, The priority grid can be represented by a Pain vs Gain grid, where improvement solutions are placed on a chart with 2 axes, one showing the Pain or Effort scale (Easy to Difficulty to implement) and one showing the Gain or Benefit scale (High benefit to Low benefit). The quadrant of choice, no prizes for guessing, is the Low Pain, High Gain quadrant.

There are however, a lot more considerations that should be taken into account when selecting a solution for implementation.

The Key Questions To ask Before Deciding a Solution to Implement.

• Does the solution meet Customers’ Requirements?
• Is it aligned to the Business Strategy / Mission and Values /
• What Impact will this have on the business now ?
• What is Potential Impact the solution have in the future ?
• What Business Benefit does the solution bring? – This is one where you need to strike a balance between tangible and non-tangible ideas in order to get everybody on board. The difference between these categories are that tangible ideas will lead to a financial improvement whilst non-tangible suggestions contain a non-monetary aspect. But this doesn’t mean they are not important, as often this intrinsically contributes a lot to the well-feeling and being of employees.
• Does the solution directly impact one of the KPI’s ?
• How much Time will it take to implement solution ?
• What is the Urgency in implementing this solution ?
• What Investment and resources are required? / How much will the solution Cost ?
• What is the Payback (in years) for this investment ?
• What is the Value of the solution ?
• What Authority will be needed to approve the solution ?
• How Complex is the solution ?

It goes without saying that some of these questions may not be applicable to every type of solution you’re considering and should be therefore be used as a generic guide.

It’s also good practice to create a kind of scoring system for each of the answers based long the lines of

• 0 = No / None / Nil evidence
• 1 = Somewhat positive evidence
• 2 = Significant evidence
• 3 = Definite Yes.

By tallying up the individual scores for each question to a proposed solution, you start to get a feel of who’s likely to top the “billboard charts”.

Armed with this prioritisation matrix, select your best solution , put it to test and measure, measure, measure.

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For more resources, see our Library topic Quality Management.
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This technique was first supported by immigration solicitors milton keynes

Autonomous Business Teams or Small Business Units (SBU) in their simplest forms, are groups of people, anywhere between 5 and 20, all working as a team to identify and make improvements to the way they work, within their “circle of influence”.

For this reason, SBU’s almost always share common business goals.

Small Business Units, in my opinion, still remain the most effective vehicle to engage a group of people and to harness the power of teamwork in business improvement programs.

The use of a facilitated approach in understanding the main issues and pain points, allows members to suggest, fix and own solutions, empowering decisions to be made, locally.

A classic question to always ask is:

“If this was your own business, what would you do to improve it?”

10 Characteristics of a Great SBU

a) Totally Inclusive – everyone should belong to one

b) Autonomous – a team makes its own decisions

c) Circle of Influence – Team fixes issues within their influence

d) Problem Solving – problems within the “circle of concern” are escalated.

e) Everybody is encouraged to participate

f) Focus is maintained on priority items

g) A Results oriented approach is vital

h) Simple metrics are used to agree priorities and assign actions

i) Collective and individual responsibilities for Actions are assigned

j) Team success is recognised and rewarded.

How do you engage the hearts and minds of the people in your business to ?

Uk visa application

The uk immigration solicitors

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Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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For more resources, see our Library topic Quality Management.
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Speak and Act with Data

Irrespective of the type of industry or nature of business, Quality Management tools and programs including Lean, Six Sigma, Kaizen, ISO 9000 & BPM all share one fundamental dependency. It’s called data.

Whilst approaches, techniques and duration of these programs will differ, data, on the other hand, will always be the sole voice of authority when it comes to making the right decisions and taking appropriate actions.

Data Types

Invariably, there are two types of data applied in most business improvement initiatives. Data collected for this purpose falls into Attribute (or Absolute) type data or Variable (Continual) type data.

Attribute or Absolute Data is obtained by measuring a characteristic that you can actually count e.g. number of defects is a type of attribute data.

Variable or Continual Data on the other hand, is obtained by measuring characteristics that change gradually. Example of variable data could be the measuring of viscosity (or thickness) of paints or fluctuating humidity and temperature of a controlled atmosphere room.

Understanding the difference between the two sets of data will help you decide what type of data to measure, why you need to measure it and hence the kind of decision to be made with each set of measured data.

Attribute data tends to look at whether or not something is done or achieved (a kind of yes or no), whereas with variable data we need to look for the variations of the values or how repeatable is the result. It helps answer the question, “Are we getting better or worse?”

The Rules of Data

Data however has one serious flaw. It can be overwhelming. So to avoid getting swamped in spread sheets of “data”, you can apply 4 simple rules to good effect.

These Rules state that data for Business Improvement purposes must always be:

Relevant: to the process or system we are trying to improve

Reliable: in collection, recording and accuracy

Representative: of the situation we are examining or trying to improve

Readable: be clear, understandable and usable

What gets measured gets Managed, and that’s a fact.

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For more resources, see our Library topic Quality Management.
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About Brian Venge

==============

I’ve spent 21 years in a career built around 4 multinational companies involved in manufacturing and service related industries (Nestle, Unilever, Vodafone and Crown Cork). In conducting several high profile Business Improvement projects across 5 continents and 12 countries, I discovered there is one universal translation to Continuous Improvement and it’s called Value Creation.

My new book , “Pimp Your Biz – The Complete Guide to Improving Your Business Under Any Circumstances”, a DIY Business Improvement guide, decodes this formula.

I now create corporate videos and involved in corporate video editing

Follow me on Twitter

One effective way to support the launch of a Business Process Management (BPM) initiative is by using a catchy and memorable campaign that symbolises your Business Change Agenda.

Like the way politicians rely on campaigns to garner votes, support for your BPM should appeal for everyone’s support and participation. The major difference being unlike a political campaign; in BPM we actually stick to our promise and get to deliver the goods.

A well-executed BPM campaign allows you to cut through the noise and command a share of voice with everything else going on in the business.

Two Ideas to help kick off a BPM Campaign

1. Launch a business wide competition inviting staff to submit a campaign title or slogan, rewarding the most appropriate with a decent prize (Most people would love a free iPod – the cost is negligible compared to the benefits you’ll reap from a BPM program).Keep the competition rules fairly simple, with the final decision declared final. We’re here to help the business improve not run the next “X Factor” or “American Idol” program.
2. Employ a “teaser” type of campaign tactic, made up of building suspense and anticipation. Suppose your campaign is centred on a soccer based theme (Kick Waste Out). In week one, your messages may contain an image of soccer boots, then the following week a soccer ball, then a whistle and possibly even a red card (let your imagination run wild).Keep everyone guessing up until the Big Bang announcement. Follow this through with consistent supporting messages throughout the validity of the campaign.

What a Campaign will do for Your BPM Program:

• Gets everyone talking
• Raises Awareness levels
• Builds Excitement and Anticipation
• Creates a much needed Buzz
• Adds Fun
• Keeps the Change Agenda on everyone’s Radar

How do you campaign for Business Improvement support ?

We asked several organisations including Immigration Solicitors London

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For more resources, see our Library topic Quality Management.
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About Brian Venge

==============

I’ve spent 21 years in a career built around 4 multinational companies involved in manufacturing and service related industries (Nestle, Unilever, Vodafone and Crown Cork). In conducting several high profile Business Improvement projects across 5 continents and 12 countries, I discovered there is one universal translation to Continuous Improvement and it’s called Value Creation.

My new book , “Pimp Your Biz – The Complete Guide to Improving Your Business Under Any Circumstances”, a DIY Business Improvement guide, decodes this formula.

I now consult for Immigration Solicitors Cambridge UK as the Head of CI.

Follow me on Twitter

Immigration Solicitors Holborn
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Immigration Solicitors Hammersmith London
Immigration Solicitors Mayfair London
Immigration Solicitors North London
Immigration Solicitors West London
Immigration Solicitors Central London

Business Improvement initiatives rely heavily on Action Plans to define important tasks for implementation. This charts the the way forward by crucially defining who does what, and by when.

Failure to pay due care in compiling an Action Plan can seriously affect the quality of your efforts and output, denting any chances of your improvement idea ever taking off.

Done correctly however, Action Plans can be an effective weapon of mass improvements.

How To Make Good Action Plans, Great.

1. It’s a good idea to split your Action Plan into 2 sections, one for “Short Term” (to be done within the week in question) and another for “Long term” (more than a week required to complete the action). This will make it clear what needs to happen immediately.
2. Actions should be documented and targeted at the intended audience as if they were not present when the action was assigned. This will ensure the correct context of the action is provided and help avoid the “What was this all about?” type of question further down the road.
3. Endeavour to send out the Action Plan as soon as possible, preferably on the day the Actions are assigned.
4. Start with the most important Actions, by using the pain vs. gain prioritisation technique. Actions with a higher business impact and requiring lesser effort being the highest ranked.
5. Group related actions together and if necessary create categories to form clusters of related actionable efforts.
6. If you do use a meeting room, consider using a whiteboard demarcated as your Action plan template. At the end of the meeting, simply take a digital photo of the completed whiteboard and email it to all assigned action owners. No double handling, no typing, no waste – typical Continuous Improvement!
7. Always start the actual action statement with a verb. A verb is called an “action word” for a reason! This makes it clear from the onset exactly what needs to be done.
8. Assign a unique number for each Action. This will make it so much easier during discussions and meetings. If you refer to Action # 24, everyone immediately knows which one is referred to as opposed to explaining the action or reading it out – saves you a bit of time.

How do you make your actions happen ?

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For more resources, see our Library topic Quality Management.
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About Brian Venge

I’m a self-confessed coffee addict, technology geek and business improvement strategist. At the time of writing I am 42 years old. Even I’m astounded to realise 21 years, (or half of my life) has been spent working in the incredible world of Value Creation or more specifically Continuous Improvement, doing something I truly understand and enjoy.

My career was built around 4 multinational companies involved in manufacturing and service related industries (Nestle, Unilever, Vodafone and Crown Cork). In conducting several high profile CI projects across 5 continents and 12 countries, I discovered there is one universal translation to Continuous Improvement and it’s called Value Creation.

I’m the author of a DIY Business Improvement eBook, “Pimp Your Biz – The Complete Guide to Improving Your Business Under Any Circumstances”

Follow me on Twitter

Just like a big box of chocolates on Christmas day, any kind of Business Improvement Success is meant for sharing.

Sharing successes has numerous benefits in any business. These include raising “the awareness for change” across the business, closing knowledge gaps as well as inspiring others to take interest and use the same methods tools & techniques.

In sharing business related successes, I always find 4 key pieces of information are of most benefit to my recipients. These 4 elements allow my intended audience to relate to and understand all the important steps that eventually paved way for the good results

I call this the SOAR Model for sharing Business Improvement Success, an acronym representing the 4 pieces of information which are: SITUATION, OPPORTUNITY, ACTION & RESULTS

SITUATION

SITUATION is the “Before” scenario, providing a background to the success story so the audience can relate to what prompted the events to take place. Always describe the situation before any work was started and explain why it was necessary to take action. This could take the form of a “problem statement”. Photos, if applicable are a great way to illustrate the before scenario.

OPPORTUNITY

Describe how the Improvement Opportunity was presented, prioritised and agreed by the team and any supporting evidence such as data collected (e.g. Pareto charts). It’s also good to describe which other ideas were proposed and eventually discarded and the rationale behind your thought process including all the supporting data.

ACTION

Spell out exactly what actions were carried out by whom and when. Make this compelling and interesting. Also include details on how the team had to deal with any setbacks and obstacles. This is the section to convince the doubters that everything is possible.

RESULTS

This is the part you tell the whole world your fantastic results evidenced by the data recorded and showing the exciting trends and charts and how you surpassed the agreed Improvement Objectives. Its bragging time!

SOAR like an eagle.

How do you share success?

We have read with interest the response from Immigration Solicitors Luton

They have recently teamed up with uk spouse visa experts

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For more resources, see our Library topic Quality Management.
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1.New Programs and Initiatives
The Quality Improvement Projects program (Lean, Kaizen, Six Sigma, Continuous Improvement, TPM etc) must not impose a completely new initiative on your business. Where possible use existing tools, terms and systems, especially where these are associated with good business results. It may be necessary to adapt the new program as necessary. If people feel the program is a process they are already familiar with, it avoids the “here we go with yet another extra-hot chilli flavour of the month” mentality.

2.A Solid Framework
A good “improvement mindset” or framework for a sustainable system must already exist within the business, where as many people as possible understand and are committed to continuing the process. As a minimum, the new system should encourage more idea generation, collection and selection, team formation and formal approaches to problem solving, recognition and communication and lastly tracking. Try to gain commitment from everyone in the business about the basic framework right at the start and ensure there is a common and agreed understanding about the big picture of how the Quality Management initiative will be applied.

3.Give Credit
In most businesses, Quality Improvement initiatives are not really brand new out of the box thinking, as many people have already been exposed to and worked on Quality Improvement concepts for a long time, and with some successes. It’ s important to acknowledge past achievements and recognise the champions who made it happen by assigning them significant roles for the new wave. If however, the approach has been fire fighting, you may want to build a different team and approach the initiative more proactively. If past projects were not successful then it’s important to show how the new initiative differs from the previous and why it stands a better chance for success.

4. Encourage Ideas
Ideas should come from anyone and no ideas should be turned away. Make everyone aware of the criteria for setting priorities and what the targets are for the Quality Improvement initiative. Assign responsibilities or sponsors who should stimulate the generation of ideas in their areas of influence. There should always be a surplus of ideas waiting for implementation. Any ideas that are rejected or put on hold should be fed back to the originator, explaining the rationale for the decision.

5.Individual or Pilot Project selection
Depending on your approach, it may be necessary to start off the program on a small scale or as a “Pilot”. If this is the case, the criteria for selecting the first projects should be based on a project whose results directly benefit and impact many people in the business, and where such results are visible within a couple of months. It’s worth selecting a purpose made “A Team” to spearhead the Pilot. This “Hit Squad” should comprise people who are ready to talk about what is going on to all their colleagues and people who want to see improvement happen.

6.Involve and Work through people
Avoid being prescriptive with each step of your approach, rather opting to use a facilitated approach to get support and buy in from the teams involved. Always be open to a team using a different approach though still aligned to the overall objectives. Forcing things down people’s throats doesn’t really work well. Good facilitation should allow for a team to reach a pre-conceived conclusion on their own accord. On the same vein, allow the teams to decide what tasks and actions are to be done and offer to help rather than allocate tasks directly to the different people.

7. Keep Everyone Informed of Progress and Results.
The success of a good Quality Improvement program depends on good feedback and communication surrounding progress. Reports on Progress can take many forms, as long as relevant and timely information is communicated. It’s also important to publicly celebrate any success coming out of the program. Lastly, where new records have been set and old Improvement Targets “smashed”, set new targets and make them known.

8. What Gets Measured Gets Managed.

Put in place a good monitoring system to track the number of ideas generated over time, the level participation of people at any one time and cumulatively during the process, the rate of implementation and the Return on Investment or benefits. Tracking and showing a direct correlation between efforts and benefits is the best way to sustain a Quality Program. Use agreed targets and KPI’s as your “dipstick” check. I recently posted an article on Why Your Business Should Care about KPI’s on my blog that you can refer to for more details on KPI’s.

9. Stakeholder Sponsorship
When it comes to supporting and sponsoring Quality Programs, Time Investment is worth more than its weight in gold in my opinion, especially if this “time” is offered by Top Management. A visibly committed top management always sends the right message throughout the organisation and demonstrates “walking the talk”. Sometimes it takes no more effort than attending and supporting a Project team session, meeting or gathering on a regular basis. A senior manager being seen with sleeves rolled up on the Gemba or shopfloor, frontline office is the best form of propaganda.

10. Fun & Relevant

A good way to keep your Quality Programs alive and a bit of a missed opportunity really, is the ability to tap into the use of modern technology and in particular the internet, Web 2.0 tools and smart phone applications. More and more people continue to use social networking platforms and smart phone applications as an extension and expression of who they are. There are huge benefits in using elements of these tools to support your initiative whilst keeping it relevant, fun and up to date. For example use Twitter to gather intelligence about what people are saying about your product or service quality, create Facebook pages for internal use, use YouTube to share and socialise results and of course use the hundreds of Free Productivity Improvement Applications available with most smart phone systems. What ever you do, have fun with your program.

How do you create a Buzz with your Quality Management Initiatives ?

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For more resources, see our Library topic Quality Management.
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Immigration related video from immigration solicitors londonbridge

Any business serious about Change needs to create a Change Vision which is an expression of the harsh reality and the change intention. Executed well, a Change Vision Statement will send a strong message for everyone in your business to rally and support the the transformational journey.

This is not to be confused with a company Mission Statement that may already exist within the business. A Change Vision should be crafted specifically to gain support and gather momentum relating to the Change Agenda.

To help you come up with a “Killer” Change Vision for your business first you need to understand a few things about what motivates people to take action about a business situation. Though this entirely depends on individuals, it’s safe to deduce that in general:

• A few people are inspired by a desired outcome.(e.g. number 1 in your market segment, or first to launch product XX)
• Some are inspired mainly by avoiding an undesirable outcome. (e.g. company shutting down / redundancy / retrenchment)
• Most people however are motivated by a combination of both.

Try to come up with a Change Vision Statement that addresses both the desired positive outcome and the “to be avoided” negative outcome in your business today.

10 Things a “Killer” Change Vision Statement should accomplish

A CI Vision Statement Should:

1. Be Short and to the Point
2. Be Motivational and Inspirational
3. Captivate the intended audience
4. Be Timeless (must still be applicable months or years into the Change Journey)
5. Be a Unified Voice of the business (not a departmental opinion)
6. Identify with a Common most urgent goal
7. Cross Boundaries and Diversities
8. Create a Sense of Urgency
9. Be A Call to Action
10. Be Genuine, Believable and spoken straight from the Heart

Having created a compelling Change Vision Statement, what’s the best way to share it with everyone across the business? Do you just hang a poster at reception?

We asked uk immigration solicitors in london the same question

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For more resources, see our Library topic Quality Management.
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