Summary: Lean and "So, what do we do next?" - Part 1 These Lean-Agile principles all seem reasonable, but abstract. What do we do to put it into practice? The problem of thrashing It has been one of those years this last month. Snow, holidays, and hospitals conspired to put me behind. So I have gotten really far behind and am slowly digging myself out. I suppose you could say to me, “Physician, heal thyself!” because I have gotten caught up in the multi-tasking / thrashing trap that we are going to talk about today. Has that ever happened to you? Where you have so much going on, so many tasks clamoring for your attention that you don’t know where to turn next? I think I am a good multi-tasker, so I was amazed at how behind I got. I decided to adopt the Lean-Agile technique of doing more by doing less at one time. My throughput has improved, even if it means I have not gotten some things – such as the blog and podcast – done according to schedule. Well, last week was spent working on a new content management system, based on Drupal. It is part of our knowledge management efforts here at Net Objectives. My prototype is done (and I’d be happy to share with you what I learned). We should get back to a weekly schedule on the podcasts soon. OK. So, what do we do now? I held this interview just after a challenging Lean-Agile Overview class that Alan had had. Midway through, the students seemed restless or frustrated. One of those times where you know you are just not getting through to them, that something is blocking the students’ ability to hear what you have to say. That happens sometimes and when it is a crowd of managers in the room, you know that no amount of pushing through the material is going to help. Taking a cue from the lean thinking principle to “stop the line” when something is going wrong, Alan Shalloway decided that the best thing was to stop the class and see what was going on. The feeling of relief was tangible. They were only too happy to vent. “We understand these lean concepts: eliminate waste, decrease cycle time, doing just enough, voice of the customer. The concepts make sense. So, tell us, what are we supposed to do?” What sort of practical advice does lean offer me to start improving our processes? That is the question that every manager has. The principles of lean thinking seem obvious, general, and abstract. Putting them into practice is not so obvious. Help me make the connection. There are a couple of ways to answer this question. The easy answer would be to hire me as a consultant and do whatever I tell you. But the better answer is to use this as an opportunity to learn lean thinking, to take on the eyes of lean. I wanted the students to learn to think honestly about the root causes that create limits to productivity. To learn to look for delays. And then to start using some simple tools that can help you remove bottlenecks in as smart a way as you can. And finally, to learn not to be afraid of starting where you can to make small improvements every day. Think about root causes Alan’s first answer to the question, “so, what do we do now” is to make the connection between the problems of delay you are seeing and the root causes for those problems. Organizational silos and thrashing are two primary types of root causes for delay. Thrashing is caused by multi-tasking, often brought on by having too many projects going on at once or having projects that are too large and complex. A “Bold Claim”: Do more by doing less at one time We see organizational silos and thrashing in one form or another in so many software development groups we talk to. Alan echoes a bold claim made by Mary and Tom Poppendieck that the best way to get out of thrashing, to improve your throughput when your pipeline is overfull is to stop trying to do so much at one time. As an organization and as an individual, you are better off focusing on one (or two) things at once, get them done, and then move on to the next thing. Having fewer projects
