10 days in May

image of calendar

Variety is the spice of life – even for a lean devotee like myself.

One of the things I value about my role at S A Partners is that every day is different!

Different clients, different locations, different cultures, different challenges, different improvement projects – but there are similarities………….

10 days in May proves this. Over a 10 day period I visited a fresh produce importer & grower, an abattoir, a waste water site – all in the UK – and a recycling plant in mainland Europe.
You would think that these clients and sites have very different needs – but actually some challenges and activities are very similar:

  • Building an accredited, sustainable internal capability to drive their Lean and CI programmes – Yellow, Green & Black Belts
  • The importance of consistent stakeholder engagement, management, visible commitment and strong communication across the organisation
  • Processing ‘goods’ and ‘services’ to meet a variety of customer needs (both internal and external customers).
  • Managing the variety, quality and delivery profile of supplier inputs and standards
  • Regulatory and environmental compliance.
  • ‘Life cycle management of equipment (or people!)
  • Workplace Organisation
  • Leadership development and coaching to develop the right behaviours for a CI environment
  • Improving safety and reducing risk
  • Aligning strategy and operations
  • Cross functional (or organisational) working and/or working with the supply chain
  • Performance management

People often say that their organisation is ‘unique’ – and they are right.

BUT – some of the ways organisations operate and can improve are often universally recognised – just applied in a contingent manner.