A reminder first.
We are establishing a maintenance work planning system at an intensive farming operation. The purpose of the system is to bring to the surface common things that are making planning maintenance work difficult. We’re not trying to improve the work; we’re trying to improve the plan. The reason the work currently seems hard to plan is because ‘things’ get in the way of the planned work.
Last week I spent three days on site. Every day I met with the maintenance leader and also observed the 15 minute end of day meeting. Here’s a series of happenings that underpinned the notion of ‘work with people to accept the change’.
- All along I encouraged the leader to ‘just follow the daily agenda, you will get the outcome if you do that’. (The agenda is about ½ a page, 6 or 7 actions.) The leader is about mid-fifties, very hands on. Standing in front of a group referring to ‘notes’ IS NOT his thing. Yet every day he did that. What was this saying to this team? “Yes, I’m in this too. I’m feeling a bit uncomfortable, just as you are in responding.” The maintenance leader did need to be careful with his language. Initially he tended to say “how did your day go?” I encouraged him to refer to the individuals plan for the day then ask “how did you go against that plan?” This is a much more direct question and importantly refers to the plan which is the focus of the exercise.
- They measure the Percent Planned Complete (from the ‘I’s and ‘O’s in the picture). One of the longer serving maintenance guys (natural leader, well respected) when explaining to the younger 2IC who was nervous about getting a ‘bad score’ said (unprompted) “PPC is not about good or bad, it is about what we’re learning”. Perfect!
- The same natural leader asked about a task that took a lot less time than planned. I asked why did that happen? His answer was “everything went really well”. This took our discussion straight back to a major point in the mid Feb update – the planned quantity of work must be based on nothing getting in the way otherwise the things that get in the way will remain ‘invisible’. Embracing this without any detrimental words or body language when the plan is not met is absolutely vital. It will build trust.
- ‘I’ = task completed as planned, ‘O’ means not so. The maintenance leader occasionally implied in his choice of words, more so his body language, that ‘I’ was good and ‘O’ was bad. We discussed that ‘O’ is to be celebrated because it immediately requires the next question of ‘what interrupted the plan?’ Answering that question then ultimately removing obstacles to the plan being achieved is why we’re doing all this. Encourage the ‘O’s to come out.
- We provided a template for the weekly board and agendas (daily and weekly). The natural leader said “we’re de Oscar’ising it”. Absolutely, without diminishing the principles.
On my third day the natural leader said “We’re getting used to it”. They’re getting used to it by doing it, we rarely ask for more than that.
Trust will I’m sure be a critical factor in further evolution of this system with this intensive farming maintenance group. And as it evolves and planning becomes more effective, trust will increase.