Lisa Kim’s back was starting to cramp up from how rigidly she was sitting in the office chair. She blamed her sister, Felicia Kim, entirely for her current predicament. All she wanted was a night out with her sister so she could complain about how poorly her marketing department was doing compared to the other departments within Kent Publishing House. She felt extremely exhausted, both mentally and physically, and she was looking for a chance to unwind to finally open up about it to someone.
The thing was, Lisa was finding more and more that the complexity of all the different job types and job routings her team were handling was becoming unmanageable. She could’ve gone to the other department managers for some advice but the sheer workload each department had made Lisa refuse to even consider the idea. What if the answers were simple and it was just taking me a bit of time to get there? She just needed to find some time to completely relax, and then focus in on the important tasks.
Lisa knew the worries circling in her head were a warning, but they were starting to dominate her thinking, and this was often completely unhelpful in solving the situation she was facing. To make it worse, finding any gaps for the downtime she wanted at such a crucial time for her company was impossible. So, she kept her lips firmly sealed and tried her best to push through. Adding to Lisa’s sense of pressure was that her role model and branch manager, Roy Bensen, was facing a huge workload and seemed able to remain in control of it all.
A key point of frustration for Lisa was that previous attempts to improve the flow through her department had unravelled. There had been too many moving parts, and this had created too many tensions.
Lisa believed it would be an act of failure if she didn’t produce some sort of improved solution before reaching out to Roy for help, which is why she needed her sister. She needed someone she trusted to tell her that she could do this, even if she didn’t necessarily know all the answers Lisa was seeking at the moment.
However, today, instead of venting her frustrations to her sister, she found herself sitting in front of Ms. Ada Wang, an expert consultant when it came to anything business, at least that’s what Felicia claimed.
“Good afternoon, Ms. Kim. How are we doing today?”
“Great.”
Lisa frowned at how choked her voice sounded. Surely, this wasn’t an entirely unsalvageable situation. She would listen to whatever Ada had to say and leave as soon as it was over with no plans of coming back. Ada’s eyes seemed to narrow in on her, just watching her for a minute which made Lisa try and sit up straighter than she already was.
“We’ll just go over the challenges you’ve been facing so I know what I’m dealing with. Think of this as sharing your troubles with a trusted friend. I assure you that I’ll do my best to assist you in any way.”
Lisa hesitated, picking her words carefully. “Our publishing house is one of the larger ones, and we have many products and many customers…”
“Go on,” prompted Ada.
“OK, I have been trying to stabilise and control the performance of my department for some time now. But inevitably, the changes I have made become blocked and non-scalable. Performance improves temporarily and then spins out of control. It’s driving me crazy. I need a solution that will stick and make a difference.”
“Would you like something to drink?” Ada interrupted.
“Pardon, sure. Just a glass of water will do.” Lisa replied, trying to relax. She kept repeating ‘this is Ada’s job’ repeatedly in her head to hopefully ease her into it. It wasn’t working.
Lisa watched as Ada pressed a button and asked her assistant to get her two glasses of water before she turned back to Lisa.
“Let’s change topics briefly. Tell me, do you have any reservations about this meeting, Ms. Kim?”
Lisa was not expecting that question, but when she continued to stare mutely at Ada, the other lady simply waited, her hands folded on top of one another on the desk in front of her.
“Uh…” Lisa started, before the sound of a door opening thankfully cut her off.
She took a sip of the ice-cold water that now sat before her and cleared her throat before trying again. She was hoping she didn’t have to participate in this meeting and that Ada would just give her a bunch of general tips and tricks before slamming down a paywall in front of her for access to more personal help. Lisa was not going to pay someone to tell her how to be a better manager.
“Well, I feel like this is a waste of time.” Lisa winced, not being able to hold back her sharp tongue, but Ada simply smiled and waved her hand, gesturing for her to go on. “A lot of the changes I need to implement are basically adopting stricter rules for my staff.”
“So, you believe the problem lies with your employees?”
“Yes,” Lisa replied, having no doubt about it. She just needed her people to be straight with her. To share their problems with her and let her help them instead of crashing and burning on their own.
“Hmm…” Ada hummed to herself. “Exactly what kind of problems are you facing with your employees?”
“Well, I’m in charge of the marketing department. We produce promotional content such as videos, posters, merchandise, you name it, for the authors that are licensed by us. Since I know all the authors licenced by our company and the upcoming sales events, my department is able to start work early on their promotional content, ensuring we have a reasonable time frame before the final publishing date to make any changes.
Unfortunately, even though we start early, we always seem to be delivering right on the deadline or a little late. And a lot of time and money is being wasted every time we have to reprint to accommodate last-minute update change requests. While I wish my employees would complete certain things on time, or early, I have had to increase the lead time to start even earlier so we can get the drafts prepared and accommodate whatever changes the other departments or the authors wish. But it is really not our fault as they keep asking us to make changes closer and closer to the due date. Either way, it seems like the more time we allow, for jobs, the more time the jobs need. It’s a little ridiculous really.”
Lisa took a huge sip of water as Ada hummed, nodding her head.
“On top of that, the many and varied demands we receive from the other departments are the main reason why my team members are being told to get started on tasks early. The more requests made the more disruption is caused. While I can manage this day by day, I do feel like I should rework my department’s processes before nitpicking on the others. The last thing I would want is to increase the tension within the company.”
“Anything else?” prompted Ada.
“Well, due to various interruptions, our flow of jobs is frequently interrupted. Once a job starts, we basically have low visibility and managers have to micromanage everything. The complexity is huge and rising. We struggle to differentiate and react promptly to our own jobs, and then we have jobs for other departments that need our inputs. There is never enough time to do it all. For example, another department might want a fast response from us for a revision of some promotional materials, but these interrupts are not necessarily something our system is optimised for.”
“Am I right in saying that you’re constantly being pulled back and forth from focusing on your department flow to focusing on the demands of other departments, who are trying to protect their flow?” Ada inquired, making Lisa raise her eyebrows in surprise.
“Absolutely! Our system is a myriad of processes. All these processes are necessary for us to ensure we deliver on the orders, but since my department is linked to the others, I’m really not sure if I should be focusing on improving my department’s processes, routings, and control systems, or reach out to the other managers to rework the processes we jointly follow. To make matters worse, our job routings are not easily understood, nor able to be scrutinised, and they tend to expand at every review to ensure every edge case is represented. More jobs equal more routings. It is becoming impossible.
Clearly, something needs to change so that we are all on the same page. I need to ensure my team members aren’t spending an exorbitant amount of time on any one job and that all the various jobs are finished within or before the set deadlines.” Lisa supplied.
Oh, Lisa thought. This is getting a little deep, is Ada following me?
Ada seized the opportunity to ask a probing question. “With so many jobs and their unique routings, how do you know where to focus your attention? Have you got control points you monitor that inform you what risks to pay attention to today?”
“That’s the problem, I don’t know. Most of the time we can’t agree on what and where to monitor. There are so many points of risk,” Lisa added. Good question, not what I expected, thought Lisa. Nobody has been able to grasp what I am saying before, let alone understand my problems so clearly. Lisa finally let a smile show and nodded along, now much more interested in what Ada might have to say.
“It’s not as though we never tried implementing any solutions before. It’s just that once we address one process and tweak it, we realise other issues that we had now become a huge problem. Sometimes, the solutions we suggest directly clash with the timelines set by other departments or slow down the work further. It feels like I just keep going around in circles, and the best I can offer my people when I give them their assignments is to ‘be quicker with this than the last time.’ I would like to reduce our lead times, but any talk of this is met with shocked disbelief or outrage. Apparently, it can’t be done.”
“Hmm, I can understand your frustration.” Ada hummed, looking sympathetic. Lisa needed to vent her thoughts out loud for someone to hear, and here was a person who seemed willing to listen and seemed to understand. I am at the point of being too burned out to continue functioning like a normal human, Lisa rationalised, and here’s an angel sent to her by her sister, willing to hear everything.
“Ada, there are many factors that affect our work processes, it has been hard to configure the system we follow to represent all our products. Especially when every change in the product mix brings about its own share of routing variations that further mess up any control system we put in place.”
“So…” Ada trailed off.
“So, it is often easier for the managers to micromanage and assign tasks to employees as problems arise. But this method consumes so much time that we are reacting late to the job risks that arise. We need a holistic solution that reveals the truth in real time and helps us focus correctly.”
Ada made a small noise of agreement before proposing a question. “Would you say that these difficulties are the main ones causing your department to fall behind the others, for your managers to find themselves out of control? And what about the increased costs from wasted resources, time, or money you’ll be experiencing from starting jobs so early? Is there anything else you’d like to cover before I start?”
Ah, this was the moment she’ll give me general tips and tricks on how to manage my department, Lisa thought to herself. It’s not as if Lisa herself hasn’t scoured the internet for hours on end trying to figure out different tactics to address her issues and have motivational talks with her employees. She promised Felicia she would give this meeting a chance and since she had nothing more to lose, why not hear what Ada Wang has to say?
“Yes, these are the main issues I am facing within my department.” Lisa nodded.
“Hmm, now, I do have a few suggestions on how to systematically reduce your risk exposure and improve the control you have over the jobs flowing into and through your department. And, I’d like to have more meetings with you in the future to keep track of your progress and assist you when the inevitable new issues crop up as you successfully resolve these issues for your department,” Ada began.
Of course, you do, Lisa thought to herself, but nodded again for Ada to continue, making her smile. Lisa couldn’t fault Ada for trying to acquire a new customer, and she was definitely more receptive to it now than she was when the meeting started. A part of Lisa hoped she would not have to pay to access more of Ada’s advice, but she had to admit to herself that she didn’t completely hate the idea either. I’ll give her a chance, thought Lisa.
“It has been my commercial experience that no system actually has hundreds of utterly unique product routings. Most product extensions are just that, a variant, or a change to an existing routing. Most of your routings will use in-common process, with the scale, the quantity, or the colour changing. Now, most people will see each product as different and not as a set of in-common processes, and as a result, they create system solution designs that have excessive complexity. Inevitably, this means to stay in control they implement many management control points, and micromanaging becomes the norm. No, first you should look for the in-common process steps. Seek to merge routings into in-common flows. Find out what your most used routings are and build from there.”
“Now Lisa, you know as well as I do that people will inflate the safety in their completion estimates. Most people think ‘A bit longer equals a bit safer.’ Stop doing that. Think in terms of system safety monitored at your control points, not, ‘Is this job late?’ rather ‘Is the system in control?’ Your system solution has to be buffered and predictive. Currently, it is reactive with safety being wasted through late starts, slow handovers, last-minute requests for artistic change, and the like. Your solution should put you in a position where you have a minimum, usually three to five, control points which reveal to you the in-progress overall system risk and any trending individual job risk.”
“This means choosing the right amount of safety to add, what I am calling your buffers, and to do that you’ll have to assess the frequency and magnitude of events that cause you lead time losses. As in, what will you treat as routine events to be protected against in your solution and what will be addressed as an exception?”
“Since you have to keep making changes to pre-made promotional materials, I propose you add chase-up processes to reveal likely change requests early. For example, if a poster for the release date of a book has been made, the next task would be to follow up on the draft and bring forward in time any changes they want to see so you get it approved as a ‘final.’ Make visible which drafts are still waiting on change request feedback and preserve the buffers. Following me so far, Lisa?”
“Yes, it will be a bit repetitive if we go back and forth, but I suppose being proactive on this is better than finding out at the last-minute and then being late.” Lisa agreed, whilst relaxing into the soft chair she was on for the first time since she stepped into this office.
“Of course, this also means that you will not be sending finalised work for any promotional material ahead of time. Instead, this will be a joint process with the other departments which will improve your joint ability to deliver on time.”
“Is it possible,” Lisa wondered, “It would address a major problem we’re facing which is that other departments frequently leave their artistic choices to the last minute, when they have known for days what will be necessary… yes this can work.”
Why didn’t I think of this? It seems so simple. Find what is in common in what we do, and really a lot of it is the same processes, figure out what we experience as the most frequent delays, and act to control the collective flow risks at these points! Mitigate the risks and protect the buffers. Got it. Lisa couldn’t help but look at Ada in wonder as her words sunk in.
In amusement, Lisa almost rolled her eyes at the thought of buying Felicia lunch for a week as she threw a barrage of ‘I told you so’s at her. This was worth a month’s worth of lunch if Lisa had anything to say about it, though she could do without the smugness.
“Remember, it is important to focus on the effect of a process and not its product-specific uniqueness. This will allow you to make a flow map of your operation, on to which you can design your control points and your buffers. It will also highlight where the other department risk plays a role in your department’s success. Having a tangible representation, like a schematic, will aid you in choosing and communicating your control points. You can use it to clarify with other department managers how your department affects their performance and vice versa.”
“So, make a flow chart? What did you call it? A schematic” Lisa asked, half-jokingly, but was hanging on to Ada’s every word.
“Well, that’s certainly one way to do it. You can map out the sequence of processes each routing takes and merge them together where they follow in-common processes. Think, how would you describe the transform of raw materials into finished goods on the flow chart? The same map can be used to track the progression of jobs that your employees are working on.” Ada smiled at the incredulous look on Lisa’s face.
“Don’t knock it till you try it!” Ada stated cheekily. “This addresses the main concerns you’re facing. These design principles will lead you to a solution that gives you increased control with less micromanagement.”
“Hang on, are you saying that this alternate view of my system will eliminate a good 80% of the micromanagement noise? Oh my, that would be heaven,” Lisa added, before looking at Ada with fresh eyes.
“Thank you so much, Ms. Ada!”
“You’re most welcome, Ms. Lisa.” Ada returned Lisa’s smile. “Remember, your management system is what you are reconfiguring. The focus should be on tweaking the system to cut through the noise and absorb the risks. This is the role of your control points.”
“There’s a lot to think about and do, but I’ll get started on it first thing Monday!”
“Of course. These suggestions address your main concerns. A caution though, as you succeed here, your people’s attention will shift to other complaints. That is a sign of success, not failure. Your solution should halve the pain and then halve it again. Very few people need a perfect solution. You need just enough solution that people stop worrying about the issues you had at the start of today’s session. I call it ‘Getting a better grade of problems to solve.’ Can I expect another meeting with you in the near future to discuss your progress?”
“You know what? I think you can definitely expect me back, Ms. Ada!” These were the first concrete pieces of advice Lisa had received about her situation and she was not about to lose what she had started to see as a breakthrough.
“We have three book releases coming up over the next month, how about we set our meeting about a month from now?” Lisa offered.
Ada was only too happy to comply.