Hints and tips are HelpGov Ltd’s occasional ideas our clients and potential clients will find helpful in improving the performance of their organisation. If you want to know more about any of the thinking lying behind these ideas please contact us. Watch out for regular new hints and tips.
The human aspects of continuous improvement
The most popular post on our HelpGov blog has been our summary of what we have learnt (and teach) about
the human aspects of continuous improvement, that people deliver the best customer service
when they are fulfilled at work, that they are most fulfilled when they are
empowered to make the key decisions about their own work - see What we believe, how we work.
We charted our learning in this area
through the stories of six wonderful people whose working
lives were transformed by being opened up to the power of properly implemented continuous
improvement.
Their experience teaches that people
must be at the heart of continuous improvement.
If they are not it will fail.
- Leadership from the top is critical – without it, thorough-going
transformation through continuous improvement
is just not possible
- The customer is king (and queen) – often challenging for people in the
public sector
- Get the basic principles right – there’s no single blueprint
for continuous improvement and you must do what works for your organisation. But you must get the fundamental principles right
- Get the culture right – leaders must understand the
right behaviour throughout their organisation is essential to
achieving the improvements they knew are needed
- Involve everyone – the people who do the work
are the best to improve it (with help and support)
- Understand all work flows step by step in processes
and use the right tools and techniques to improve how it’s done
- Get some early wins under your belt – it's not
about low hanging fruit but proving early on that the
approach increases efficiency and improves customer service
- Support, support, support – make sure your experts (we
prefer the idea of facilitators) are supporters not a tribe apart.
Finally, remember the
good stuff is never easy and
it’s a never-ending journey.
Read a fuller version of these lessons on our blog
and click through from there to the six individual tales, from Dave the chief
executive to Jeannie the mail room supervisor.
Wising up to Twitter - how are UK councils doing?
The answer's a distinctly mixed picture, as our latest report shows.
Not everyone's up to speed with what Twitter really is or its significance for councils. The full report explains (in plain English) and shows how some councils are using this short messaging web site effectively (or not).
The key messages?
- Councils should be using Twitter but only when they’ve
understood it and know what they want to achieve with it
- Twitter doesn’t need
major resources to use but the right people do need to be involved
- There’s a big
difference between using Twitter badly and using it effectively – find out how
- Don’t hide your light under a bushel (many do) – publicise your Twitter account
- Use more than one Twitter account if you want to but make sure you
know it’s happening
- Make sure you learn the lessons from what people ask and
tell you on Twitter
- Allow your staff to access Twitter – what message does
it send if you tweet but don’t let them read it?
Read the full report here.
10 keys to sustainable improvement
If you want to use lean or systems thinking as a way (it’s the way) to generate sustainable improvement in your organisation make sure you understand 10 things.
Work is a system
The purpose of the system is to meet the needs of customers- Anything that does not add value for customers should be eliminated
- Work flows through the system from suppliers through the organisation to customers
- Flow can be expressed in processes, which should be made as efficient as possible
- All unwanted variation should be eliminated in the delivery of services
- Use all the relevant tools and techniques that are available
- The people who do the work are the best to improve it because they know it best
- The role of managers and leaders is to enable improvement in the system
- Be self-aware.
Contact us to find out how we can help you understand these fundamental principles. Applying them will ensure you provide excellent services to your customers and save money.
Online business networking - some things you should know
After the Facebooks and the Bebos came online business networking, most prolifically in the guise of the Linkedin® website – an unbelievable 60 million people worldwide setting up a profile to market themselves to the other 59,999,999.
Nothing wrong with that – in fact everything right. Talented individuals associating themselves with the organisation they work for as well as setting out their skills and work history. Except…
…there’s also the capacity to set up a profile of the organisation they work for. And unless you take control of your own organisational profile on the site you may find:
In brief, you could be sold short! Read what you can do about it in our document library.