Every organization struggles with continuous or performance improvement. With reduced staffs and everyone wearing multiple hats, time just seems to fly by. It seems like only yesterday we were remembering the first anniversary of September 11.
Consider these suggested changes as you ponder what you can do to take your organization to a higher level of performance:
- Commit to holding monthly all-employee meetings. These one-hour meetings can go a long way toward helping improve communications, stressing key expectations, reviewing performance trends, and identifying possible improvements.
- Redesign all training courses to consist mostly of practice. Lecture-based training carries little value. If you want to jump the curve in the training domain, try redesigning courses to be practice-based.
- “What’s in it for me?” Give people a short line of sight between their efforts and rewards. You’ll help show each person that individual contributions make a difference.
- Improve your leadership development process. All leaders need regular behavior- and task-based feedback to improve.
- Begin setting up an intranet for your facility or work group. By setting up basic Web pages and workstations where pages can be viewed, you can reach a lot more people with company needs, performance trends, and plans.
- Create a personal plan for improvement. Help your staff go through a similar exercise. Personal improvement is the driver of team and organization improvement.
Significant, fundamental change won’t happen without system changes that are equally significant. I wish you the best in the coming year. IBI
