Sharing is Caring - Leveraging Global Presence

There are many benefits to working in a global organization. While it may be difficult to navigate through the bureaucratic waters of a large corporation from a continuous improvement perspective, hidden underneath is a treasure trove of riches waiting to be tapped.

Large organizations often have several sites in several territories. Some may have specialized functions while others have like functions. It is easy to get overwhelmed dealing with the day-to-day activities and demands of continuous improvement for a single site. However, you should never forget to consider the potential scope for any changes being brought to the table. Sharing information between sites is the key to fast tracking success and leveraging global presence.

• Communication – The first step is to identify and create an open line of communication to any/all sister sites. Track down your counterparts in the organization and build a rapport with them as they will act as your proxies and gatekeepers to the other sites. This relationship is meant to be symbiotic, therefore you should expect to give as much as you get.

• Best Practices – Best practices are often accumulated through many years and iterations of processing. These may take the form of formal standard procedures or baked into the process through modifications to the environment, equipment or tools. Therefore, it is important for global organizations to share best practices in order to save on this learning curve and perhaps spur additional changes by inviting a new perspective. This is best applicable when comparing like processes, equipment, and workforce.

• Lessons Learned – As with successes, we should also share our failures. This gives other sites a chance to anticipate obstacles or offer their solutions. It is difficult for people to offer up information about normal processes unprompted. Using a Lessons Learned Report or a forum to discuss everyday challenges raises the visibility of these issues and gives other sites a chance to provide input on how to address them. Often these issues are not new and there may already be methods in place at other sites to rectify them.
  Also refer to a previous post about creating a Lessons Learned Report: HERE.

• Understand Limitations – Although it may be tempting and easy to just cut and paste procedures from one site to another, it is important to understand and keep site limitations in mind. There may actions that are regional/market specific or cultural differences in the workforce that make adopting some changes impractical or more challenging. Differences in organizational/reporting structure may also play a part.  

Discussion
How has expanding your network of communication helped you in Lean?