Continuous Improvement

What is meant by continuous improvement?

The concept of continuous improvement comes from Lean Manufacturing and has an original, Japanese name of ‘Kaizen’ meaning "change for the better". Why Japanese? Well, much like Kanban, the origins of continuous improvement lie in the success of Lean / Kaizen methods employed by Japanese manufacturing and business.

Today, thousands of companies strive to identify areas for continuous improvement. Building a culture of lean thinking and continuous improvement allows you to better your product or workflows, track the progress of each improvement, and identify any bottlenecks.

How do you apply continuous improvement?

The four-step Plan, Do, Check, Act (PDCA) model is probably the most popular approach to organize and implement improvement efforts and build a continuous improvement culture. The model is a continuous feedback loop shown as a cycle because it is repeatable across the four stages:

1. Plan

Once you’ve recognized a problem in your product(s) or processes, you need to put a plan in place. What ideas do you have to improve it? How might that work? And what’s the desired outcome?

2. Do

Now is the time to try out your improvement ideas — you can test drive the improvements on a smaller, pilot project if it’s a wide-scale change you’re considering. Approaching the improvement as a trial helps you work out if it solves the problem in a low-risk way.

3. Check

Did your plan work? Have you achieved the desired outcome? If not, begin the cycle again.

4. Act

If your plan did work, roll out the changes beyond your pilot project.

What is continuous improvement in the workplace?

So far, we’ve spoken about the continuous improvement of products and processes, but this concept can be embraced across the entire business and in multiple departments too. 

In any typical workplace, there are unending opportunities to work smarter, more efficiently, to collaborate better, to be more customer-centric, and so on. Continuous improvement can also be used in the workplace to keep staff engaged — ask them what they think can be improved upon and then follow the PDCA model.

Synergy with Agile and Scrum

Agile

Continuous improvement is a key principle of Agile product management. It helps you streamline your product development process and reduce waste while still delivering value. Additionally, continuous improvement is a fantastic way to help you focus on critical tasks, updates, and features while reviewing how to best deliver value to your users. 

Scrum

Because Scrum focuses on delivering incremental improvements and integrating customer feedback quickly, it dovetails nicely with continuous improvement. 

Key Scrum elements, such as product backlog and sprint backlog, ensure that you focus only on the most important improvements. 

Alignment with business objectives

You can align continuous improvement strategies with your broader business objectives and goals. But how do you do it?

Review your business’s present state

Understanding the current state of your organization is essential for implementing continuous improvement. If you don’t know where you stand, it can be difficult to accurately identify opportunities, and team members may struggle to recognize why continuous improvement is so important. You need to evaluate your business structure, operational processes, workplace culture, and the systems you rely on. 

Define your vision

After reviewing the present state of your business, you should be able to determine the right vision for its future. What is the organization moving toward? What objectives must it hit, and what strategies will enable it to do that? Be clear when defining your vision — it should be simple enough for all team members to grasp. Ensure that your vision aligns with your business’s mission, too. 

Establish core business objectives

Consider the main objectives your business must achieve within a set period — five years is a good time frame to start with. Implementing a fixed end-point can help motivate teams more than setting a goal with a vague completion date. Objectives should be simple to remember, inspiring, and aligned with both your vision and overall mission. 

Set annual goals and determine how to track progress

Now that you know your main objectives, break them down into smaller goals that must be achieved within the next year. They must be practical and achievable. Additionally, you need to decide how you’ll measure the progress of your annual goals. Choose your Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) carefully to ensure they offer clear, useful insights.

Highlight all known improvement opportunities 

Establishing known improvement opportunities is vital for driving ahead with annual goals. Consider existing obstacles between you and achieving your goals, and what you’ll need to overcome them. 

Continuous improvement best practices

Here are just a few best practices to follow for continuous improvement success.

Consistent communication

Leaders should consistently communicate with team members, from discussing the annual goals to establishing strategies. Everyone should know what they’re working towards and how they can accomplish objectives. 

Track and validate benefits

Tracking and validating benefits is essential for assessing the value of continuous improvement. You can secure support for ongoing initiatives when you have provable, validated benefits. 

Know what metrics truly matter

Determine which KPIs are most relevant to your business and which allow you to continuously improve based on collected data. 

Brainstorm (and document) ideas for improvement

Welcome ideas for continuous improvement from all areas of your business. Encourage suggestions to make everyone feel they can play a key part in the process. And don’t forget to keep a record of these ideas so you can refer back to them later.

Build continuous improvement into daily processes

Make continuous improvement a part of every day work, whether that means offering incentives for achieving goals or inviting team members to discuss an improvement they’ve made in weekly meetings. 

Improve your CI process continuously

Assess the progress you achieve with your continuous improvement process and the value it brings to find ways to make it better. If you or your team members spot practical, valid opportunities to update your process, take advantage of them. 

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