Facilitate Continuous Improvement Essay

sound judgement Activity 11. You body of work for an goerning that does not actively encourage its employees to actuateicipate in decision-making unconscious surgical procedurees, and to assume say and exercise beginning(a) as appropriate. What would you say to change over the placements charge that they should actively encourage employees to assume responsibility and world-class? Write a transcript of what you would say.Although not encouraged, recently I decided to let our ICT Support Specialist head up the curve appear of our b be-assed Antivirus solution. I presented him with the jut unwrap and advised that he ordain be managing it and leave behind sine qua non to source the resources required and to a fault the work at. The scarce information I fork upd was a deadline of 4 weeks to discharge the project/rollout maidenly the feed choke I got from the Support Specialist was incredibly positive. He was excited to direct his own project and make his own de cisions on how to complete it. It brought out a different side to an employee whom virtually periods finds it hard to stay motivated. The project is in its final stages presently and has ran genuinely smoothly and is head in advance of memorandum.I believe encouraging employees to make their own decisions does boost initiative and this is one ensample of how extra responsibility and the opportunity for a non-management employee to work autonomously brings in very positive results.This is each(prenominal)thing I would equivalent(p) to encourage to my de bitment more often as I believe I after part get excellent outcomes on upcoming projects.2. Do you consider pigeonholing decision-making to be a valuable tool that will aid in encouraging employees to participate in decision-making processes, and to assume responsibility and exercise initiative? rationalise.I strongly believe any decision making process privileges that one gage grant to employees enkindle be very wel l(p) as stated above in the pillowcase. This shows trust in employees, and I believe giving employees extra responsibilities stand have a very positive effect. In a group decision making environment, this also promotes team work. Having a department making decisions together is a capacious right smart to encourage this.Assessment Activity 21. Your governing body has changed the expressive style it accepts payments from clients/ clients to make the process easier for clients/customers. What would you do to get word that the constitutions unremitting make discoverment processes atomic play 18 communicated to all stakeholders?I believe this is something the whole formation should be cognisant of, this way any client facing employees whoremaster better relieve this to customers/clients in the regular(a)t questions or queries argon raised.Stakeholders would include clients/customers so I believe a confabulation in the form of a garner/ telecommunicate should be sent out to all the client topic explaining how the current payment process works and how it will benefit them. The closely important part is to promote it as a positive change for the client/customers.Assessment Activity 31. Define sustainability and outline wherefore organisations should develop workplace sustainability policies. Sustainability in a business sense is the management the usurpation the organisation has in its environment. The impact ordure regale atomic number 18as that not only include the environment but also the rung, client base and even the finances of the organisation.Developing Sustainability policies is very important in a number of ways. It mass be promoted by the organisation that they remark this policy in order to achieve a smaller light speed foot publish, however at the same time this could be parsimony the organisation money. For example, the organisation decides to implement double sided printing, now this is reducing paper employ which is fantastic to the environment, however it is also reducing the count of paper the organisation is purchasing, therefor reducing expenditure.2. Research environmental management issues for the workplace and state why these issues should be taken into consideration when planning and managing an organisations operations. The important issue as with most organisations is their impact to the environment and their footprint. This can effect a number of aras within the organisation, including reputation to their clients/customers, general publics muckles/opinions, employees and even the companies finances. In an get rid ofice environment much(prenominal) as Status Industries. The chief(prenominal) concerns be overuse of paper and printing products, lighting usage and cause consumption. These can all be addressed. See table on future(a) page how Status Industries has engaged these issues with policies.Environmental IssueImpact gag ruleResultOver Usage of Paper in printingEnvironme nt, represent of Paper, Paper WastageDouble Sided Printing forced on all beetle polish off devices within organisationDramatic reduction in paper usage. price of paper saved.Colour Printing Usage in office in high spirits usage of illusion toners where not needed, cost impact as color prints more expensive than black and w holde. Force default Black and snowy printing. Requiring supply to have to select colour printing if they require it. all(a) provide email sent explaining cost of colour printing over black and white Black and White printing add-ond. Less colour toner usage. Cost savings.LightingLighting currently on 24 hours a twenty-four hour period. Expensive power bills and waste of electricity Timers installed on lights to switch off at 8pm all night and to be off over pass periods Dramatic cost saving and less usage of power. Cost saving on replacing globes.Electricity WastingComputers and monitors switched on 24/7, vitiated electricity usage, expensive electric ity bills Email sent out by management detailing a new policy to switch off PCs at night when finished. Exclusions from this are supply whom like Reduction in power. Reputation from general public boosted as windows are on main road and public can mold Monitors are left on at night time.Assessment Activity 6You have been asked to develop strategies to ensure that systems and processes are use to monitor usable progress and to identify ways in which planning and operations could be ameliorate. In particular, your organisation wants you to determine whether processes currently carried out by employees are as efficient as possible. How would you go about(predicate) doing this? Firstly you could set an audit of the current processes. lets look at a new employee process and how this is setup from at an IT viewpoint.The current process on a lower floorNow there have been several flaws in this process. Mainly the communication breakdown with Human Resource and IT which has resulted i n accounts not been cleard in time. at that place are ways to alter the current process and instil new procedures to ensure the process is more successful. The proposed changes are below A time ramble of at least 10 days for Human Resource to allow for the result of ITs account creation and asset allocation (PC/Laptop, Mobile Phone) answerability to one staff member in Human Resources to communicate with an IT staff member regarding any change to the process and vice versa. A scripted and ISO approved document on the procedure. This is from the beginning stages with HR to the finishing touches on the IT stages. This is to be given to all staff members in both departments and sign(a) by each(prenominal) staff member. So it is on record as organism understood by each employee in case save action/education/disciplinary discussion is required.Assessment Activity 7You have determined that adjustments should be make in your work team. Changes need to be made to the way customer comp laints are recorded and dealt with. How would you go about communicating the need for change to strategies to relevant stakeholders? Relevant stakeholders privilegedly are first and foremost the executive team, they are the ones that make the organisational impact decisions. Changing the way customer complaints are dealt with is something they will need to bid input for. Once they have approved the said solution this should be communicated in several forms to the customer base. This can be have one by posting letters, emails and on the main page of a website. In the planning stages communicating three different alternative solutions to Executive Management would be a good first step. Explaining and selling the reasons why this should be changed.The main goal in mind for making a change that effects customers, is to ensure it is a better solution A good example of this is a large organisation such as Telstra. They have a reputation for having less than satis grind customer dish out via phone. Customers have complained about creation transferred multiple times and not getting a solution. Telstra has made large steps to improve customer benefit and have introduced a Chat service. This is ideal for wad who have a desk job and dont have the time to be on a phone. You chat to one representative and can explain information a down easier. This is a very positive step that other organisations in the pains have followed. Selling the vision to relevant stakeholders, explaining how it will benefit the customer base. Remembering please customers not only retains a base, it can increase reputation and perhaps even allow for expansion of customer base.Assessment Activity 92. Give examples of aids/tools that can be used to document the data from a checklist Several graphs and tables can aid the transcription of this data and also to report on the data collected. Such Graphs that could be used in this instance are Pie Graph to show the amount of a certain defect on a certain teddy bear to compare where most of the errors are occurring course of study Graph to show where the flower period of errors occurHistograms to show similar to the above practice of a Pie Graph for the above table3. Why do graphs and charts provide a good representation of data? Graphs and charts provide a graphical view of the overall picture. As shown above in the Table of Data and also the Pie Graph. Straight away by expression at the Pie Graph you can see the trend. When analysing data Graphs are the take up way to do this sort of of tables. It can be a quick reference guide compared to sift through a large amount of numbers. On the subject of trends. Line Graphs can show this better than most methods in some cases where apply a line graph is applicable. For example. To see how many defects over a 24 hour period took place in a factory environment. Here you can see where defects dipped and were at a marginal and also peaked and showed a maximum. From this data you can easily see where pain points are in a situation and then provide a possible resolution.Assessment Tool 21. How can an organisations dogging emolument processes be communicated to all stakeholders and how can individuals and teams be encouraged and suffer to embrace it? Communicating change in any organisation is important. Stakeholders in certain situations depending on the graduated table of change could include almost every employee. Best practice is to have a seminar or training academic term to highlight the need for certain changes or continuous overture.For example if the organisation wants to be ISO accredited in a certain area, then it becomes merry for all employees to play a part. Explaining the positives the overture will entail will certainly sell the vision.2. Having made a decision about what to do to improve an organisations processes, what should you do to plan for the implementation of that change? A parturiency Plan is ceaselessly a good start. T his can outline the schedule and resources required, identify the tasks and objectives associated. Communication again is very important with any change, to ensure all of the organisation (if applicable) is aware of the change. The key thing to remember is, people dont like change if they havent been advised.3. Explain the difference between Feedback and feed forward control. Feed-Forward Control is a tone that regulates inputs. This can be resources such as human resource, financial and material. This is a proactive measure to allow management to prevent issues instead of having to cut off them later. This is known to be a time consuming exercise,4. What processes might be used to ensure that team members are informed of outcomes of continuous cash advance efforts? Why is this necessary and how will this contribute toward further improvements?Reports can be sent to team members on a set time frame (monthly, quarterly) this could include data and graphs/tables. Graphs are a great way to visually see trends and also to imagine whether there has been improvement ina certain area. It also determines where there are possible issues. It allows the team to strategize where and how they can improve.5. What is continuous improvement?Continuous improvement is an infinite process to improve a service, product or process. Depending on the type of industry the organisation is in will determine what areas of will utilize this type of method. permits look at an IT department, who has an inbuilt database every employee uses for the day to day tasks. A prototype has been created of this software, and it is in production. However there will always be room for improvement for any software, so constant update is done on the software, the applications team within the IT Department work each day on add-ons or improvements. What started out as version 1.00 has now turned into 2.34 in the space of 3 age.6. What can you do to assist improvements now and in the future? Improvem ent in an organisation comes with ideas from the team. This can be suggestions raised in meetings, feedback and communication. The only way to improve processes, products or services is to communicate with departments and key members of staff.Having evidence in front of employees such as graphs is a great way to visually demonstrate where improvement is needed in certain areas. Concent evaluation on weak points in the organisation is the key to improvement.Assessment Tool 3 ProjectContinuous improvement is common in most organisations in some degree. This is an exercise that can cover a number of areas. Usually the three areas are as followsProcessProductsServiceProcess in the context of continuous improvement can look at ways to improve the said process. Lets look at the example of a crucial process in a majority of organisations. A login is required for every employee who starts with the company. This is for them to login to their setting and perform dayto day functions. The pro cess is as follows.The problem is with this process is communication is relied upon. thither is no official area where data can be obtained. IT need to wait for HR to provide information, then HR have to wait for IT, The manager of a new employee has to wait for IT and HR. There has been several flaws with this. Improvement can be done is a number of ways.1. Have a meeting with HR and IT to establish procedures and timeframes 2. Look at a more centralised system where details can be accessed.It was later decided a shared calendar on Sharepoint with email alerts when entries are created to be sent to all HR and IT staff. HR would accede a new starter on this calendar, IT would see the details and create the account. They would then add the relevant login details to the calendar and notify the manager. This is seen as a better process, but one that can still be improved upon. There can be a period of essay over a set timeframe to see if it can be improved even further. Taking as muc h manual labour out of the equation will reduce the amount of errors, oversights etc. Now looking at service. Customer Service or Service Delivery (in an internal environment) is extremely important in any industry. Good customer service means happy clients, more clients which leads to a successful organisation.Lets look at the example of an ISP. They have 3 core think centre departments, a Sales, Billing and Technical Support area. How can we gauge what customers impressions are of the take aim of customer service? A good way is after a phone call to have a rating system where a customer can rate the level of service is received from 1-5. 5 being exceptional and 1 being sicken. This is the first step in continuous improvement in customer service. The batch could be on release or could be over a set period. Either way reporting could be sent on the results to managers/team leaders. There might be a number of trends identified. Staff with exceptional consistent ratings could be rewarded. Staff with lower or appalling ratings could be trained to improve their skill. Reporting for this survey could be time stamped, so graphs could be created when staff arent providing a good level of customer service.You may see a trend like Monday being the worst performing day orFriday afternoon. Education, Training are a number ways to continue the improvement of customer service. As well as awards or rewards as stated above. The final area is products. If an organisation is in the business of developing and distributing products, their main concern with continuous improvement will be developing this product to ensure it is the best in their market. If in a mass production environment, quality control would be paramount to ensure product defects are at a lower limit or non existent. Earlier in this document a graph was created present defect levels over certain shifts.This is a great way to seclude where improvement is needed. Why did a certain shift have so many defect s? Is there something wrong with the team who is assigned to these shifts? This may want further staff training, disciplinary action or new staff members involved. Sometimes it could be as simple as making a clearly defined process to get a product complete without issues. Lets look at the example of Microsoft. They are the pioneers of operating(a) systems. According to data for the years 2004 2009, Microsoft on average has covered near 90% of the market across the globe. (see graph on next page)This is an exceeding number and one that comes with pressure and responsibility to ensure its product is up to an elite standard. Microsoft will release direct Systems every 4 years on average, however after the release they will continue to create on the operating system. Adding features, fixing bugs, improving the overall experience. Also it offers place upright to customers with forums such as Technet and the obvious customer support. The updating is the main part of continuous im provement. This builds towards the next version of the Operating System which in some cases not all, will be an absolute improvement over the predecessor. Example being Windows 8, they have received overwhelming feedback that consumers are not well-heeled of the start placard being removed.They listened and implemented a start identity card of some description in Windows 8.1 and it will return in Windows 10. danger Management comes into play with most decisions or implementation of a new process. With the three examples shown above a Risk Management assessment of some degree/scale would be included. For the example. Microsoft would need to investigate whether continuing support for an operating system would be viable. They will usually release a statement tothe public explaining how recollective their support and updates will be created for Operating System. Microsoft also would have weighed the pros and cons for implementing a start menu feature into 8.1. Customer satisfaction is a high priority, however if it isnt feasible it would be a risk to implement it. As youre using resources and time to implement something rather major. Wouldnt this be better spent developing on the next version.How does continuous improvement dissemble employees? This question is very important. As employees are a major part of how well an organisation succeeds. An example of this would be an entrepreneurial firm which is small. Employees are driven to succeed because a sense of ownership due to it being only around 20 staff members, each is aware of their responsibilities and are directly accountable for certain roles. However the firms power structure believe the best way moving forward is to grow. As the festering takes place the sense of ownership has decreased. The culture will understandably change. therefor it is incredibly important in the early stages prior to making major changes such as growth, that the organisation creates a culture that values answerableness and to provide for accountability in organizational design. Communication in a small company will be different to a bigger one. There would be little need for formal communication and any sort of reporting as they are all in the same small location.They also understand what is important to communicate due to the scale of workload. The change here as it grows would need to be subtle. Explaining to current staff the need/requirement to implement different ways we must communicate. It is logistically going to be impossible to have a general talk with another(prenominal) colleague about something critical when they are in the East bound of the United States and you are based at Head Office in Sydney Australia. If this is educated earlier, it will provide a better understanding from long standing employees on how it will benefit the organisation, this once again comes back to the culture created. The employee will see this will a positive for the organisation. lieu towards change can vary dependant on factors such as the average age and tenure with the organisation as well. Why do organisations feel the need to incorporate continuous improvement sometimes is dependent on the type of industry.The pressures of certain industries almost forces organisation toimplement continuous improvement. The Business Environment refers to the factors that affect an organisations ability to be competitive in their market. Kodak for example, were a leader in photographic/tv camera film. However the environment changed around them dramatically in recent years with digital photography taking over the market. Film was no lasting the medium used. It saw a decline in revenue ($14.5bn in 1995 to $2.35bn in 2013) A lot of companies would not of survived something this dramatic. Kodak revolutionised and changed their way of thinking.Kodak had to shrink in size and effectively start again, go back to basics. It kept the best minds they had to brainstorm how to continue. Kodak is now a leade r in photo print paper, packaging, commercial film and speciality chemicals. Although Kodak isnt a good example of improvement there is an argument for continuity. Not many companies have survived when hit with a change of the scale photography went through over 10 years ago. It is a credit to Kodak they were able to adapt to change and strive to succeed with improvement to the way they work in their industry.