I am re-reading Robert Maurer's book: One Small Step Can Change Your Life: The Kaizen Way, which is the best book I know for understanding the kaizen philosophy and its practical application, either in the development of organizations or in personal life. By the way, it was such an easy read that I recommend it not only to hard-line leaners.
When we talk about change and development, big breakthroughs usually come to mind, but I think these are the rarest. I almost only experienced this when we made such an epoch-making discovery, the new solution was so obvious, that we couldn't do it any other way anymore, or when the threat/danger was so big that we were able to overcome internal resistance. But the latter usually only worked for a short time, and the old practice tried to creep back.
In any other case, if I wanted to move something quickly, it required strength, and even more strength and endurance on my part to maintain it, otherwise the process started going backwards. It may be an unusual analogy, but it's like wearing braces at night. If you don't use it one night - you don't check the change in pratice - the next day you can already feel that the teeth are going back to their original place, just as organizations, processes and people go back to their previous state. The less control, the greater chance to go backwards.
As a rule, there is no time to be present 7/24, so I prefer the other method described by Maurer. The concept is simple: if the change is too great, the midbrain wakes up and triggers the stress response: hit or run. Fear and resistance to change arise, the path becomes difficult, and we also have no access to our creativity. If the change is small, then this reaction is omitted, and many successive small changes together can bring us a better result. These changes are rarely reversed and it is much less of a struggle to keep them alive.
I'll give you an example. We operated a large warehouse of technical materials, full of tools and machine parts accumulated over the past decades. When I suggested that it should be put in order or, God forbid, some parts should be scrapped, the storekeeper and the technical team went deffensive, and everyone suddenly had a lot of unquestionable work to do. I started with a small step by telling them how much I do not like the mess on the three pallets in front of the warehouse, let them tidy it up. I signalled this once in a while for four or five weeks, by which time the colleague got used to it and paid more attention to that area, because he knew that I would check it anyway if I went there. Then I went inside, and there I pointed to a shelf and a product group. I kept repeating this until it was built in that this was the new norm and they noticed on their own, something I would point out if I were there.
Here, too, it is necessary to repeat and confirm the expectation, but it requires much less investment of time and energy. On the other hand, it does require consistency and a clear definition of norms.
I experienced something similar in other areas, if I took a big step, I had to work harder to maintain it than if I had three small ones in a row, and the idea was more likely to die. This is probably one of the pitfalls of large-scale, overnight, fast lean implementations (and big promises on the first of January ????), the kaizen principle itself is not applied…
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