Go to Gemba
One of the tenants of continuous process improvement is to go to the workplace to see problems. In lean terms, this is know as going to "gemba". Gemba is a Japanese word that loosely translates to real-place or the place that work is done. In the western culture, gemba is almost holy. It is widely accepted as the source of all truth for seeing and eliminating wasted time and activity in the workplace. This gemba term is accepted for both product and service industries and applies anywhere work is done.
This blog is not about gemba, however, but rather lack of gemba. I am somewhere between concerned and appalled at the lack of gemba visits by both leaders and continuous improvement people alike. I'm sure this blog will not be popular with all readers, especially the firm "work from home crowd", but let me explain. In the last two months alone I have personally encountered the following that impacted my clients ability to generate meaningful positive change.
- Continuous improvement personnel working remote.
- Entire departments working remote.
- Entire departments working hybrid, which implies partially remote and partially physically at work.
- Managers and leaders working both hybrid and remote.
Let's dig in a bit further and get some evidence on the quantification of the opportunity. Here are some statistics listed in Forbes Advisor. The link is listed below for reference.
I'll paraphrase the key statistics here:
As of 2023, 12.7% of full-time employees work from home, while 28.2% work a hybrid model
By 2025, 32.6 million Americans will work remote by 2025
98% of workers want to work remote at least some of the time
16% of companies operate fully remote
For any of you that have tried to work a cycle of improvement (Kaizen event, A3 improvement, PDCA, etc.) remotely you can likely resonate with the challenges of a virtual team. Which includes a near impossibility to go to gemba. In trying to be a little balanced, there are times when the team is global and it makes sense to work virtually to keep travel costs in check. I have also had some small success using a digital camera to see the workplace virtually and make a modest attempt at going to gemba. This approach was a necessary option during the pandemic. So I don't want to say there are not exceptions to being present in gemba.
But frequently the manager or the improvement facilitation expertise simply choose to work remote. While I recognize that their is a high level of interest in working remote from a personal standpoint, you must also recognize that this is wreaking havoc on the quality of improvement efforts. Almost 60% of the workforce still arrives in the physical workplace each day. As a leader and as an improvement resource, I strongly encourage you to be present, to support the value adding resources, to assist in seeing and eliminating waste, and help your organization, your staff, and your community.
If you want a little more evidence on working from home, I'll leave with one additional study from the National Bureau of Economic Research.
" Workers who prefer work from home are substantially less productive at home than the office (27% less compared to 13% less for workers who prefer the office). These negative selection effects are partially explained by subgroups that face bigger constraints on selecting into office work and additional demands on their attention when at home, such as those with children or other home care responsibilities."
source: https://www.nber.org/papers/w31515
We not only cripple our continuous improvement efforts by eliminating or making it difficult to go to gemba, but we are also less productive. Elon Musk feels so strongly against this practice that he labeled working from home as morally wrong. This seems to be a bit of an extreme view, and I am not advocating one way or the other in how to operate your company and lead your workforce. But all of us need to figure out how to effectively go to gemba in our new world. Excellence demands we find a solution. Maybe we can use lean tools and problem solving approaches to generate a working solution?
Lean Blessings,
Ron
Ron Bercaw, President and Sensei
Breakthrough Horizons
www.breakthroughhorizons.com
LinkedIN: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ron-bercaw-882a0a8/
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