Success in Ipswich

Back in 2012, my colleague and I ran some workshops for senior management and clinical leaders introducing the Lean philosophy and some of its practices at Ipswich Hospital NHS Trust.  As noted at the time:We started with an introduction based on the Toast Kaizen video produced by and featuring GBMP president Bruce Hamilton.  Then it was off to gemba, the "factory shop" floor, where the class members shadowed a member of the staff. The idea was to practice observation skills and try to identify the various types of waste found in all organizations. The class members gained a new appreciation for the degree of difficulty faced by their colleagues in doing their everyday jobs.  They noticed impediments, inefficiencies, and work-arounds. Later, I gave everyone a homework assignment, which was to answer the following question: "Waste exists in Ipswich Hospital because the people who work here are uncaring and lazy. True or False? Provide evidence in support of your answer." I suspected (and hoped!) that the answer would be "false," and it always was.  People understood that the well-intentioned and hard working people in the hospital face the common problems of complex organizations.  Phil Windsor offered the following answer:To say waste exists at Ipswich Hospital because the people who work here are uncaring and lazy is a statement that couldn't be further from the truth. The people that work at Ipswich are uncaring ...
Source: Running a hospital - Category: Health Managers Source Type: blogs