The Visual Workplace: Work That Makes Sense

Our exploration—and exultation—of the power of borders continues. Completing the agenda from last week’s show, your host and visual expert, Gwendolyn Galsworth, provides three stunning examples of the double-border function—highly useful applications you can bring to your own company and your own area. She then moves on to color-coded borders and the secret of their success (as well as the most common mistakes). As time permits, Galsworth will detail two other border-strengthening processes. First, her tips for laying down borders that last a year but can be removed overnight. Then she shares her 11-Step Procedure for developing a color-coded system for borders that, among other things, ties each color to the percentage of floor space that color category actually occupies. This is a call-in show so don’t hesitate to tell us about your own border/color-code challenges. Time is not an issue. Anything we don’t finish this week, we can complete during next week’s show.

Borders are the work horses of operator-led visuality—and rarely utilized to their full potential. Over the past several weeks, your host, author, and visual expert, Gwendolyn Galsworth, has walked us through the Smart Placement formula (Function + Location = Flow) so we can position workplace items in locations that connect and align their functions. Now nail that relationship in place through borders, addresses, and (if possible) ID labels—a trio of device categories that imbeds the visual where. We begin with borders, starting with the floor and moving up to walls, benches, shelving, cabinets, and drawers. In the end, borders get installed for everything that casts a shadow—a requirement that applies equally to easy-to-move items as well as to those that never budge (machines and tall shelves). Plus when you learn to apply borders effectively, they can get smarter as you get smarter. Join us this week LIVE! Learn about borders and their powerful visual performance vocabulary.

Until a company understands the logic and power of borders, borders are merely treated as so many lines—useful for neatness and order but not much more. Few people will expect performance to improve because of them, let alone positively impact KPIs. What a surprise to discover that borders (especially when combined with robust addresses) can measurably increase productivity on the departmental level, even while helping build a work culture of continuous improvement if there is none. And if such a culture already exists, borders will strengthen it. On this week’s show, Gwendolyn Galsworth (your host, author, and visual expert) presents the reasons that justify borders on a functional as well as cultural basis. Tune in and learn how borders help to make the workplace transparent, building accountability and a PDCA loop in the floor and work surfaces. Listen as Galsworth describes dozens of examples and you imagine or re-imagine the role robust borders can play in your company.

The problem with using the term “line” interchangeably with “border” is that a line is a geometric coordinate. It does not have a performance function. But a border not only tangibly contributes to the nature and performance of work, it also functions dynamically as an operational partner in how, when, and where work gets done. The more we understand this, the more we recognize how borders can help us create work that makes sense. On this week’s show, Gwendolyn Galsworth (your host, author, and visual expert) discusses ways you can add dimensions of meaning to your borders so they can extend, control, and reveal the work itself. When we get very clever with borders, we can even make them imbed time into the process. Yes, borders change our understanding of the flow and changes in work content. As a result, our visual intelligence grows. And as we get smarter, our borders get smarter as well. Tune in and learn more—especially if you want to amp up your current 5S approach.

The final three of the fourteen principles of Smart Placement focus on opportunities hidden in thin air. What, for example, is meant by “negative space?” And how do you turn it into a positive factor that helps the enterprise succeed? This is just one of the many imbedded questions this set of principles reveal. In this final Smart Placement show, Gwendolyn Galsworth (your host and visual workplace expert) discusses this and other important content that can help you utilize Smart Placement, either as an powerful doorway to robust 5S or as a set of stand-alone lessons that can be used by any work area keen on improvement—whether assembly area, hospital floor or engineering office. One thing is sure: The past eight episodes of The Visual Workplace have demonstrated that where the things of work are located is of vital importance and there is more to learn about that than has ever been contemplated. Tune in and find out for yourself. This a LIVE, call-in show. Let us hear from you!

Visuality based in principles means you can continue to expand workplace transparency far beyond the first cycle. Over the past two months, your host and visual workplace expert, Gwendolyn Galsworth, has explained and described a set of 14 Smart Placement Principles and how to imbed them into the living landscape of work. The result? The flow of work content based on the actual function of the things that populate the work environment. In today’s show, this discussion is completed and next steps described. In addition, Galsworth shares key insights from the project she has undertaken in parallel to her show: revitalizing and strengthening her approach to poka-yoke/visual guarantees. In it, the true meaning of 100% Source Inspection becomes clear: the conversation between attributes. And the real use of poka-yoke devices comes to light: imbedding those attributes deeply into the process of work—or better yet into the design of the product so it can only be made right. Tune in for more.

Does the location of things at work matter? You bet! Finding that right location can accelerate the flow of work—or slow it to a standstill. This is the logic of Smart Placement and its formula: Function + Location = Flow. Over the next several shows, Gwendolyn Galsworth, your host and visual workplace expert, shares her Smart Placement approach—that indispensable step before laying down borders. Today, she defines the problem of placement that is not smart and shares a mapping tool so you/your teams can discover the level of motion (moving without working) in your area currently triggered by un-smart location—the un-conscious placement of function. Smart Placement doesn’t just show us where things are. It ensure that things are in the right place—not simply a designated location (as in “a place for everything/everything in its place”)—but the smart place for a function (item), its right location in relationship to every other function in the area. Tune in and learn more.

Question: On your way to the Visual Where, what do you do before laying down floor borders? Answer: You implement Smart Placement. This is a surprise step Gwendolyn Galsworth (your host and visual expert) discovered twenty-two years ago when her then-attempts at traditional 5S failed. Part of that failure, she realized, stemmed from people laying down "lines" that simply traced where workplace items were—instead of validating the current location of the functions those items represented or improving it. In response, she inserted a step before implementing borders: Smart Placement. This week in the second show in the series, Galsworth walks you, step by step, through Smart Placement mapping. She also emphasizes the need for trainers/coaches to do their own homework in advance while also preparing for messy people issues associated with new layouts. Listen and learn how to amplify and anchor your 5S in visual thinking and operator inventiveness. This is a LIVE show. Call-ins welcome!

If employee ownership is crucial to continuous improvement (and who would deny that?), then what happens when people want to own their improvements too much? What do you do when hourly associates falsely assume their creativity guarantees their ideas will get deployed? How do you handle the outliers—people with innovative but un-popular improvement notions? And what happens when operators cannot agree amongst themselves on what is needed and why? How do you handle that? Do you step in and pull rank? Do you let associates “duke it out?” In this third show in her current Smart Placement series, Gwendolyn Galsworth (your host and visual expert) tackles these questions and shares her “Four People Process Tools” for getting people involved and managing the boundaries. In parallel, she completes the details started last week of the Smart Placement Mapping process, a core step in her 5S protocol for making borders meaningful. This is a LIVE show. Call-in comments and questions welcomed!

How do we get smart about the placement of function at work? If you’ve been listening to The Visual Workplace, you now have a growing understanding of the HOW and the WHY of that. This week, Gwendolyn Galsworth (your host and visual expert) continues to share the details of this core methodology—which she developed so operators could deploy higher dimensions of 5S and become more culturally aligned. This is where 5S and visual thinking begin their dance. After a quick review of the learning so far, hear the first four of the 14 Smart Placement Principles, principles that operators apply directly to their Could-Be or Dream Maps. Because these first four principles are simple, they get heads nodding and pave the way, gradually, to more complex considerations as value-add associates re-engineer the layout of function and create an accelerated flow of material, information and themselves into and through their work areas. Join us for an hour of practical, hands-on listening.

This week on The Visual Workplace, we continue our march through the fourteen principles of Smart Placement. Last week, Gwendolyn Galsworth (your host and visual expert) walked us through the first four. Today, we are bound to pick up three or four more—maybe five: Principle 5/Put It On Wheels; Principle 6/Make It Ergonomically Sounds; and Principle 7/Make Function Appear & Disappear At Will. Those three conclude the basic set of easy-to-make changes on a micro-level. Then we move on to thinking that is more abstract and more conceptual, beginning with Principle 8/Let The Flow Do The Work. You will also learn more about how to maximize the use of the Could-Be Map that teams created to help them see, think, and re-envision the layout of function in their work areas. Listen as Gwendolyn tells you how to keep groups engaged and thinking and how to set up a Charge Chart that captures that thinking, without overpromising. Join us for another practical session of how-tos and what-ifs.

Flow is pull’s foundation. Pull is flow under demand, driven by time. This week we focus on Principle 8/Let The Flow Do the Work in our continuing march through the 14 Smart Placement principles. In 8, we look at the macro-layout in a work area and at its overall flow line. How would you describe that flow? Fluid? Stalled? Using the Could-Be/Dream Map to illuminate motion, we contemplate the placement of what’s easy-to-move and what needs approval before it can be re-located. If you are a regular listener, you know you are in the Land of Big Ideas (yellow post-its)—and they have to be considered carefully. Not handling Big Ideas correctly can cause your smart placement efforts to crash and burn. Do not confuse “I-driven” with open-handed permission. If you do, associates may get the mistaken notion that thinking of a BIG improvement idea is the same as doing it. This is not so. Listen and hear how to handle those decisions and keep the spirit of inventiveness and engagement alive.

Piles of things is a known trigger for massive motion. As we continue our journey through the fourteen principles of smart placement, we learn not only how to order those piles but how to organize them to support our performance outcomes. This week, your host and visual workplace expert, Gwendolyn Galsworth, walks you through Principle 9: ways to sort not only components and supplies into a coherent pattern but, if need be, the entire layout of your area. Or in the case of Scania Trucks, the entire production floor; the result: a 30% increase in productivity and cancellation of plans to build a new plant. Then, in Principle 10, you learn how co-locate different workplace items for a specific task. Called “Design-To-Task,” this approach is indispensable to complex machine change over, patient delivery or assembly processes. Then on to “Use the Existing Architecture,” one of the many double-up functions in workplace visuality. Tune in and learn how to utilize these in your company.

What are the visual tools of the new leadership for supervisors? Last week your host and visual expert, Gwendolyn Galsworth, presented their seven-element new role description. After a short reminder of how supervisors begin to practice these new skills, Galsworth introduces a nested framework of visual functions, designed to equip traditional supervisors and executives to take on their new leadership roles. The first of these visual functions is Visual Displays: multi-layered information delivered in single, interactive format. Displays enable us to see the relationship between complex information at-a-glance, understand status, and take correct, timely, and independent action—based solely on the info in that display. Tune in and learn why effective displays are always I-driven and how they help harried supervisors: a) secure control over their corner of the world, and b) gain the internal margin needed to become effective visual leaders of improvement. Call-in LIVE: 866-472-5790.

Whether you are new or very experienced as a trainer, there are special things to learn in order to become an exceptional visual workplace trainer. This week, Gwendolyn Galsworth, award-winning author and visual workplace expert, continues her trainer series and shares the first five of her Nine Principles of Effective Training—principles that build knowledge, understanding, skill, and confidence for trainer and learner alike. Listen as Gwendolyn discusses: 1) Principle One/Inspire First, Then Inform; 2) Principle Two/Start Small (growth is faster/deeper as a result); 3) Principle Three/The First Cycle is for the Trainer; 4) Principle Four/Everyone Gets Trained (representative training is not effective); 5) Principle Five/Make the Training Room Physically & Psychologically Safe for Learning (operationalize “Respect for the Individual”). In support of Principle 5, Galsworth shares two sub-techniques: “Normalize the Room” and “Talk Amongst Themselves.” Tune in for all this and more!

How do supervisors contribute to a successful visual workplace conversion? This week, your host and visual workplace expert, Gwendolyn Galsworth, continues her series on “Becoming a Brilliant Visual Workplace Trainer”—this time focusing on the crucial role supervisors play in a visual transformation. But that role is probably not what you or they think. Yes, everyone knows it is vital for supervisors (and managers) to get and stay on board. But what if they spoil the process because they don’t fully understand the nature of the change visuality represents for their direct reports? Even highly successful, natural-born supervisors may need to adjust their approach. What has this got to do with becoming a brilliant trainer? EVERYTHING! Tune in as Gwendolyn discusses the four remaining principles of effective visual workplace training. When she does, the indispensable role of the supervisor may take on new meaning for you and your company. This is a LIVE show. Your call-in is welcomed!

What’s next? The physical training room is in tip-top shape, you as a trainer know whom to train—and how to handle some quirky issues that surface on your way to your training launch. And thanks to last week’s show, you also better understand what supervisors and managers do during training sessions (Gwendolyn will finish up the last three of the nine principles she started last week). What’s next? Now we get down to brass tacks: Just what do trainers teach? What do you talk about? What do you explain? How do you get people to learn about and apply visuality? How do they become visual thinkers? And what does Galsworth mean when she tells us (repeatedly!): Trainers have to do their homework or the learning won’t happen? What is that about? Tune in this week and get the next dose of how to become a brilliant visual workplace trainer, as Gwendolyn Galsworth, your host and visual workplace expert, continues her series on just that. This is a LIVE show. Call-ins welcome!

How does the logic of visual thinking relate to leadership? Do the same core visual principles apply to a leader who wants to make his job more effective, stable, and imbedded? Can it really be said that a leader becomes more effective when she uses visual devices to assist her in achieving her required day-to-day outcomes? In this third show of her new series—The Principles & Practices of Visual Leadership—Dr. Gwendolyn Galsworth, your host and visual expert, sets out a line of logic that helps us understand the leader as “just another I-driven visual thinker.” But she also identifies the conditions and qualities that make leader-led visuality distinctly different and apart from operator-led visuality. As she explains, while the building blocks of the visual thinking are the same for every employee, the unique pressures of leadership expose a different set of expectations and a unique definition of both work and the leader’s value field. Call in questions/comments: 866-472-5790.

What do supervisors do? What is their job? Is that job the same in companies pursuing the new excellence? This week, in the fourth show of her new Visual Leadership series, Dr. Gwendolyn Galsworth, your host and visual expert, shares her perspective on supervisors and their work. While not yet widely recognized, this perspective tells of a new role for supervisors, one that is pivotal and transformative. Galsworth describes that new role—not as logistical expeditors—but as Leaders of Improvement, a revolutionary principle that can trigger a deep cultural shift. When supervisors learn and adopt this new role (this wider identity), everything changes and for the better, including supervisors themselves. This new job description is a complete replacement for the old way and has a powerful counterpart for executives (which Galsworth covers in future shows). Tune in as she begins to share her leadership model for supervisors. Invite your staff to listen LIVE. Call in: 866-472-5790.

What does a leader of improvement on the supervisory level do? Does that new role overlap with traditional supervisory duties? And how can visuality help? This week, as her series on Visual Leadership continues, Dr. Gwendolyn Galsworth (your host and visual expert) maps out the seven elements of what a leader of improvement on the supervisory level does—and how visuality is the glue that holds them all together: 1) stabilize the work area; 2) measure performance by focusing on what winning means; 3) target specific improvement outcomes; and 4) deploy the needed activity to meet each target. For Element 5/Coach, Galsworth draws the difference between teaching and coaching. In 6/Model, she describes behaviors that reveal and inspire. In 7/Improve, she demonstrates ways that the new area leader can make improvement contributions of his or her own. Tune in LIVE and learn how these elements work together and how your supervisors can gain skills and experience in each. Call-in: 866-472-5790.