Enterprise Learning Strategies How Do We Use Gemba Academy?

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1 Enterprise Learning Strategies How Do We Use Gemba Academy? What would you guess is the most common question we get from prospects and new customers? It is phrased in many ways but usually voiced as How do most companies use Gemba Academy? or What is the recommended way to use your content? As you might imagine, this question has many possible answers as each organization s unique continuous improvement goals, needs, and current knowledge base vary greatly. Though there are many possible solutions, we wanted to boil this down to a few key actionable strategies and share some of our best customers best practices with you: Online Deployment: one of our largest customers, an auto parts manufacturer, leverages their company intranet s Continuous Improvement page to easily link Gemba Academy training for their employees. They utilize a co- branded page from Gemba Academy that serves as a single access portal for all of their employees worldwide. By making training easily available online and creating a dedicated place to find content, this company has been able to get their employees speaking a consistent language of lean and are now working to build a Six Sigma program. Other companies also build courses in their Learning Management System (LMS), which allows them to serve up content in context with other tools they may have developed internally. Gemba Academy is LMS- agnostic and can work with any system, enabling companies to pair Gemba Academy content with the training and tracking tools they ve invested in and have already implemented. On- site Training: many companies combine online pre- work with on- site training and reinforcement through activity- based learning. A large facilities management company takes ownership of their CI training by hosting regular meetings to watch key Gemba Academy videos in conjunction with key internal training initiatives. By planning a training schedule, they are able to maximize independent study time as well as group training sessions. Armed with laptops and break out space, some companies also break their team into groups to review videos and then reconvene as a group for an activity. Hybrid, or Flipped, Learning: Organizations ranging from those in government to healthcare to manufacturing, net very effective results with a hybrid or flipped learning model. Using this approach, trainees are responsible for reviewing content on their own prior to pre- scheduled weekly, monthly, or quarterly team meetings. Not unlike a traditional course, a syllabus of topics to be covered is provided to each trainee for self- study prior to the team meeting. During the team meeting, a portion of time is dedicated to discussing Gemba Academy videos and their impact on daily work, as well as ideas to test, apply, and implement what they ve learned.

2 Many groups use Gemba Academy s Excel templates for specific post- meeting applications, such as red tagging or Kaizen events. Also, the flipped model is used to actively check for knowledge retention and ensure that the learning sticks. Many companies print out Gemba Academy s PDF quizzes, take the quiz as a group, and use this as a learning opportunity to discuss and dispel misconceptions. This topic- focused discussion helps to reinforce understanding as well as identify immediate real- world application of Lean and Six Sigma concepts and tools. What are other simple best practices anyone can employ? Here are a few ways our customers have leveraged their Gemba Academy training: Schedule. Develop a training schedule early on that is shared with the team Set Goals. Identify short and long- term continuous improvement goals and share these with your team(s). Share. Share small wins and involve the company in CI efforts. Introduce the concept of gemba walks to the company and invite management and other personnel to join in and learn more. Show off. Create a Kaizen Hall of Fame to proudly display ongoing improvements to employees and visitors alike Signage. Post reminders about your company s continuous improvement philosophy. Hang posters to remind people what PDCA means. Create wallet sized cards with your company s 10 commandments of continuous improvement. Simplify. Make Gemba Academy easily accessible and provide log- in credentials to team members regularly. If you re meeting on site, provide a binder with all of the video overviews printed out for each trainee s reference. And, include your company s philosophies, quotes, new processes, etc., as part of the binder. Support. Be available to answer questions and discuss ideas with employees learning about continuous improvement. Ultimately, learning is subjective and each learner learns differently from the next. By offering up a variety of ways to access, apply, discuss, and review Gemba Academy content, you are one step closer to the goal of teaching people new skills to continuously improve every day!

3 How Do You Use Gemba Academy? Gemba Academy in Higher Education Bryan Glenn, MBB, West Texas A&M University West Texas A&M University (WTAMU) decided to roll out Lean Six Sigma to faculty and staff in Developing the training soon proved to be expensive, time consuming, and extremely difficult. Gemba Academy s training method proved to fit our needs and the cost was within our budget. The videos are clear cut and simple to follow, and, if someone misses class or needs to review, the DVD resources and online access are perfect. Using Gemba Academy s training tools, we have trained 18 Green Belt candidates and one Black Belt candidate since July of Gemba Academy has provided the tools for these candidates to learn the methodology and use Minitab while working on their projects, which have already resulted in documented hard savings of thousands of dollars across the campus. Soft savings are important for us since we are a service industry and cater to students and many projects have been geared to this area. For example, we have transformed the student dorm notification process from 45 days to a 48- hour turnaround time and made many improvements in Financial Aid. Our program has garnered the attention of the community and we have had several requests to put the training online as a class or provide training on a one- on- one basis. Gemba Academy s methods are straightforward and easy to understand. Since finding Gemba Academy and implementing the training videos, our LSS program continues to grow and blossom.

4 How Do You Use Gemba Academy? Gemba Academy In The Airline Service Industry By Christopher Manglaris, Director of OPEX North America, Gate Gourmet As a company that serves more than 300 million passengers a year, Gate Gourmet is proud of its culture of continuous improvement. We regularly seek ways to further enhance our Operational Excellence program and, in Gemba Academy, we found an excellent partner to supplement Lean Sigma training content. The courses are a good length, with just the right amount of real life examples to be meaningful when conveying Lean Sigma methodologies. Because Gemba Academy takes each concept and breaks it down into easy- to- digest 5 to 15minute video sessions, it allows us to better leverage the content in connection with operational projects and development plans for our team members. It s also convenient to have the option of streaming content or purchasing DVDs, for added flexibility. Also, Gemba Academy s partnership with the Kaizen Institute and prominent Lean leaders like Masaaki Imai, in addition to offering interviews with other business leaders about practical application of the trainings, provides vital peer learnings and validation to our colleagues that the training can work for any aspect of our business operational or transactional. Additionally, the people at Gemba Academy have made the difference for us. Ron Pereira and the team are truly committed to customer satisfaction and support. They have listened to our feedback and made enhancements to site navigation and even added content that better benefited our organization. Overall, we would recommend Gemba Academy to any company looking to provide timely, relevant, and easy to understand Lean Sigma training to their organization.

5 How Do You Use Gemba Academy? Gemba Academy at American Axle & Manufacturing By Mark Umlauf, Senior Manager - Lean Business Process Team At American Axle & Manufacturing (AAM), Lean is a cultural value. We have been using lean in our manufacturing facilities for many years. We have been recognized as an industry leader in lean manufacturing and are a recipient of the Shingo Award. Developing our associates is a key part of the lean culture, and we have established an internal lean training program for both business and manufacturing associates. The training material for our Lean Business Process Class introduces lean concepts and tools, with an emphasis on Standard Work, Process Mapping, and Problem Solving. Since 2012, we have successfully integrated Gemba Academy videos into our instructor- led course in two ways. First, prior to attending the course we require participants to watch two background videos from the site. Second, during the course we incorporate select videos to emphasize the material being presented. For example, we show the video Standard Work Standardization as we start that topic during the course. We have designed our training course to give attendees an opportunity to learn by doing. Each participant will work on a self- selected lean initiative throughout the course. We ask participants to select a process that they are familiar with, can be improved, and they have some control over. At the conclusion of the course they have an outline of steps that can be used to prepare an action register. This activity gives participants practice with the concepts and is a good start on a real- life process improvement. Periodically, we recognize successful initiatives by posting a summary on our associate

6 portal. Posting these success stories is a good way to recognize teams for their work, and also provides an opportunity to share improvements that could benefit others in the company. Through these and other initiatives, we have reduced process times, implemented standardized work instructions, and seen measurable improvement in the completeness and accuracy of information flow.

7 What Are Lean Leaders Saying About Gemba Academy? Gemba Academy is very pleased to share a review from lean authority, Bill Waddell. We were pleasantly surprised to read his unsolicited review of Gemba Academy that you may view here at the Manufacturing Leadership Center blog. I can unequivocally state that any company pursuing lean that has not bought their School of Lean package is missing the boat in a major way. These guys cover the fundamentals of lean completely, clearly and accurately in a way that is not only more effective but light years more economical than anything else out there. - Bill Waddell