Continuous Improvement Practice In Large: Benefits, Strategies, And Methods

Benefits of continuous improvement philosophy in business

Discuss About The Continuous Improvement Practice In Large?

Continuous improvement is immensely important and is now much more required to sort out the process related issues that may affect the business badly. Such issues need to be identified before it becomes an epidemic and disrupt the relevant area (Jarocha et al. 2015). Continuous improvement is required for few good reasons like ensuring a sustained business practice, reducing the potential threats that are there at the workplace and implementing a change required to mitigate the identified threats (Jarocha et al. 2015).   

There are ample of benefits of implementing the continuous improvement process. The first and foremost benefit is the identification of potential organizational threats that could not have identified if not has been put on the inspection or monitoring. Another benefit is the mitigation of threats that could be in any form like an incremented turnover rate. The ultimate benefit of the continuous improvement process is to maintain a progressive chart of success (Singh and Singh 2015).

It depends on the area of development which the development process is focused on. If the improvement process is related to motivating the employees then in such process contribution from employees, the trainers, the human resource management, and the management team will be required. On the other hand, if an improvement is being felt necessary for the financial department then this will include the finance department of the company in concern (McLean, Antony and Dahlgaard 2017). 

In case of improving the employee performance, trainers will be included as they will train the employees in the required areas. The HRM of the company will design the training plan and the management will support the training program with sufficient funds. In case of improvement in the financial performance, executives from the finance department will be included in order to understand where the problem lies in (Cohen-Vogel et al. 2015).

There can be several strategies to implement the continuous improvement program; however, effective organizational communication, effective support of management and the training requirements will generally do the needful (Carnovale et al. 2016). Communication will let the information gets circulated to the staffs. Moreover, they will also be able to support the improvement process. Management will help the process with the required funds. Training is perhaps a key to success in any improvement process as this helps staffs to integrate with the elements of improvement (Carnovale et al. 2016).  

People that need to be encouraged to get involved in the development of continuous improvement process

Coach needs to have the ability to make the staffs understand the improvement process. They are associated with the coaching process for a short period of time. A coach can use a training style divided into few sessions to make staffs understand the process. On the other hand, mentor used to have a long-term association with the employees. A mentor can go with the feedback process, which will help the staffs to learn from the mistakes and repair the damages done before (Stadnicka and Antosz 2015).

To monitor a continuous improvement process, it is necessary to first identify the areas of improvement. Once the identification has been made then there is the need to set up the few performance indicators (KPIs) in order to judge whether there is any change post the implementation process. The performance-based indicators will help to judge the identified area on the specified performance indicators (Podgórski 2015). For example, if the turnover rate is high then post the implementation process, the turnover rate will be monitored to check whether there has been any change.

It is very important to monitor the continuous improvement process as this will educate on the progress of the implemented change. The improvement process is planned to bring a minor change in the organizational process. It is of no use to do nothing after implementing the continuous improvement process as this may not produce the anticipated result. This is indeed required to regularly monitor the improvement process till the time span that has been set for the improvement process. It can be beneficial in several ways like any shortcomings will be identified and can be treated within the set deadline. This will also help to save on the investment as structuring a new improvement process will ask additional monetary values (Wells et al. 2017).

Progress can be monitored through different ways like setting up a few simple performances based indicators (KPIs), maintaining an up-to-date data, using the dashboards and checking whether the progress is in alienation with the operational goals (Podgórski 2015).

Communication in regards to the improvement process can be done in numerous ways like by the mails, through the circulars and with the help of the supervisors. In addition to this, the communication can also be made through different other ways like a face-to-face announcement, panel discussion, team meetings, workshops and videos & webcasts updates (Bloom et al. 2014).

Explaining with reasons why these people have been selected and what will be there contributions

The implementation of the improvement process needs to first identify the required resources which are vital to the continuous improvement process. These include but are not limited to like the physical, financial and the human resources. Post implementation, there will be the need to do the evaluation process as to check whether everything has moved according to the planned schedule (Bloom et al. 2014).

Sustainability requirements may have to meet with the help of the improvement practices. However, this will differ depending on the circumstances. For example, if the improvement process is for addressing an issue related to an employee performance then the process should constantly focus on the performance. If a positive impact is not experienced in regard to employee performance then this will not be termed as have met the sustainability requirements (Dyllick and Muff 2016).

 Another example could be a change for improving the business performance that has been hampered by an incompetent customer service. In such case, the continuous improvement process will focus on whether there have been any changes in the customer service standard after implementing the continuous improvement process.

The Australian companies can contribute to the environmental legislation through an ethical practice of the suitable legislation. The Federal, local and the state governments jointly take care of the environmental-related legislation. They may create troubles for organizations if there is any violation of environmental legislation. The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act will be very much suitable for the chosen hotel industry in the New South Wales. This is because the legislation covers a wide area such as the importing, the sea, hazardous waste, heritage issues and the fuel quality. The basic purpose of this legislation is to ensure a reduced hazardous wastage in the sea, safety of the heritage issues, taking cares of the importing business and the fuel quality to ensure an environmentally friendly atmosphere (Bilotta, Milner and Boyd 2014). 

 The manager must make sure that employees are being informed of the improvement process. The assurance can be made by meeting with the different team on one-to-one basis. The meeting will be arranged only after the communication process is over. In a team meeting, the manager will allow every single staff to say something about the process of what they know about it. Such questions will help the manager to understand whether the employees have related them to the continuous improvement process (Singh and Singh 2015).

Suitable strategies to support the implementation of continuous development program

Feedback is very necessary as this will help the managers to know whether there is any challenge faced by the employees. Moreover, this may also put forward some important finds that will be needed to undergo a quick repair. Feedback does also help to make others understand the few issues which they might not have understood if not have been spoken on (Singh and Singh 2015).

Managers may know the requirement to implement a continuous improvement program in numerous ways like the falling graph of business performance, increased turnover rate, reduced standard of customer service and a reduced employee motivation. These are the few circumstances that tell of the needs for a continuous improvement process in relation to an operational practice (Singh and Singh 2015). Falling graph of business should be seriously considered as these are a clear indication of probably an outdated service or an incompetent product. This can also be an outdated marketing potential. An increased turnover rate will simply mean that the employer is not able to provide the best in industry offers to its staffs. Offers can be in terms of competent salary package, the work environment and the other benefits (Singh and Singh 2015).

Knowledge management system is a way to store the knowledge and utilize those at the time when it is required. The management can be done by using the different information technology (IT) related systems. Such IT systems include but are not limited to like the data warehousing, data mining, decision support systems, simulation tools and artificial intelligence tools (Premkumar et al. 2014). These systems are used like a database, which is kept secured for future use. For example, training staffs on the enterprise resource planning (ERP) database is one of the kinds of the knowledge management system (Premkumar et al. 2014). On a similar note, the learning from a software-enabled system in an accounting is the other kind of knowledge management system. Moreover, knowledge management system is necessary to maintain an inflow and an outflow of the information for an effective business performance (Premkumar et al. 2014).

References:

Bilotta, G.S., Milner, A.M. and Boyd, I., 2014. On the use of systematic reviews to inform environmental policies. Environmental Science & Policy, 42, pp.67-77.

Bloom, N., Garicano, L., Sadun, R. and Van Reenen, J., 2014. The distinct effects of information technology and communication technology on firm organization. Management Science, 60(12), pp.2859-2885.

Carnovale, S., Allen, C., Pullman, M. and Wong, D., 2016. Using continuous improvement in online program design: DMAIC as a tool for assurance of learning assessments. Decision Sciences Journal of Innovative Education, 14(2), pp.128-153.

Cohen-Vogel, L., Tichnor-Wagner, A., Allen, D., Harrison, C., Kainz, K., Socol, A.R. and Wang, Q., 2015. Implementing educational innovations at scale: Transforming researchers into continuous improvement scientists. Educational Policy, 29(1), pp.257-277.

Dyllick, T. and Muff, K., 2016. Clarifying the meaning of sustainable business: Introducing a typology from business-as-usual to true business sustainability. Organization & Environment, 29(2), pp.156-174.

Jarocha, D., Milczarek, O., Wedrychowicz, A., Kwiatkowski, S. and Majka, M., 2015. Continuous improvement after multiple mesenchymal stem cell transplantations in a patient with complete spinal cord injury. Cell transplantation, 24(4), pp.661-672.

McLean, R.S., Antony, J. and Dahlgaard, J.J., 2017. Failure of Continuous Improvement initiatives in manufacturing environments: a systematic review of the evidence. Total Quality Management & Business Excellence, 28(3-4), pp.219-237.

Podgórski, D., 2015. Measuring operational performance of OSH management system–A demonstration of AHP-based selection of leading key performance indicators. Safety science, 73, pp.146-166.

Podgórski, D., 2015. Measuring operational performance of OSH management system–A demonstration of AHP-based selection of leading key performance indicators. Safety science, 73, pp.146-166.

Premkumar, V., Krishnamurty, S., Wileden, J.C. and Grosse, I.R., 2014. A semantic knowledge management system for laminated composites. Advanced Engineering Informatics, 28(1), pp.91-101.

Singh, J. and Singh, H., 2015. Continuous improvement philosophy–literature review and directions. Benchmarking: An International Journal, 22(1), pp.75-119.

Stadnicka, D. and Antosz, K., 2015. Continuous improvement practice in large enterprises: study results. International Journal for Quality Research, 9(1), pp.9-26.

Wells, G., Fisher, J.A., Porras, I., Staddon, S. and Ryan, C., 2017. Rethinking Monitoring in Smallholder Carbon Payments for Ecosystem Service Schemes: Devolve Monitoring, Understand Accuracy and Identify Co-benefits. Ecological Economics, 139, pp.115-127.