Ten Practical Facilitator Tips To Help Your Kaizen Blitz Workshop Run Smoothly
Although these ten tips relate to facilitating a kaizen blitz workshop,
they are also useful in the facilitation of most team based activities.
 Arrive Early To Avoid stress
 If you are facilitating any type of Continuous Improvement Workshop, like a Kaizen Blitz or a Rapid Improvement Event, always arrive at least one hour earlier than the rest of the team. As facilitator it is your responsibility to make sure things run smoothly. This extra hour can be a real life saver. An extra bit of breathing space. It allows you to make sure that everything is "just so" before the other team members arrive. It can also be useful to have a pre-event check list that you can use during this hour to tick off items prior to the start of the event. Ignore this tip at your peril.
 Use A Mind Map
 If you are training people in lean principles as part of your facilitation duties, I think it is always wise to have a Mind Map, written on a flip chart, covering of all of the topics you intend to
cover during the session. Why so ? If you are using Power-point or equivalent to deliver your message, guess what? At some point the technology will fail and you will be staring at a blue screen with a red face. For the participants it is the equivalent of watching a car crash in slow motion. By having your mind map primed and ready you will be able to do a bit of "stand up" and carry on like the real professional that you are.
 Use A Pencil To Cheat
 One great technique that you can use to give your brain a rest is using light pencil on a flip chart to give you aid memoirs as you deliver presentations. The idea is very simple. You
create a flip chart with your main headings on it that the audience can see. Beside each heading you write down your own cryptic notes in pencil. The audience cannot see the notes but you can. It's not really cheating. It's just a smart way to give you a checklist of all the points you want to cover and so improve the participants experience.
 Use Icebreakers to Break The Ice
 The dreaded icebreaker. Don't you just love them. That said, a good icebreaker can be a great way to get people comfortable in the team environment. I've tried many different ones over the years but the one I've found most effective at the start of a kaizen blitz goes something like this; Get people working in pairs; Ask each person to find out the following information from
the other person; How long they have been with the organisation and their current role and responsibilities?; What they did prior to joining the organisation? What they enjoy doing most in their spare time? You would then get the person to introduce the other person and answer these questions about them.
 Use Games/Simulations To Help People Learn By Doing
 There are many games/simulations that you can use to bring out learning points about Lean methodologies. In my experience people gain the greatest knowledge by learning by doing. People tend to enjoy doing something, rather than listening to you as facilitator "lecture" them on the wonders of a Lean approach to business. As a facilitator it can beneficial to design your own games/simulations that are specific to your audience. Not only is it good fun to do, it also makes you focus on bringing out the key learning points. They do take a bit of time to put together but once created they can be re-cycled and adapted for new audiences and new
situations. People always remember these games. They don't tend to remember what was
on your seventy fourth power-point slide.
 Use A Car Park to Keep Things Rolling Along
 What is a Car Park ? It is a place to capture items that you do not necessarily want to deal with there and then. Typically I tend to get a large piece of flip chart paper, stick the heading "Car Park" on it and put it up somewhere in the workshop room. There are several ways you can use this as a Lean Facilitator. If there is a heated discussion between a couple of team members on a particular topic that is great. We like a good lively debate. If that lively debate is drifting towards the Cuban Missile Crisis, that is maybe not so good. Time for deploying the Car Park post it note. Capture both arguments and then park them for future debate off line with a smaller group. Another great use of the car park is to capture great ideas or important points
that are currently a bit off topic. Use this device with caution, and don't over-fill the car park.
 Always Use A Kaizen Newspaper To Record Activities
 The Kaizen Newspaper is a chart used to capture the planned activities of the team over the next few hours. The chart should have the following headings:-
Action ; Who ; When ; Outcome
As a Lean Facilitator this is one of these tips that I constantly have to remind myself about. You know the "Do as I say rather than do as I do". The more you plan your kaizen newspaper and the more you do it, the easier it becomes. Remember Tip#1 getting there early. Well putting together a smart kaizen newspaper ahead of the team is one of those activities I'm talking about. Just the discipline of writing up the Newspaper can help you make better
facilitator decisions. What does the team need to achieve and by when? Who would work
well together as a sub team? Have I balanced up those who know about the process with
those that don't, but may question it? A great kaizen Newspaper is the key to keeping the
team focused on track to meet the objectives.
 Get The Team To Go Narrow And Deep
 What do I mean by narrow and deep? As a Lean facilitator it is your responsibility to make sure that things are put in place to a high standard with little chance of backslide. So for instance it is far better to re-organise a small area to a high standard than to make a half baked attempt on improving a large area with only small pockets of improvement that won't stand the test of time.
 Tip #9 Make Sure The Team Document All Of The Improvements
 When we make improvements in an area one of the cardinal sins is not to document the new way of working so that it has been properly captured. Failing to do this will always lead to failure. As facilitator you need to ensure that this always happens. Every time you make a change. All of the teams efforts will be a complete waste of time if this is not done. You will end up with what has been commonly named in the folklore of "Lean" as a Drive By Kaizen Event.
 Tip #10 Ensure The Team Have A Credible Action Plan
 As the Lean facilitator you need to ensure that at the end of the day the team come up with a credible improvement plan. Ideally it should have no more than ten actions on it and only include items that have already been started as part of the improvement workshop. When you see plans with thirty five actions which include things like; improve communications across the organisation; buy an enterprise telecommunications solution; then you know as facilitator you have not had your finest hour. You need to ask yourself to step outside for a one to one. Give yourself the verbal warning and move on.
So there you have it .Ten Simple Facilitator Tips. As a Lean facilitator, if you apply these sensibly you will not go far wrong. Just remember to do it. It's easy to forget about these simple things during the heat of battle.
Hope this helps.
Best regards,
Graham Ross
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