SIMPLIFYING PROCESS MANAGEMENT TO AMPLIFY ITS …...processes and identifying all customers and...

KID ©2020 APQC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

CASE STUDY

BUSINESS RESULTS

» Launched and sustained 80 continuous improvement teams with

400 employees across 12 functions.

» Improved employee engagement and accelerated skill building.

» Generated significant, sustainable improvements in a variety of

areas including aftermarket, engineering, HR, and quality.

SOLUTION

The organization simplified its approach to prioritizing processes and developed purposeful trainings and communication for leaders and employees to create increased employee empowerment and engagement.

What You’ll Learn

» How to allow functions to take the lead in prioritizing which process improvements

they want to make, as well as how and when to make them

» When to provide specific guidance and structure for selecting process improvement

team members

» How to build and sustain engagement through tailored messaging

» How to provide an opportunity for employees to learn about, apply, and reflect on

process management—all in one day

SIMPLIFYING PROCESS MANAGEMENT TO

AMPLIFY ITS SUCCESS AT COLLINS AEROSPACE

BUSINESS CHALLENGE

Collins Aerospace needed to improve the adoption, ease of use, and scalability of its process management efforts.

ORGANIZATION PROFILE

Collins Aerospace, a unit of Raytheon Technologies, is a leader in technologically advanced and intelligent solutions for the global aerospace and defense industry.

» Aerospace & Defense

» $26 billion (USD) net sales

2019

» 78,000 employees

PARTICIPANTS

Wes Ralph, Associate Director of ACE, Electric Power Systems, Collins Aerospace

Tonya Castillo, Director of Quality, Electric Power Systems, Collins Aerospace

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K010612 ©2020 APQC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Organizational Background Collins Aerospace is a leader in technologically advanced and intelligent solutions for the global aerospace and defense industry. The company was created through the combination of UTC Aerospace Systems and Rockwell Collins in 2018. In 2020, it became a unit of Raytheon Technologies Corp. through the combination of United Technologies and Raytheon.

Collins Aerospace is headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, and operates in more than 300 sites around the world. It has 78,000 employees, 16,000 of whom are engineers. In March 2020, APQC interviewed Wes Ralph, Associate Director of ACE at Collins Aerospace’s Electric Power Systems division in Rockford, Illinois, about the organization’s new approach to engaging employees in process management.

Evolving the Process Management

Approach at Collins Aerospace Collins Aerospace has been a process-focused organization for over 20 years. In 2017, Collins Aerospace benchmarked its process management and continuous improvement approach with another organization. The Collins team had set up an Obeya room (a lean approach to expedite communication and decision making) for its joint engineering and quality data delivery process, which had greatly increased its process maturity. As the team shared their successes, an executive from the other organization asked, “What’s your strategy to take what you achieved with this process and multiply it across the organization?” The Collins team quickly realized they did not have an answer to this important question, which inspired them to re-examine their process management approach.

Collins Aerospace’s continuous improvement program is called Achieving Competitive Excellence (ACE), which includes Process Management as one of its tools. Historically, ACE asked leadership teams to perform 10 different steps—including mapping all current-state processes and identifying all customers and metrics—before a process could be prioritized for improvement.

“In other words, leadership was asked to create a lot of business process inventory just to set priorities. It was just too much to ask of leaders. The prior process also lacked guidance on process improvement team selection principles, both for empowerment and professional development,” said Wes Ralph, Associate Director of ACE. “As a result of all of that, process management wasn’t working the way it was originally intended for our Electric Power Systems business.”

Collins Aerospace

Collins Aerospace improved

adoption and accelerated

results by simplifying its

process management

approach and training.

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GOALS OF THE CHANGE

Collins Aerospace’s ACE team wanted to overhaul its approach to process management with the following goals:

1. simplify the approach to process management to make it easier for leaders throughout the business to get started,

2. support leaders and their leadership teams to gain alignment on top priorities for improvement,

3. engage the workforce to leverage the organization’s diversity and innovation with respect to process in roles that also support their professional development,

4. empower employees through skill development and hands-on “learn-do-share” workshops, 5. collaborate with leaders and their direct reports to develop a cadence for ongoing support

and review of progress as follow-up to “learn-do-share” kickoffs, and 6. focus on continuous improvement and ask employees and leaders for their candid feedback

throughout the process to improve the process of process management itself.

In a nutshell, the new approach still uses process maturity and business impact to prioritize processes for improvement. However, it allows for prioritization to occur without weeks of process mapping. The new approach also includes specific guidance on team selection and streamlined trainings for leadership and employees. “It’s drastically easier and has resulted in much better process management than we’ve had in the past,” said Ralph.

ACE Team The business office ACE team is responsible for continuous improvement expertise within the organization’s non-factory functions, which include approximately 800 people across 12 functions. Electric Power Systems also has a similar group for its operations side in Rockford, and the two teams remain in close communication to share best practices and stay up to date on each other’s work.

The ACE team reports to the Director of Quality and includes three employees. Its primary responsibilities are:

» lead consulting, coaching, development, and the creation of

facilitators across the business to drive ACE activities in the

site aligned to business and customer objectives;

» coordinate and conduct training in ACE tools and methods to build skills across the business;

» coach and develop ACE trainers for the business;

» consult on the appropriate use of ACE tools, including success criteria, for impactful results;

» consult and support leaders in the development of their ACE strategy for their employees

and their processes;

Continuous improvement is everyone’s job. The ACE team is there to assist people. When you combine employee subject matter expertise with the continuous improvement skills that we have helped to provide, we get much more meaningful results for the business as well as for employees.

- Wes Ralph, Collins Aerospace

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» continuously improve ACE and its adoption within Electric Power Systems, Collins

Aerospace, and Raytheon Technologies through tool improvements, trainings, and the

sharing of best practices with internal and external sites; and

» support facilitation and execution of projects as agreed with executive leadership.

As Ralph explained, the ACE team has evolved significantly since 2017. At that time, the organization had zero teaching certifications in the business unit. Ralph was the only member of the ACE Team in the business office, and he spent most of his time on direct facilitation of continuous improvement projects. As the ACE group grew and as the simplified process management approach started to make progress with employees planning and executing their own continuous improvements, the nature of its work began to change. The ACE team now spends more of its time coaching, consulting, and providing continuous improvement skill support to employees in the business.

Functional Process Management Approach Collins Aerospace designed a streamlined approach to align functions on their key processes, business outcomes, and improvement priorities. While this approach was specifically developed for Electric Power Systems, it can be applied in any organization in any industry. The approach consists of four stages (Figure 1).

Functional Process Management Approach

Figure 1

STAGE 1: DEFINE PROCESSES, IMPACTS, AND PRIORITIES

In stage one, the functional leader and his or her direct reports work together to define their processes by name. They use affinity diagrams to capture their activities on individual post-it notes and then group the post-it notes for similar tasks. These similar tasks quickly take shape as their processes. Then, they finalize the list of processes by making a heading for each grouping and save it so teams can understand the most basic boundaries of their processes.

With processes defined, the next step is to determine impact. The leader and their direct reports use flip charts to identify positive outcomes for the business if processes are executed well. They examine business unit level goals, initiatives, and scorecards to see if any positive outcomes are missing. Then, they weight the outcomes to sum to 100 percent, and perform an

https://www.apqc.org/resource-library/resource-listing/affinity-diagram

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impact assessment using an impact assessment tool provided by the ACE team (Figure 2). The impact that each process has on each outcome is scored, which results in a weighted impact score.

Impact Assessment Tool

Figure 2

The final step of this phase is to determine priorities through a combination of process maturity and business impact. The ACE group offers leaders three different methods to assess priority. If the business area has already defined process maturity, it can graph that onto an impact/maturity chart (Figure 3).

Impact/Maturity Chart

Figure 3

The points on the impact maturity chart provide a visual guideline as to what priorities might make the most sense for the team. Generally speaking, high impact and low maturity processes are selected for improvement. Given that this chart does not include the complexity of

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potential improvement efforts, the ACE team does not force priorities on the team. The functional team is given choice to decide what they want to improve.

If simple conversation does not result in aligned priorities, teams can use nominal group technique. Each member of the team identifies their top three to five processes they think are most important to prioritize. These votes are totaled to arrive at a consensus on prioritization (Figure 4).

Nominal Voting

Figure 4

When teams do not have existing process maturity well understood, relative process maturity can be developed on a simple “How are we doing?” flip chart. This method provides teams with the ability to self-assess the maturity of their processes by asking themselves how that process is performing. The impact and maturity scores can then be placed on the Impact/Maturity chart to develop priorities. This is the preferred method for areas that are new to process improvement.

After the group has identified their top processes for improvement, they move on to stage two.

Process

Impact on

EPS Person 1 Person 2 Person 3 Person 4 Person 5 Person 6

Priority

voting

totals

Process 1 3.7 5 5 5 1 5 5 26

Process 2 3.2 4 2 3 1 10

Process 3 3.1 2 4 4 4 2 2 18

Process 4 2.9 1 3 3 1 8

Process 5 2.7 1 1 3 5

Process 6 2.5 2 3 5

Process 7 2.2 3 2 5 4 4 18

Process 8 2.2 0

Process 9 1.6 0

Process 10 1.2 0

Nominal group technique for most important to prioritize.

Each team member will rank their recommended top half of priorities

The vision that I have for the business is that we’re a team of archers all aimed at the same targets. The construction of process management as we’ve set it up helps people reach that alignment faster than ever.


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STAGE 2: IDENTIFY PROCESS IMPROVEMENT TEAMS

In stage two, the ACE team helps the functional owner and direct reports host a “draft day.” Gathered in a conference room, the group lists each process on a whiteboard and sets aside a space as the “reserved bench” (Figure 5). Then, using sticky notes with each employee’s name, they add people to the whiteboard, first identifying process owners and then identifying teams for the processes that were prioritized for improvement. The ACE team sets ground rules and offers recommendations, including:

» each person can only be assigned to one process team;

» only select people that are involved with the process,

have relevant skills, or relevant development needs (and, the reason for selection should be

written down for one on one conversations between supervisors and employees before

teams are finalized);

» identify resource needs—including key internal customers and suppliers—from other

departments;

» keep some experienced talent on the “reserved bench” for other functions’ teams and/or

for surge capacity on improvement projects.

» Every employee in the department will be on a team or on the reserved bench, including

supervisors

Draft Day Process After Team Selection

Figure 5

At the end of draft day, the supervisors of employees will talk to individual employees to confirm their participation. In parallel, the leader of the function collaborates with their peers

Success Factor

The makeup of improvement

teams is a critical determinant

of success. Collins Aerospace

provides clear guidance and

structure for selecting the best-

fit team members.

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to secure key resources for customers and suppliers of certain processes. Then, the leader and their direct reports come back together to finalize the process improvement teams.

STAGE 3: COMMUNICATE AND ENGAGE

In stage three, the functional leader—with support and guidance from the ACE team, develops and executes a communication plan. The primary goals of this communication are to share the priorities and how they were determined, publicize the improvement teams, and ask for everyone’s support in achieving improvement together. Each individual employee already knows their assignment before this meeting as a result of the discussion they had with their supervisor before teams were finalized, so this engagement meeting is an opportunity to learn more about the overall goals, what processes their peers will be improving, and to ask questions of the department leader or the ACE team.

At this meeting, employees also learn that they will be invited to a “learn-do-share” kickoff in stage 4.

After the meeting, supervisors and employees also add continuous improvement goals to the performance management system.

STAGE 4: TRAIN, PLAN, EMPOWER, AND CONTINUOUSLY IMPROVE

In stage four, the ACE team helps host a “learn-do-share” kickoff. The kickoff is a full day event for multiple teams in a department that consists of:

1. Learn: 15 minutes of stage-setting by the functional leader and 90 minutes of simplified process maturity training provided by the ACE team,

2. Do: 6 hours of immediate application wherein the empowered teams work on their improvement ideas, and

3. Share: 1 hour of knowledge sharing between the teams.

A big part of the workshop opening is communicating employee empowerment. Employees get to decide what they will improve within their processes. The ACE team does not specify the amount of time that should be spent on improvement. “Ask yourselves what you can give. Instead of trying to improve a bunch of different things at once, pick one right thing at a time. Take it in small bites, and chew fast,” said Ralph.

The ACE team also works with the functional leader to define a post-workshop review cadence. As each improvement is completed, the functional leader celebrates successes and employees and their supervisors update the performance management system with successes and next opportunities.

Success Factor

Providing an opportunity for

employees to apply and reflect

helps cement learning and

builds momentum.

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PEOPLE, INPUTS, OUTPUTS

The main participants in the functional process management approach are a member of the ACE team, the functional manager and his or her direct reports, the executive leadership team, and once teams are formed and communicated, all department employees. To prepare for the functional process management approach, the function is asked to collect existing SIPOCs, process maps, process maturity ratings, impact maturity models, existing process improvement teams, and a department org chart. The ACE group provides templates for process management, facilitates the prioritization process and team selection, and provides process management training.

The end results of the approach are necessarily varied and dependent on the function’s goals and participation of team members, but typically include:

» a prioritized list of processes to improve;

» formal process improvement teams for priority processes;

» employee communications;

» IMM and SIPOC for the function;

» a detailed plan and cadence to achieve process improvement; and

» performance management meetings on goals and successes for priority processes.

“We help the leader establish a cadence and perform ongoing consulting upon request, but we don’t follow up with the teams as if we’re their boss. We don’t want continuous improvement to become check-the-box,” said Ralph. “We focus more on encouraging, skill building, and empowerment.”

Training The ACE team provides a variety of trainings. Courses are presented in-person whenever possible; otherwise, training is delivered via video conference. Some of the more common courses that the ACE team provides to leaders and employees are in the following areas:

» process management and process maturity;

» collecting and analyzing voice of customer and voice of process data,

» standardized work,

» relentless root cause analysis (RRCA),

» benchmarking,

» leadership and change management,

» kaizen leadership,

» value stream mapping, and

» process certification.

The ACE team also purpose-built a simplified process maturity skill course. This is the training that is provided during “learn-do-share” kickoffs, and it’s called “Process Management with SIMPACT.” SIMPACT stands for simple, actionable, and tangible. The course provides additional guidance on tips on how to drive process maturity by correlating the ACE process maturity tool

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to a one-page summary of the ACE operating system. It also offers simple methods for effectively implementing voice of the customer, voice of process, standard work, success criteria, and measures.

Thus, “Process Management with SIMPACT” serves as a crash course in process that, when presented in the “learn-do-share” kickoff, offers employees an opportunity to immediately apply what they’ve learned. Leaders also participate in the training as a show of support and buy-in. This also ensures that employees and leaders speak the same language when it comes to process and continuous improvement. Often, the leaders learn something too. “Even among people that have had a decent amount of the formal ACE training, we’ve been told that it’s a great refresher,” said Ralph.

Engagement The ACE team built engagement for its new process management approach by starting with receptive leaders. As Ralph explained, he reached out to a positive leader on the Executive Leadership team and said, “I’ve got an idea on how we can do this even better than before. Here’s what’s in it for you, your employees, your department, and when we are successful, the business as a whole. Can we try it?”

Then, that department piloted the approach and used success stories from that engagement to encourage other teams and areas to get involved. The ACE team was patient in its approach. Overall, it took about 18 months to fully deploy process management across all functions. “It wasn’t long before every function was excited for the opportunity to take this approach,” said Ralph.

While the ACE team used top-down messaging to build initial buy-in, it uses tailored, bottom-up messaging to create engagement. Messaging to leaders focuses on alignment and improved business results, while messaging to employees focuses on empowerment (Figure 6).

Messaging Examples

FOR LEADERS AND THEIR DIRECT REPORTS FOR EMPLOYEES

“We’ve made process management easier for you.”

“Here are the top priorities for the business, why they are important, and how you fit in.”

“This is an opportunity to align your group and your leadership team on top priorities.”

“We want to empower each and every one of you to make improvements to processes that you know more about than we do.”

“This is an opportunity to engage your department, develop their skills, and solve problems all at the same time—without everything resting on your shoulders.”

“We want you to spend time on this, and we are going to provide you with additional skill training in order to make process maturity easier to understand and act upon.”

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“Over time, this will help you find future leaders on your staff.”

“You are empowered to decide within your team what you want to improve within your process, and when you carve out time to work on it.”

“This is something you have to own and support. If you support it through your actions and by removing obstacles, you will get great results from your employees.”

“We look forward to your ideas and improvements. If you need help, ask.”

Figure 6

Training proved to be the best way to convey the ACE group’s message of empowerment to employees. “In the SIMPACT process maturity training, I always have a moment where I say, ‘Hey, this is what works for me. Here’s how I do it and the tactics I use. If this reverberates with you, go ahead and do it the same way. If you have a different idea or want to do it in a different sequence, go for it, because you know your process better than me,’” said Ralph.

Measurement and Business Results The ACE team measures the success of its new approach to process management through feedback surveys. For example, they survey kickoff participants how they felt about their leadership, the training material, the training, and the applicability of the concepts within their own business (Figure 7).

Learn-Do-Share Kickoff Feedback Survey

Please mark one rating score for each question Extremely Very Very Extremely

Dissatisfied Dissatisfied Dissatisfied Neutral Satisfied Satisfied Satisfied

How satisfied were you with: 1 2 3 4 5 6 ☺ 7

The process improvement kickoff and training?

The instructor's knowledge of the training material?

The clarity & delivery of the training presentation?

The explanation from leadership on how the process improvement teams were formed and how priorities were developed?

The discussion your supervisor had with you prior to today’s process improvement kickoff meeting?

Overall:

Are you satisfied that this session provided knowledge you can apply in your job?

I believe we can make improvements for the team I am a part of

What is your overall satisfaction with this day of training and planning?

I believe in the EPS Business Improvement Effort

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Figure 7

Across 80 teams launched within the past two years, feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, as a small sample of testimonials conveys.

» “I felt the organization has been re-energized using this approach to ACE. The team felt very

empowered to work through their process.”

» “Great vision for improvements that can support my daily job.”

» “The presentation of the material wasn’t redundant and was taught with high energy, which

kept me interested.”

» “We were able to come up with problems and work through possible solution steps on our

own.”

» “I feel empowered and excited to be a part of the positive transformation.”

In addition to this positive employee feedback, the approach has also received high praise from top leadership. For example, Tonya Castillo, Director of Quality at Collins Aerospace, said, “Wes brings a really fresh perspective on ACE and process improvement tools. He breaks it down in a way that makes it understandable to individuals that don’t necessarily have a lot of background or information about the different process tools that he drives. It’s very easily digestible.”

ACE’s new approach to process management has generated significant business results. The approach to process management and continuous improvement has been praised by internal and external AS9100 auditors, many of whom have said it is one of the best within Collins Aerospace. The organization has seen a broad spectrum of results across functions, for example:

» aftermarket—improvements to pricing approvals process and voice of customer idea

submission process from field service representatives;

» contracts—created dashboards for demand management reporting;

» engineering—improvements to the technology planning process and improved service

bulletin standard work;

» finance—improved financial planning with mistake-proofing tied to SAP logic;

» human resources—process mapping for the co-op and intern/early careers program;

» international trade compliance—applied 5S (a lean methodology to reduce waste and

improve productivity) to balanced scorecard measures;

» program management—developed talent and skills processes including mentoring of new

program managers;

» quality—improved calibration processes and equipment, software quality assurance SIPOC

development, drastic reduction in handling steps for first article inspection process and

developed a more effective quality management system audit preparation process.

“The very best part about these improvements it that these were ideas that the employees came up with and implemented,” said Ralph. “The ACE team is focused on building skills across the organization which, when coupled with the subject matter expertise of our employees, gives us better outcomes than if the ACE team were solely leading these projects.”

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Lessons Learned Wes Ralph shared five lessons learned throughout the process of streamlining and improving process management at Collins Aerospace.

1. Find the right leader to help you pilot the process. Nothing is more important than their support and behavior as it relates to any change effort.

2. Allow choice. Choice applies to leaders and leadership teams for what processes they want to improve. It also applies to employees, who should able to decide what they want to improve in the process and how to make those improvements.

3. Build teams purposely. This includes selecting team members for their process knowledge, existing adjacent skills, and/or for their development. It also includes engaging the entire department with clear priorities for every employee. Finally, key customers and suppliers should be included on teams in order to focus on customer value and to get the right inputs into the processes.

4. Skill empowerment is full empowerment. The ACE Group worked hard to condense and simplify its training material so it could fit into a smaller time window, which then allowed them to structure “learn-do-share” workshops in a way that accelerates skill building and retention of concepts.

5. Develop a cadence that works for the leader and the team. In continuous improvement, it’s sometimes difficult to see results every day—or even every week. Work with the leader to determine a cadence that the team will support. This is key for long-term sustainability.

ABOUT APQC

APQC helps organizations work smarter, faster, and with greater confidence. It is the world’s foremost authority in benchmarking, best practices, process and performance improvement, and knowledge management. APQC’s unique structure as a member-based nonprofit makes it a differentiator in the marketplace. APQC partners with more than 500 member organizations worldwide in all industries. With more than 40 years of experience, APQC remains the world’s leader in transforming organizations. Visit us at https://www.apqc.org/, and learn how you can make best practices your practices.

COLLINS AEROSPACE INTERVIEW POLICY

All opinions expressed by Wes Ralph and Tonya Castillo in this article are solely their current opinions and do not reflect the opinions of Hamilton Sundstrand, Collins Aerospace, their respective parent companies or affiliates or any other organization with which they may be affiliated. Wes Ralph and Tonya Castillo's opinions are based upon information they consider reliable, but neither Hamilton Sundstrand, Collins Aerospace, nor their affiliates, warrant its completeness or accuracy, and it should not be relied upon as such.

“There’s not a single thing that we did that’s rocket science. It’s just a lot of common sense that is uncommonly applied.”


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SIMPLIFYING PROCESS MANAGEMENT TO AMPLIFY ITS …...processes and identifying all customers and...

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