Chris Schweighardt @chrissch9674  Reputation - 382 Rank - Aluminum | Process Improver vs. Process Owner I find quite often on projects, that the process improvers (lean six sigma/black belt resources) sometimes “evolve” into a process owner role; still leading well-beyond implementaton and control. In fact, even when team member roles are clearly defined up-front on the charter, it still seems to happen. Whatever your opinion is on this (for it, or against it), I’m curious to hear your overall thoughts & experience. |
MBBinWI @MBBinWI Reputation - 1829 Rank - Silver | @chrissch9674 – Yes, Chris, this often happens. It is symptomatic of really understanding the process, something that all too often the process owner doesn’t. And when the process owner abdicates responsibility to the belt, it is typical that the belt will step into that role. When I work with a process owner, I mentor them that the belt is a temp resource there to help them achieve their objectives. If they give up their ownership, then they should expect to give it up fully and be replaced (I try not to be quite that direct/harsh, but sometimes it is necessary). Belts are not process owners, they are resources to help process owners succeed. If they “evolve” into the process owner, then it was probably the wrong person in the process owner role to begin with.
Just my humble opinion. |
hogan rebel | This blog is the nice article.the view is the news. |
Chris Schweighardt @chrissch9674  Reputation - 382 Rank - Aluminum | MBBinWI, good points & I agree |
Mike Paulonis @paulonis Reputation - 8 Rank - Aluminum | What I see more often than the belt becoming the process owner is that the belt becomes the company expert in the topic of the project. The process owner is still the process owner, but the belt actually gains a deeper understanding of the process than the process owner. Thus, the belt remains attached to the process because of their newly-minted expertise. This isn’t entirely bad, but isn’t ideal either. |
Chris Schweighardt @chrissch9674  Reputation - 382 Rank - Aluminum | @paulonis Mike, I see this as well. Just my opinion, but belts should be able to continuously move on to other/new projects to allow themselves to practice what they’re trained to do, and the owners become the process experts, but this doesn’t always happen. This is especially true with belts who are embedded in specific organizations that own the processes they’re working on. The organizations seem to make the belts “all things process-related”…e.g. the process improver, owner, expert, performance reporter, etc. It’s not bad, except it typically doesn’t allow the belts the chance to execute their LSS tools (charters, SIPOC, FMEA, value stream mapping, facilitation, data analysis, etc) on an on-going basis. They’ll execute the tool one time for a specific process, and the rest of their time is spent on a specific process — implementing, monitoring, and owning. One way I’ve seen that’s somewhat effective in preventing this, is to assign all belts to one single organization that doesn’t own any of the processes they’re working on — like internal consultants that float from one organization to the next. This also promotes sharing best practices across the company. |
February 7, 20120
