Eritrea's HIV/AIDS Plan

The battle against HIV/AIDS is frustrating many governments around the world, despite the vast amounts of resources poured into this global fight. We have helped the Ministry of Health of Eritrea demonstrate how the battle might be won.

The Challenge
Dr. Saleh Meky, Eritrean Minister of Health, was keen to begin implementing the national strategic plan to fight HIV/AIDS in his country. He had seen too many well conceived strategic plans developed by well intentioned experts gather dust on the shelves. He was not about to let this happen in this case-too much was at stake. The World Bank asked us to help Minister Meky introduce the Rapid Results Approach as a way to jump-start and accelerate implementation of the national HIV/AIDS strategic plan.

How Schaffer Consulting Helped
We helped Minister Meky and his team and other stakeholders quickly zero in on six areas of focus to attack right away. Rapid-Results teams were launched, each challenged with achieving a significant result within 100 days in one of these areas. Our consultants provided coaching to the leadership team at the Ministry and methodological support to the teams. We also trained local consultants on supporting Rapid Results teams to ensure that the momentum would be sustained and to set the stage for scaling up the initial results.

The Impact
Here are a few of the results that the Rapid Results initiative teams achieved in the first hundred days of the effort:

Weekly number of clients visiting Voluntary Counseling and Testing (VCT) centers jumped 80 percent, from 220 in early March to 396 during the second week of June
Of the 100 commercial sex workers who participated in the 100-day peer support program, 72 became regular users of female condoms, and 34 started using VCT services
A home-based care program was developed-and 117 families began receiving care in the first 100 days

Eighteen months after the Rapid Results Approach was introduced, the pilot region is in its third wave of Rapid Results initiatives-each wave expanding on the initial impact. For example, the effort targeting commercial sex workers expanded from 100 to 500 in the second wave of Rapid Results initiatives, and to 1000 in the third. And the goals and results in terms of the percentage adopting safe sex behaviors were ratcheted up from round to round.

The Rapid Results Approach was adopted in the five other regions in the country-with support from local coaches. Rapid Results initiatives have become a central part of the arsenal for fighting HIV/AIDS in Eritrea.

Growth at Avery Dennison

The leadership team in Avery Dennison was looking to accelerate growth-now-while building the foundation for continued expansion. Using the Rapid Results Approach, they were able to add $50 million in the first year of the program; the second year they contributed an additional $150 million to the top line.

The Challenge
When the adhesives films, and office products manufacturer, Avery Dennison, was growing, CEO Phil Neal and his leadership team were not satisfied with the pace. Although growth was a major corporate goal, the company had increased its revenues by only 8% in two years. Neal and President Dean Scarborough asked us to introduce the Rapid Results Approach as a way to quickly act on growth opportunities that could be turned into real growth within 3-6 months.

How Schaffer Consulting Helped
Within weeks, we helped launch 15 Rapid Results teams in three North American divisions. One was charged with securing one new order for an enhanced product, refined in collaboration with a large customer, within 100 days. Another focused on penetrating three new retail chains so it could use that experience to move into new distribution channels. A third aimed to book several hundred thousand dollars in sales in 100 days by providing-through collaboration with a dozen other suppliers-all the parts needed by a major customer. By December, it had become clear that these growth initiatives were producing results, and the management team extended the process throughout the company. Dozens of teams, involving hundreds of people, started working on Rapid Results initiatives. Rapid Results Initiatives continue to fuel organic growth in the company.

The Impact
The 15 pilot growth initiatives had delivered almost $15 million in annualized incremental revenue. After expanding the program through all major divisions and around the world, the program delivered over $50 million in incremental revenue in the first year and $150 million the second year of using Rapid Results to fuel organic growth for the company. The effort continues, driven by internal resources we trained to support the approach. Ram Charan described Avery's winning strategy of focusing on "singles" and "doubles" in his book "Profitable Growth is Everyone's Business".

DuPont Canada

Breakthrough Strategy: A stepping stone to greater success

Since the early 1990s, several DuPont business units have relied on a performance improvement methodology called the "Breakthrough Strategy." Developed by Schaffer Consulting over the last 40 years, the technique is also used at Nortel, Motorola, E. I. du Pont, and other leading companies.

The Breakthrough Strategy provides a structured framework to help align improvement objectives with business objectives, ultimately accelerating their pace and payoff. Its cornerstone is "tapping into hidden reserves" of potentially productive capacity, then focusing on immediate results, which are used as stepping stones to greater successes. "The commitment is to reach the set goals with the resources that are available right now," says Rudi Siddik, a Schaffer consultant who has led Breakthrough Strategy sessions at Du Pont Canada.

The first applications in DuPont Canada were at Whitby site, where two projects contributed over $900,000 in savings in 1990. Art Heeney, now site manager at Maitland, was Whitby's site manager then. Of the Breakthrough Strategy, he says, "Today, in Manufacturing Committee, we are looking at ways to increase productivity, and the Breakthrough Strategy can help us do this."

Examples abound within DuPont. Some breakthrough projects have been initiated by Manufacturing Committee (made up of site managers and key functional leaders); others were sparked by Functioning Effectiveness.

Under the Functioning Effectiveness umbrella, Jack Smith led a breakthrough project in Maintenance, Repair and Operate Materials (MRO) at Kingston and Maitland (see courier, December 1998). Improvements in shop access have led to better safety and operations integrity, while reducing costs.

In another Functioning Effectiveness project, Wilma Ouimet, senior business specialist - Kingston, and her team used the strategy to reduce re-work related to inventory reclassifications at Kingston site and Maitland Engineering Polymers. (Reclassifications are needed after incorrect codes are entered into the main accounting system.) By developing improved work processes, including detailed documentation, the controllers and Finance people succeeded in boosting quality and cutting errors. "We met our original goal and now have a documented process that can be used by other teams," says Wilma.

The Breakthrough Strategy is also being used in a corporate drive to reduce hand and finger injuries. This team, sponsored by Ajax site manager John Foster (representing Manufacturing Committee), is chaired by Lloyd Cook, Whitby, and Jim McKinnon, Ajax. In December 1998, they quickly set a goal to reduce hand and finger injuries by 50 percent at the end of 12 weeks. "We first developed a generic workplan. Now each site and business unit is forming its own specific workplan from the generic one," says Lloyd, safety manager at Whitby. "If we meet our goal, we will achieve our best year ever, as far as recordable injuries are concerned. We want to have the systems and processes in place that will sustain our improved performance," he adds.

The strategy has also been used to cut freight costs. Pat McCaffery, a manager in Materials, Logistics & Services, explains that Manufacturing Committee, while looking for ways to support our superordinate goals, asked if there were additional opportunities to reduce freight expenses. "Even though our freight costs are very competitive within global DuPont, we set ambitious goals and then met them in four or five months," says Pat. They generated actual savings of $100,000 in 1998, and expected savings of $500,000 in 1999, by putting in place controls for everyone who deals with freight, to ensure that it is being handled by approved carriers who offer pre-arranged rates.

At Kingston site, a breakthrough program started in August 1998 for the Batch Polymer Pelletizer Systems, which had experienced quality problems. "We used a disciplined approach to understand the issues, determine the root cause and set up a work plan. Our specific goal is to decrease the monthly volume of pelletizer waste by 2.4 percent by the second quarter of 1999," says Ken Hall, integrated operations leader. At press time, the team was on track; they expect to see the benefits of their work through the second quarter of 1999.

Sourcing and services manager Josée Lachance says, "The Breakthrough Strategy is an easily learned, very focused project-planning framework that brings discipline to a project. It is not new at DuPont, but we are applying it more diligently now."

This article reproduced from the DuPont Canada "Courier" March 1999

Employee Safety at Norwich Hospital

Project reduced injuries at hospital

Just about everyone involved agrees that the so-called Schaffer project was a success at reducing injuries to workers at the state's hospital for the mentally ill in Norwich.

"It's the best thing I've seen recently," said Robert F. Taylor, who heads safety and security for the state Department of Mental Health. "It's produced the best results."

"This is the most exciting thing I've seen. It shows what can be done when there is a real focus," said Merrilee Milstein, and official of the New England Health Care Employees Union, District 1199.

Under the project, which was implemented by a private consultant, Schaffer Consulting, managers and employees work as a team in each hospital ward to understand why specific injuries happen and to prevent them from happening again.

The project involves close monitoring of patients, particularly those that can become violent, and tries to make sure each shift of workers communicates well with the other shifts.

The department says that in those wards where the project was implemented, injuries to workers were cut by more than half.

Mental health department administrators say they plan to expand the project to wards at Connecticut Valley Hospital in Middletown.

The project is part of one of the most aggressive efforts by state agencies to reduce injuries and costs, department and union leaders say. They say Taylor has worked hard to make sure managers and employees overcome animosity to team up to prevent injuries. The Schaffer project fit into those plans.

Curiously, some state officials who coordinate workers' compensation programs are reluctant to give the project their wholehearted endorsement.

"It was a good project, a step forward," said Stephen J. Negri, commissioner of administrative services, which oversees workers' compensation programs for the state. "But it's not really and end-all, be-all."

This article reproduced from "The Hartford Courant" March 12, 1990, by Brant Houston

Motorola UDS

Team effort ensures success of breakthrough strategy in V.3225

In early November 1993, Jim Wagner announced several critical improvement challenges facing Motorola UDS. Of particular importance was the need to improve the delinquency and cycle time performance of key high-selling products. Jim wanted a significant step up in performance-a breakthrough in delinquency and cycle time results-and he wanted these results in the short term. Bobby Potts was picked to lead the effort to improve the performance in these important operational areas.

Bobby formed a cross-functional team made up of key departments that can help reduce processing cycle times for the major products. Team members included: Jack Hayes of Engineering; Joe Forrest of Production; Mark Breen of Production Control; Linda Baty of Master Scheduling; John Leavitt of Finance; Amy Cleary of Product Marketing; Debbie Nevins of Materials Management; Jim Oliver and John Delore of TQP; and Kathy Woody of Shipping. This core team was supported by other ad-hoc members including Anita Kimbrough of Order Entry; Paul Souve of Quality; and Dennis Buffaloe of Human Resources. In addition, Rudi Siddik of Schaffer Consulting worked with the team to apply the Breakthrough Strategy methodology to this effort.

The Breakthrough Strategy is a results-driven improvement process that produces tangible gains in performance in the short term. It has been applied in a number of Motorola divisions to help accelerate performance improvements in sales, quality, productivity and new product introductions.

The team also worked with the MIS group to generate reports on delinquency and cycle time, which enabled the team to track their progress against the goal on a weekly basis.

"I was most impressed with the spirit of cooperation throughout the whole company. This project brought everyone together to work in one direction with one focus," said Linda Baty, Manager of Scheduling.

The Results
The impact of the team's efforts were quite dramatic. Within six weeks, the cycle time goal was achieved. V.3225 is now available within the one-day order-to-ship cycle time. Additionally, the delinquency performance for V.3225 improved significantly from an average of seven to nine days in November to zero to one day in December. Other spinoffs from this project included improvements in quality and a significant cost reduction.

Some of the reasons for the success of this effort can be attributed to the creation of a single cross-functional team focused on achieving a specific goal. "We really experienced how effective a cross-functional team could be when members concentrated on accomplishing a company goal rather than being preoccupied with just the effects on their respective departments," said Mark Breen, Supervisor of Production/Inventory Control. Because the goal was agreed to by everyone in advance, the team was able to break down barriers between organizations.

The momentum generated from this project led to an evolution of this team into another breakthrough team. The new team will roll the V.3225 success across all product lines and apply their learnings to other products starting with V.3229 and then expanding to the other top 20 high-selling products.

Simplified product structure, streamlined processes, controlled stocking levels, weekly delinquent tracking are now becoming the norm at Motorola UDS.

This article reproduced from "Online" the newsletter of Motorola UDS Division, Volume 1, Issue 8
By Bobby Potts and Rudi Siddik

HR Managers

Attention HR: Managers need help

Professionals in human resources could sit around, hoping to come up with that big idea that will get them to the boardroom table. That will work for about one per cent of HR people. The other 99 per cent can take a route that is less idealistic but more likely to succeed. They can help ordinary managers, in ordinary departments, become more efficient.

HR's real value to a company comes through applying its tools, such as organization effectiveness, to less-efficient departments to help managers improve performance. Many managers feel helpless, as though external factors will always prevent them from achieving their goals, their budgets and deadlines. They don't have enough money, they don't have enough staff, they don't have enough time or outside help or whatever it is they want to point a finger at. HR likely can't give them more money, head count or resources. But HR can help managers prioritize - to focus on what their true goals are and should be.

A good HR professional can help managers look at what they've done right in the past, analyze those projects, identify what helped them succeed and apply what they've learned from past successes to present-day projects. A manager who is spinning his wheels, achieving average productivity, will almost always accept assistance from an HR professional who, rather than taking over and forcing herself on the department, simply offers her organizational effectiveness knowledge as a conduit to improved performance.

Even high-performing companies experience delays, errors, miscommunication, delivery failures, turf battles, dysfunctional management styles and other execution shortfalls. HR needs to help managers improve their departments' capability to execute successfully, to achieve goals on time and on budget.

But how? First, HR needs to engage managers by helping them estimate their company's productivity losses and the potential gains for the organization in improving execution. Managers should think about the kinds of execution shortfalls and management dysfunction they have experienced and then consider projects they've been part of that went well - recovery from a crisis, getting a new product out to a vital customer ahead of schedule or making that extraordinary delivery against tough obstacles. Finally, they should look at the gap between their day-to-day performance and the successful performance. The HR professional who can help a manager see what he's done right in the past, and how the elements of those successes could be applied in the present, will have everyone's attention, including that of the CEO.

Improving execution is an opportunity that can be easily exploited without major investments in facilities, equipment or massive cultural change programs. It can be done by making execution improvement explicit and making a commitment to incorporate execution improvement into the company's work-life.

There are four major steps to take:

Focus the organization on a few major priorities - those things that must happen and which will have the greatest impact on bottom-line results and growth. A few very sharp, very clear and very urgent priority objectives can set the stage for extraordinary execution. Many managers are overwhelmed by all of the things they feel "must" get done, when in fact senior management is likely only focused on a handful of measurable items. The HR professional can help to bridge the gap between the CEO's expectations and the everyday reality of a manager's department.
Help the manager focus on some specific, short-term projects. These can be 30-, 60- or 100-day projects that are relatively easy to do and can be learning experiences.
Provide rigorous support to help managers tackle the short-term projects to learn the basic disciplines of proper execution.
Be sure reward processes are in place to recognize people for their successes.

Teaching and coaching, as well as on-the-job experience are needed to build better execution capabilities. There are several major categories of execution discipline to be learned:

Designing work: Think through the job to be done and design it to succeed. This requires helping the manager think through assignments and work with his core team to create an effective strategy.
Dealing with tough issues: Resourceful managers learn how to handle real-life challenges along the way to the goal, managing political ins and outs and problem-solving to overcome unexpected delays and obstacles.
Learning from experience: Openness to learning is at the heart of it all. Learning should be built into every project.

A manager's goals should be measurable. Take, for example, a manager who is aiming to get a website up and running by a specific date to generate sales orders. Every day of delay is a day of lost revenue. It may be tempting to blame the delay on the IT group or a web designer or a marketing person, but it is the responsibility of the prime project manager to see that everyone else delivers and the project is completed on time. Ensuring that manager has the necessary execution skills will enable the project manager to fulfill that responsibility.

HR can help a company get on the road to extraordinary performance by practicing these skills on progressively tougher and more ambitious goals.