Lessons from Escaping the Improvement Trap

Fact: Within any industry – be it hospitals, public accounting firms, manufacturing, governmental organizations or law firms — 20% of the organizations will be dramatically improving much more effectively than 80% of their competitors.

What does the top 20% do differently than the rest in their respective industries? In The Escape the Improvement Trap: Five Ingredients Missing in Most Improvement Recipes , the authors reveal the five most important ingredients that the top 20% exploit, but the remaining 80% do in a mediocre fashion:

Create value for customers.
Create an environment in which employees excel to their fullest potential.
Measure performance in a more meaningful fashion – Use the “right” metrics not all the metrics!
Apply process thinking to all areas of work.
Use an “executive mindset” to improve the way the organization goes about the business of improvement.

This podcast I had with co-author Michael Bremer was exhilarating for me as a host. By the end of the podcast, you will look at your continuous improvement efforts from a totally different perspective. Mike does a great job summarizing the five steps and you will be surprised and maybe how simple it is. He simply nails it!