Paul Dunlop: Why I Joined TeamAssurance

Over my twenty something year career in the manufacturing sector I have had a broad range of experience and learning. My beginnings on the frontlines as a machine operator and the subsequent progression through the levels of functional leadership combined with my journey as a Lean practitioner has provided me with many insights into the workings of any aspirational organisation. 

This experience led me to establish my own consulting business in 2017 where my passion for operational excellence using Lean tools and methodology has helped drive sustained continuous improvement, positive cultural change and financial performance at many businesses across all sectors.

I have learned that the key to driving effective and sustainable organisational change is through a human centred approach focussing on engaging the ongoing support and commitment of both frontline staff and senior management through effective Lean leadership to facilitate engagement and inclusive problem-solving cultures. This must be combined with effective visual communication structures with clarity and alignment around strategic goals and objectives. 

My experience of having walked in the shoes of the people I now coach provides invaluable insights into the challenges that organisations and leaders face. Many of these challenges revolve simply around the flow of communication, exposure and visibility of process issues and engaging frontline teams in a meaningful and purposeful way. My focus is always to build and develop local capability and structures for the long term by facilitating a growth mindset and a culture of innovation which consistently delivers business improvement and human development.

So, why TeamAssurance?

From my experience working in organisations and my experience working on organisations I have encountered a number of trends or ‘truths’ as they are known in my lexicon. These exposed truths are centred around:

• Communication flow
• Engagement and unlocking inherent human capability
• Performance monitoring and management

Most if not all organisations struggle with these ‘truths’ and grapple with an approach or methodology with which to overcome the associated suboptimal cultural and performance issues. Traditional Lean tools such as Tiered Visual Management structures, Standardised Work and Hoshin Planning combined with the appropriate Leadership approach provide a substantial antidote to these universal issues. Implementing these tools and sustaining them requires the development of numerous physical (and human) structures and connections. This creates potential bottlenecks or roadblocks caused by inaccessibility, timing or the volume of administration. This is particularly true of larger organisations or those with multiple sites and departments. These barriers to entry and processing issues are often not intentional as a Lean approach in itself has liberated information, exposed process waste and opened up the problem solving conversation with a wider cohort vertically and horizontally.

The limitations with a ‘manual’ Lean process can be exposed quickly and the conversation turns to how we optimise or ‘lean’ our Lean process.

Enter TeamAssurance - enabling all of the above, removing barriers to entry and increasing velocity of communication. Administering strategic, targeted improvement and gaining visibility of progress is easy with the platform. Plus, it's backed by an expert team who work closely with organisations on Lean transformation. No implementation is just ‘set and forget’ - it’s an ongoing process of consultation and collaboration.

I’m excited to be a part of this process, and a part of this team. We’re on the cusp of widespread adoption of digital Lean tools and I believe TeamAssurance is leading the charge.