Last week I talked about ratings and how we seem to have lost the purpose. So if ratings have taken on a life of their own, what do we do instead to foster continuous improvement?

In the manufacturing world there is the concept of Kaizen, brought to the U.S. by Edward Deming. It’s a simple concept that goes like this. Intentionally and continuously look for ways to innovate and improve your business processes. Employees, customers and other stakeholders can be a source of those ideas.

So, rather than give up on surveys, what if we turned them into something useful?

  • Instead of focusing on the ratings, what if we focused on the comments?
  • Instead of looking for what is wrong, what if we looked for what is right?
  • Instead of focusing on big initiatives, what if we encouraged our stakeholders to share ideas for continuous improvement?

Once we start collecting these ideas and small innovations, what metrics can we put in place to measure the results of our continuous improvement efforts?

Why Vistage Works

Elisa K. Spain

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