The Inner Game of Change
Welcome to The Inner Game of Change podcast, where we dive deep into the complexities of managing organisational change. Tailored for leaders, change practitioners, and anyone driving transformation, our episodes explore key topics like leadership, communication, change capability, and process design. Expert guests share practical strategies and insights to help you navigate and lead successful change initiatives. Listen in to learn fresh ideas and perspectives from a variety of industries, and gain the tools and knowledge you need to lead transformation with confidence. Explore our episodes at www.theinnergameofchange.com.au, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Youtube or anywhere you listen to your podcasts.
The Inner Game of Change
E90 - What Kaizen Gets Right About Change - Podcast with James Stevenson
Welcome to The Inner Game of Change, the podcast where we explore the unseen forces that shape how we lead, adapt, and thrive in the face of change and transformation.
In this episode, I am joined by James Stevenson, Principal at Kaizen Institute Western Europe. James brings clarity, calm, and sharp thinking to the world of continuous improvement.
We talk about what Kaizen truly is (and what it is not), why it starts with the customer, not the process, and how so many change efforts lose their way by optimising for convenience rather than value.
From leadership mindsets to simulated learning, from efficiency gains to the often-ignored question of “what happens after the improvement?”, this conversation looks at the human and the structural sides of change.
We also explore the role of artificial intelligence in continuous improvement, and how AI might be the sharpest new tool in the Kaizen toolbox, if used wisely.
If you are in the business of enabling better change, better work and better workplaces, this one will land.
I am grateful to have James chatting with me today.
About James
A conscientious and hard-working consultant at Kaizen Institute Western Europe.
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Ali Juma
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partner with an organization and we talk about change change as much as some people say they they're very pro-change. Change can be quite a scary kind of topic for people, naturally, purely because it's the. It's the, let's say, fear of the unknown. So everybody likes routine and they like their habits, and making a change in the first place can be can be a little bit uncomfortable, purely because you don't necessarily know how you're going to adapt at an individual level. So there's a few things I would say that are differentiating factors to ensure the sort of sustainability of changes, to avoid them sort of fading away over time.
Speaker 2:One is Welcome to the Inner Game of Change, the podcast where we explore the unseen forces that shape how we lead, adapt and thrive in the face of change and transformation. I am your host, ali Juma. I am your host, ali Juma. In this episode, I am joined by James Stevenson, principal at Kaizen Institute in Western Europe. James brings clarity, calm and sharp thinking to the world of continuous improvement. We talk about what Kaizen truly is and what it is not, why it starts with the customer, not the process, and how so many change efforts lose their way by optimizing for convenience rather than value. From leadership mindsets to simulated learning, from efficiency gains to the often ignored question of what happens after the improvement.
Speaker 2:This conversation looks at the human and structural sides of change. We also explore the role of artificial intelligence in continuous improvement and how AI might be the sharpest new tool in the Kaizen toolbox. If used wisely. If you're in the business of enabling better change, better work and better workplaces, this one will land. I am grateful to have James chatting with me today. Well, james, thank you so much for joining me in the In A Game of Change podcast. So good to see you again.
Speaker 1:Pleasure to be here, Ali, and great to catch up.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much. You are, in my eyes, an expert in the Kaizen and the methodology. Can you just walk me through what a Kaizen methodology is?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so Kaizen originated in Japan and, in terms of kind of the core principles of what it stands for, it's all about being very transparent, data-driven, looking at things in a very holistic way to understand where waste exists and how it can be eliminated, to make processes better. Okay, so in essence, it's really just about continuous improvement. So change for the better, or making improvements to the way that people work or the way that processes function.
Speaker 2:This idea of eliminating waste. Is that the core of Kaizen, or is it improving existing processes?
Speaker 1:It's sort of a combination of the two really. So it's really the fundamental starting point for Kaizen is really understanding what is value in the eyes of the customer, so whether your customer could be somebody internal to your organization. So if you think about there's several functions within an organization. Some serve other functions internally and others are directly driving to, say, the end customer or the next customer outside the organization. And really in Kaizen what we're talking about is what matters to them, what do they care about, what is important? That means that they come to you for your product or your service and then really homing in on the activities that exist within the organization, what are directly contributing to those, let's say, value adding activities that the customer is willing to pay for, and then what are the processes or activities that aren't.
Speaker 1:So it's quite a binary way of looking at the world. But once you have that kind of concept clear, then Kaizen is really just focusing on how can you add more value to the customer or to the people that you're designing those products and services for, and how can you reduce the amount of time and effort and resources that the organization or the people are spending on the things that don't matter to the customer. So it's quite a simple way of looking at things, and the way in which we do that really is to understand where waste exists. The way in which we do that really is to understand where waste exists. So we use the concept of seven wastes, which I'm sure you'll be familiar with, and really just try and either eliminate those where they exist or reduce them as much as possible in an iterative way. So that's where the sort of continuous improvement element comes in.
Speaker 2:I'm going to share with you an example and a scenario that I often see. I often see business units internally. They focus on improving their own processes to make their lives easier, rather than the Kaizen philosophies that started the customer and what they need and work backward. What do you think, in your opinion, that started the customer and what they need and work back with what do you think, in your opinion, how can we shift that mindset? Because I've seen Kaiser in real life and I've been part of a few programs and I often find it really challenging to actually shift that mindset challenging for to actually shift that mindset.
Speaker 1:I think. I think it's natural, particularly in quite, let's say, siloed organizations where there's either you know, it could be a geographic distance between departments physically, so, um, one's based in one location, one's based in another location where they don't really have, let's say, peripheral vision of how their actions and behaviors affect others within that organization. So I think it's really important to, when we're talking about improving processes and improving businesses with a Kaizen mindset, it's really about zooming out a bit, taking stock of what the customer wants and then getting people to kind of align on that vision. Because, as you say, ali, it's exactly right If you're a silo department that's purely looking at their own processes and not necessarily the consequences of, oh, if we make this change, it might save us I don't know 5% in efficiency, but the consequence might be that we push a problem into another neighbouring department or a customer or a supplier. That actually causes a net larger problem for them than the efficiency gain that we might have made internally.
Speaker 1:So I think it's really about, you know, aligning the leadership of the organization to what the changes and why it's needed, and then of, let's say, it's a multifunctional organization with lots of different areas of internally. We need them to understand that. Ok, this might be slightly more complex in terms of your responsibilities in the future, but the net impact for the overall organization is far greater. So it's more about looking at things in a very holistic way for the good of the entire organization, rather than trying to make pockets of efficiency in one area that then have a negative impact in another area. So it's really about looking at the holistic view.
Speaker 1:So yeah, I see that. You know, especially in multinationals or very large organizations, which which perhaps have quite segmented functions, it's, it's a common theme that you know and it's and it intentions. You know people are trying to do the right thing by optimizing their local team or their area, but sometimes we do need to take a step back and we do need to look at the big picture and see OK, yes, we made productivity gain, but then the net knock on effect for the whole business is actually not as positive overall. So really zooming out, aligning leaders on what changes is needed, that's kind of where we like to start, purely to avoid this type of challenge that you're describing.
Speaker 2:James, in my head, kaizen is a change. How do you ensure that that change sticks at the end of the day? Is it about the leadership, is it about the building of the capability, is it the training, is it the redesign of the process, or is it all of the above?
Speaker 1:I think it is a bit of all of the above really. So when we partner with an organisation and we talk about change change as much as some people say they're very pro-change change can be quite a scary kind of topic for people, naturally, purely because it's the, let's say, fear of the unknown. So everybody likes routine and they like their habits, and making a change in the first place can be a little bit uncomfortable, purely because you don't necessarily know how you're going to adapt at an individual level. So there's a few things I would say that are kind of differentiating factors to ensure the sort of sustainability of changes, to avoid them sort of fading away over time. One is really involving the people who are close to the process or the way of working in designing the solution of what's going to be changed, purely because there's a few reasons for this. One is if you involve those people, they're more likely to be bought into the solution that is generated in the end. The second thing is that they will often understand to a deeper degree the intricacies and details of that process, more so than perhaps a senior leader, a senior leader and also if you involve those people in the change and you're then trying to spread that in the organization, it becomes a lot more palatable, let's say, to others, perhaps in similar roles in other areas. But if that team that's very close to the process did the design, implementation, proof of concept and measured the impact let's say the positive impact it becomes a lot more of an easy to communicate story as to how it's originated than if it's some sort of top-down directed movement.
Speaker 1:So really making it stick, I think first thing is involving the people close to the process. Second thing would be the, the consistency in the process confirmation. So making it easy to understand whether what's being changed is to a good standard and and is is delivering what it is supposed to through layers of management. So whether it's supervisors, team leaders, senior leaders OK, to uphold best practices, there needs to be some sort of process confirmation. So that can be very different depending on the situation. It could be some kind of simple checklist, a visual audit, or it could even be, you know, teams in different areas assessing one another to take best practice, not only to take best practice away from what they see, but also to guide and support their colleagues. So I think, involving the people doing some periodic process confirmation to uphold the standard. And then, lastly, I think it's about cultivating a mindset of collective responsibility to make the change successful. So this shouldn't lie on an individual or, let's say, a change team. It should be the organization's collective responsibility. Now, this is obviously a much more cultural element that needs to be adopted in the organization, but there's ways in which you can kind of foster that mindset.
Speaker 1:Um, it take, it can take time, but really it's about celebrating when teams have made change and it's and it's given a good, good result. It's really about celebrating those, those people, those, those colleagues, and also, you know, acknowledging that it's not going good result. It's really about celebrating those people, those colleagues, and also acknowledging that it's not going to be perfect straight away, but it's important to have respect to the current standards. So it might not be the ideal, perfect process with absolute perfection, repeated day after day, but until we can iterate and improve on that, we have to respect the existing standards.
Speaker 1:So, um, it's like all of us driving our cars you know, we've got the, we've got the rules of the road that we all respect and follow, and we know why we do that. It's because you know, if we don't, we know that there's a chance of accident or there's penalties from from fines, from the police, okay, but primarily those rules are there to keep as many people as possible safe. So it's the same kind of concept that we want to try and build within an organization. It's, you know, until we have a better way, let's respect the standards, okay, and then use the process confirmation to uphold those standards. So I think that kind of hopefully covers how do we sustain change over a long period of time. There's several elements to it, but those three are probably the most important ones, I would say.
Speaker 2:A couple of things, james, that I'm thinking about now.
Speaker 2:First of all, maybe six, seven months ago, I don't know, something came to me and I was reading something, and then I was inspired by the fact that I promised myself that from now on, every time I talk, I'm going to drop anything to do with best practice and I change it into better practice.
Speaker 2:I think over time I realized that who decides the best practice and best practice today might not be good tomorrow, so there's always an opportunity for a better practice. But I also noticed that every time I think your idea about the change team, the whole idea behind it, also can be triggering resistance by default. The fact that a change team is coming to work with a particular operation that by itself we are sending indirectly a message to say what you're doing is not the best way to do business and therefore we're going to work with you to actually make it better. We're also going to have to realize that some team members of this particular team or operation, some of them have designed the existing process and they strongly believe that that's the best thing that they can do. So I often see a lot of clashes right from the start. Right from the start, how much do you think getting the team ready to even adopt a mindset to be open to better ways of working?
Speaker 1:I think, yeah, that's a very important point as well because, as you say, these processes have been developed and most likely it's people who are currently within the organization who have developed a lot of the existing processes. So I think, as a starting point, really it's important to understand that, particularly in organizations that have grown quickly, perhaps from a small starting point a small starting point is tend to grow quite organically and they tend to be shaped by external factors that have that have led to the direction of growth and the way in which the business operates. So that's that's important to recognize that nobody's deliberately made a wasteful process or at least we hope that nobody's deliberately made a wasteful process, or at least we hope that nobody's deliberately made a wasteful process. And it's just about looking at looking at things in a very pragmatic way, but not just being honest about, you know, the paradigms that we might have. Okay, we do this process because of X, y, z. Okay, but are those factors still relevant in today's world? If they're not, okay, maybe we should rethink how we're doing things.
Speaker 1:I think it's all about making people understand that this is not a change to highlight, let's say, inefficiencies and blame individuals. It's really not about that it's really about how can we bring our principles of value added and waste in the eyes of the customer to you and you bring your local expertise about what your process or service is to to us and how can we kind of combine those to to strip back where there's inefficiencies and help you really out, helping the people that do that process or task do it in an easier way, with less burden, with less variability okay to to enable it to be a lot more repeatable and a simpler process in the end. So I think it's it's important to be transparent about that up front and not not go in with, uh, with a blame mindset.
Speaker 2:I think that's really important to avoid that when, when you, when you're talking about starting to engage people so that they they- I want to ask you, james, that the premise of any business improvement is that at some stage it will make your job hopefully easier, better for the customer, but almost all the time it will save you some time.
Speaker 1:What I do, though, notice is that management always struggles to find meaningful work to fill in that extra time that an employee is that their employee actually gains out of the efficiencies. Is that part of what Kaizen looks at as well? See, I think we always we're always looking at, you know, if we've, if we achieve, let's say, labor efficiency, okay, is the goal of the organization, you know, to utilize those resources more and more efficiently, or the other? The other question I would have is how much, what percentage of the organization is actually working on improving the organization? This is quite an interesting topic because often you'll find that there's, you know, a sprinkling of people, maybe by function, that spend a little bit of time working on the strategy or the changes to the way in which the company works. But really, at Kaizen, what we're trying to do is it's better to try and get a small amount of time from a lot of people to look at ways in which the business can improve rather than, let's say, saturating a few individuals purely looking at that. So it's really if we can use some of the time that we free up to work on improvements. So it could be a colleague who works in the shop floor of an industrial site.
Speaker 1:You know I've worked in plenty of companies over the years where they come up with some really fantastic ideas that aren't necessarily very expensive they tend to be quite low cost.
Speaker 1:But you know, if we can implement some small, low cost ideas that the colleagues come up with, that can have a huge net impact on the productivity as well. So I think when we create efficiency, the first thing we can do is look at okay, well, how can we utilize those resources that are, let's say, free to improve even further? As a first step, okay, if the change is so significant that there's a substantial spring of resource, then of course it's a lot more about how the organization is then structured. But as a first port of call, you know, I think trying to influence the proportion of people working on small improvement is a good place to start. So that's also a message that you know. If we can encourage that and foster that kind of behavior particularly because those individuals tend to know the intimacy of the process, and if they start to understand the concept of wastes and value added in the eyes of the customer, they can come up with some really fantastic ideas that can then have a much larger net positive impact on the business.
Speaker 2:I like that. I actually haven't thought about that myself. Efficiency back into the business by looking at better ways and even better ways of doing business and servicing the customer or whatever their business that the team is doing. Is that right?
Speaker 1:Yeah, to a degree. So I think you know clearly we don't want to be spending hours and hours and hours. If we're saving lots of time, no, but we should be spending a small amount of time regularly to to analyze our, our ways of working, to to improve them certainly. I think that's quite, quite a healthy habit, that that some organizations have. Many many don't have that habit, but for those that do, I think reap really good benefits from it, because you know processes shouldn't be completely static. You know they. We should always be looking at how can we evolve it and improve it. You know even the most highly technological, advanced companies in the world some of them we have partnered with over the years they even understand the need that if you're staying still, a competitor is catching up. So if we're not trying to improve and focus on the needs of the customer, then we are opening the door for a competitor or a rival to, if not catch up, at least close the gap to where we are today. So I think having that mindset is really important.
Speaker 2:And I agree. I think any process is vulnerable to external factors and changes in the market, customers' needs, value adds, new products, new competitors, and that's where the continuous improvement mindset would need to be in place at all times. Also, remember that if we get any efficiency, one of the biggest complaints from staff is that I don't have time to even learn new things, and so that efficiency gain can be reinvested back into learning and any learning for any employee can be a benefit back into the business.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that I don't have time to change. I think it's probably one of the most common sentences I hear. If they're so busy and their process is perhaps not as optimized as it could be, then it's understandable to hear that type of comment. But ultimately, if you don't take that first step of being open to analyse and to change the way in which you're working, you're never going to be able to free up that time. So I think it's a bit of a catch-22 situation where we have to force ourselves to create some time in the beginning, to assess, to look for opportunities, those opportunities to implement.
Speaker 1:Okay depends on, obviously, the organisation, but usually there can be some quite quick things that can save quite a substantial proportion of the effort or the time or the investment.
Speaker 1:And you know, if we can enact those and show people quickly that this change can be made and that it's for their benefit and the organization's benefit, then that's really a good starting point to turn people's thinking around so that we can some time in order to develop the people, cross-skill individuals, to give ourselves more resilience.
Speaker 1:Because if we're relying, relying on let's take the training element that you're speaking about, ali if we're perhaps relying on a one or two specialized individuals to have the knowledge to do a particular step of the process, but we don't have much strength in depth in the organization on those particular tasks. We're really running the risk that, you know, if something would happen to that individual, then we don't have cover and we don't have, you know, a very robust way of coping with perhaps the absence of that person or that role. So certainly I think organizations should also look at, you know, how can they utilize some of the gains to make themselves more robust and more resilient to having the depth in the skills in the team as well. I think that's also a very important point.
Speaker 2:I like that. I want to shift gear and I want to talk to you about something that I've learned from Kaiser. Actually, because I used to be a martial art professional myself, I've got a second black belt in karate, so it gave me the mindset. Put it that way, one of the things that I've learned from Kaiser and I apply it today in my practice is the power of simulated learning. So I'd like you to go deep into that topic. What makes it and it's quite amazing that lots of organizations have not even learned from that practice often we go to a training session and people will show us some processes and they say that's how you want to do it, and then we have a go at it in in a very messy way, and then there you go, the project finishes and we left to our own. You know means and approaches which are not usually embedded and sustained. What I've learned from Kaizen is that the power of simulated activities, again and again for people to grasp the new process is very powerful.
Speaker 1:I think it's absolutely right really very powerful.
Speaker 1:I think it's absolutely right. Really, if we think back to when we were children, the way in which we learn is not by before we can even start to read, we learn by doing so. If you think about children learning shapes, I have a nephew now who's coming up to 18 months old. He started with his language but he already knows which shape fits in which hole and he's done that through practice. So really, now, zooming out from that, if we think about how can we ensure that we are performing a process or we're performing a task to a good standard and that it's not just here's the process written down, here's a sheet of paper off you go, go and figure it out. We don't like that method or we don't really like that, let's say, classroom approach to learning. We really like to be practical and go to the place where the work happens. So we call that the gemba, the place where value is added, and we like to do trials and we like to be hands-on in the change with the people that are doing the task. It doesn't matter what the task is, necessarily, whether it's a clerical, office-based task or a practical, physical task office-based task or a practical physical task and in doing things in a practical, hands-on way, in the place where the work happens. We can very quickly test to see okay, we have several ideas on what might be the best current way of performing this task, but we can quite easily then measure okay, is option a or option b or option c numerically the most efficient way of doing it? So we can, we can, we can actually run trials with people who perform that task day in, day out and we can have their inputs as well. But then we can be very mathematical about okay, well, that method works very well, people are able to repeat that very well and you know, it's 10% more effective than method B or method C. And then it becomes less of an opinion-driven decision and more of a purely mathematical decision about, let's say, best known way today of performing that task.
Speaker 1:But I think what we like to say or what we like to practice in Kaizen is we like to clearly have the theory in the back of our heads, but we like to be very pragmatic about how we apply it. So physical trials, in-person trials to test and prove the solution before we start running off and spreading it across the organization we have to be sure that what we're changing, um, is actually going to deliver a benefit to people. So, being mathematical, like testing it out okay, it might not work, we might need to retest, or we might need to test a different, different way um, and involving the people that perform that task, that's really key. Because if we don't do that and we skip that step and we do a classroom activity where we put down the theory of what we think is best, we're probably going to miss some really important things from the reality that you won't get unless you do those kind of, let's say, real-life trials and measures.
Speaker 1:So I think that's probably an approach in the philosophy of Kaizen that's different from other methods, I think having a practical, pragmatic way of doing things and also when it comes to teaching people the concepts, doing things in a very practical way again. So you'll probably be familiar with this, but when we teach a concept like standard work or workplace organization 5S, we don't do it from just some slides or some reading. We like to get people to actually perform a game or a challenge, which has several reasons to it. One is it stays in the memory better, so people understand the concept and remember it better, but also it makes it fun and engaging. So you know, we talked earlier about change being something that some people are afraid of. What we need to do is get something that that is digestible and fun and engaging and and should be seen as something positive, because if we, if we can do that, then we're going to have a lot more success in people's acceptance and openness to change.
Speaker 2:I like that. You remind me of the principle that there's a difference between the map and the territory. You can give me a map, but once I go, the territory is a completely different thing. The factory floor is completely different from the lecture theater. The other thing that I always find fascinating about the simulation I mean the pilots spend most of their time in a simulator for a reason. What I find interesting is that to move from knowledge to ability meaning I know what I need to do, but then I know how I do it is two completely different things. And then I find that cognitively it will be easier for people to start having a go, and it can be messy at the start, but that's where the leadership will come in there and create a safe place to experiment. So that's the second observation. And the third I really like that about Kaizen is that at the end of the day, the solution that wins is not emotive, is actually based on practical observation and data.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that particular last point. You know, I always say, look, we have to respect everybody's opinion, but we respect it more if they've got some data to back it up, purely because then it becomes a much more compelling reason. You know, I think we should always be open to listening to some insights, particularly from people close to the process. But the best way to be sure that you're you're going in the right direction and the change that you're trying to make is, let's say, the best known way forward would be to put some some numbers it, some mathematics, because if we can say, okay, well, that takes us, let's say, one minute and 20 seconds to perform that task in that method and one minute and 15 seconds to perform it in method B, and we need to obviously simulate that a few times.
Speaker 1:But if we consistently see that B is more efficient time-wise and there's no difference in the quality or the performance of the output product or service, then it's a very convincing way for the collective group to agree on what should be the way forward, without getting too much into.
Speaker 1:You know, oh, I think this or I don't agree with you because of of of your experience, it's, it's it's putting that all to one side and saying well, mathematically, this one is is more efficient. So you know, if we don't try that, then then I think we'd be a little bit foolish because, because the numbers are telling us this, um, our experience, okay, might be something different, but let's at least try that and see where it takes us during a pilot period. So I think, yeah, that way avoids going around in circles debating and discussing for long, and it enables us, in our Kaizen methods, to make change quickly, because we don't have to have all those big, long debates and theorizing. We can just be quite pragmatic and move forward and we can always revisit if we find a problem later. But it enables us to avoid big, long discussions and too many emotions getting in the way of change.
Speaker 2:How long do you think a change can stick after? Let's just say all conditions are perfect, the team is engaged, the leadership is on board, the prototype works. You repeated that multiple times. How long will it become the new way of working?
Speaker 1:I think it depends on the complexity of the process. If we're talking about a very simple process, it probably can be adopted quite quickly by others. The more complex, it is, probably longer, but just purely because of the amount of time to adopt, the learning period will be steeper. However, I don't necessarily think that there's a without process confirmation that we were discussing earlier, and without having that continuous mindset to evaluate our performance and to look for improvement mindset to evaluate our performance and to look for improvement.
Speaker 1:Without those couple of elements, I think you know, even the best laid processes and even the best design solutions can degrade over time without that sort of hygiene to check in, to monitor, to ensure that good practice is being followed and the right behaviors are in place, because people are people and any process that involves people there's that human element where sometimes a new person may join the organization and if we don't have really robust process confirmation, they may just, let's say, innovate and make a tweak to a process or a tweak to a procedure, not for any particular reason.
Speaker 1:It may just be that they, they, they want to to experiment and and see whether they can do it better and rightly or wrongly, it might, it might actually degrade the process. Well, it might. It might have a negative effect. So I think even the best designs, tests, proof of concept and standardization needs to still have some element the leaders or the supervisors of the team to do some periodic process confirmation to ensure that we don't deviate over time. So I think that would be my answer for that. Firstly, it depends on the complexity, and then, after it's, let's say, stable in the early stages, there is still then a periodic check-in and process confirmation needed to uphold the existing standard.
Speaker 2:Do you notice that sometimes, or actually most of the time, the often overlooked phase of, let's say, lax at making sure that they're what differentiated them in the first place and made them successful in the first place.
Speaker 1:If they don't have that routine to put the effort to ensure that things are stable and working as they should, then it will start to deviate.
Speaker 1:Stable and working as they should, then it will start to deviate. I think if you not to pick on a particular company, but if you look at the likes of Boeing okay, so they're a hugely successful airline manufacturer and you know, for those who are familiar with what happened there, they became too lax in their process confirmation which led to, obviously, the challenges that they've been having for the past few years. I think now, obviously, you know, you would hope that those types of organisations would have learned that. Ok, we can't take our eye off the existing process. We need to ensure that. You know it might be something that we've been doing for years, but we still need to ensure that we do things the right way, otherwise we're going to suffer eventually. It may not be today, but eventually there'll be a difference from the standard that will end up costing us. So I think it's a worrying sign that if you don't see that routine and discipline, that you may not see the problem today, but you will eventually see a problem.
Speaker 2:I've been recently fascinated by near misses in airlines, and predominantly because I'm interested in first-order impact and a second-order impact. It's funny you're talking about Boeing. I know a lot of stories about them, but let's leave these guys alone. I want to ask you about this exciting new technology called artificial intelligence. How does Kaizen look at that? Is it an enabler for Kaizen in terms of analysis and the speed of delivering that analysis to the customer and to the client?
Speaker 1:I think AI is a really interesting topic. I think I can certainly see a lot of positives that will assist with Kaizen activities. So, you know, purely from being able to quickly utilize it to support, you know, ideation of how we can make a process better or to understand the industry benchmarks quickly can be used for those types of activities. You know, activities as a way to guide discussion. I don't see it ever fully replacing human creativity, but I can see it as really a useful tool to support it.
Speaker 1:I can see technologies from the AI space which will enable greater efficiencies to be made in the future. So, for instance, utilizing AI with vision systems to quickly identify a product in a warehouse will help to avoid, let's say, potential human error in picking of a product. So I can see ways in which it's inevitably going to become quite a powerful supporting tool. I don't know whether it will entirely replace the human element of creativity. I think it will be more of a complementary system. It will really depend on how it develops over the, over the next years, um, but certainly I can see it as a really valuable addition to um, to, to to bring information and to and to combine information in interesting ways that that maybe we would not immediately think of um when, when we're working with teams to break down processes and analyze opportunities. So I think it can be a really exciting way forward for Kaizen activities.
Speaker 2:Well, I'll give you an example. I had a guest a couple of weeks ago. She's a psychotherapist and she thought that I've got a problem Because I use AI a lot. I use generative AI. In fact, I use generative AI for everything, especially personal life. Recently I've recorded myself and I've given the video to ChatGPT to analyze my golf swing and give me feedback on it. That's a visual video and then it was analyzing that for me.
Speaker 2:I see that as really powerful, to your point. It does not replace a human. Yes, I still will keep my coach because I need that human touch and reaffirmation or confirmation that I'm on the right track, although the technology can encourage you and say that's great, ali, but it's a different feeling when it comes from a human. So, although I'm not seeing my coach every week, I'm still seeing him twice a month now, but I'm working with the technology to enable me. At the same time, I think the same applies in the workplace. It can synthesize a lot of information for me. It can, in fact, highlight things that I haven't thought about. It can bring context. It can bring historical use cases around the world that happened, because nothing is unique nowadays, I think. The ability of research and deep research. I think these are all powerful things. Will they replace humans? Maybe in some jobs, but certainly, like any other technology, new jobs will evolve as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it'll be really exciting to see. I think in the last two and three years we've really seen it come on a huge amount. I imagine we'll probably see some other very large steps in the next five years. I think it'd be really interesting to see how people innovate with AI. You know you mentioned the golf swing as an example. I've seen someone else using it with playing basketball and technique, which is really amazing, especially the vision element. So if it can analyze a physical process or a physical task, I think that's where it's not just purely a digital tool. It's starting to become used as a physical tool as well, in the real world. So I think that's when it makes that jump or when it can be utilized very effectively in the physical world. I think that's when we'll really start seeing, you know, major collaboration between people and tools like AI to improve process or to improve physical tasks. I think that's really, really interesting.
Speaker 2:I love it. I think we are living in a good age now that's what I think, anyway and I lived in the age of the internet and then I ignored it at the time, but now this technology showed up in my lifetime and I'm not letting go. I'm actually deep into that. I've told and I'm really excited about it. In fact, just to close this topic, I collaborated with three generative AI tools to imagine my practice in the next couple of years. Again, it's like I've used the three experts to actually work with me to analyze what change management would look like, how the technology will actually enable me, what type of change experience I want to get going forward. And so it's exciting time and I agree with you.
Speaker 2:I think the next couple of years will be really a big advancement with you. I think in the next couple of years will be really a big advancement, and if you realize, just when ChatGPT was released, the advancement has been almost like on a daily basis. Now when I'm actually using it. So exciting time. I am aware of time. This is a really wonderful conversation. I'm so glad I'm having you chatting with me today, james. One thing that I always ask the guests that I have what would be your advice for people like me in the business of change management and communication when it comes to adopting some of the practices that Kaizen promotes?
Speaker 1:I think I had a good think about this before our conversation today. I think the first thing to think would be should the process even exist at all? So if you're analyzing some processes, first thing would be to challenge OK, rather than trying to optimize something, we'll first need to even think should we be doing it at all? Because I come from an engineering background, one of the things that engineers love to do is to optimize processes that shouldn't exist. So I think the first thing would be to analyze should it, should the process even exist? Second thing would be to really act quickly. So if we can make a small improvement today, let's. Let's do it right now, rather than wait for perfection, a theoretical perfection, later. Let let's make small, consistent improvement and then I suppose the final thing would be that change people will naturally be sceptical, but we need to be very transparent and data-driven and respecting people's opinions and experience when we're going through a change process. So I think, hopefully, those kind of three things are good takeaways, I think, from having a Kaizen mindset.
Speaker 2:I love it. That idea of start small is something that I've been practicing and I love it. It requires a level of patience. We're not saying you know. So many times people say you're going to have to think big, and I always think think big that's fine and dream big, but start small. That's the only way. Nobody climbed a mountain in one leap, and the examples are all over the place. Nature grows step by step. Why would we not follow that? So I love that. These are really wise words from you, james. I hope I can get you back in the future and then talk probably more into the sphere of AI. James, how would people connect with you and your organization?
Speaker 1:So yeah, so we have our website, so kaizencom, where you can find a lot more about the Kaizen Institute to see sort of use cases, some really, I think, interesting insights on the topic of Kaizen and change, and also I'm on LinkedIn, so if you search my name on LinkedIn you can find me on there if you'd like to connect.
Speaker 2:We're going to put all the information about you, james, and your organization in the podcast info. It's been a pleasure having you in my podcast, the Inner Game of Change. James, I hope to talk to you again. Until then, stay well and stay safe. Thank you very much, ali, it's been a pleasure, thank you.
Speaker 2:Thank you for listening. If you found this episode valuable, remember to subscribe to stay updated on upcoming episodes. Your support is truly appreciated and, by sharing this podcast with your colleagues, friends and fellow change practitioners, it can help me reach even more individuals and professionals who can benefit from these discussions. Remember, and in my opinion, change is an enduring force and you will only have a measure of certainty and control when you embrace it. Until next time, thank you for being part of the Inner Game of Change community. I am Ali Jammah and this is the Inner Game of Change podcast.
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