Great leaders take Gemba Walk

Great leaders understand that leading people is about interacting with them, understanding how they work and identifying and removing any bottlenecks that may impede their productivity and quality of life.

This technique is called Gemba Walk, “Gemba” means “the real place” or “the actual place” in Japanese and it is mostly used by leaders who believe in lean management and performance excellence.

It is a habit of effective leaders who have made it a norm to visit the actual place where work is done and have first- hand information on how employees are doing their work, and their experience in the organisation for continual improvement.

It focuses on improving processes, methods, resources utilisation and building a culture of continuous improvement, problem- solving, and employee empowerment.

In an era where quality orientation determines competition and where change is volatile and unambiguous, it is unacceptable to have leaders who lead from the comfort of their offices using desktop management style.

These are leaders who are incapacitated to lead because throughout the year their level of influence is not felt, and they are detached from the real work, including resolving pertinent performance challenges.

This is a sign of lack of accountability and irresponsibility. Surprisingly, most of these leaders blame employees for poor performance and they exonerate themselves.

It is detrimental to have leaders who are detached from the operational realities because they make decisions that are disconnected from the ground reality, resulting in inefficiencies and suboptimal outcomes.

Moreover, frontline workers may feel undervalued, demotivated, and disengaged when their leaders are not visibly engaged in the actual work environment leading to decreased morale, productivity, and overall performance.

Furthermore, a desktop management style results in lazier- fairer culture characterised by lack of continual improvement and high resistance to change.

The purpose of this article is to explain the Gemba walk technique and how it is applied to improve leadership influence, organisational performance, and staff engagement.

Before taking a Gemba walk, leaders should determine an excellence principle ( management practice) to be addressed or prevailing challenge to be resolved. This will make the Gemba walk more objective and more meaningful towards fostering a culture of excellence.

For example, if there is a recurring service delivery or production issue, a leader might choose to focus the Gemba Walk on this matter to understand the root causes of the problem and facilitate its mitigation.

Thereafter, they should prepare the team by scheduling the walk- in advance, explaining its purpose and objectives, and encouraging team members to actively participate in it.

For instance, a leader could hold a brief meeting to explain the importance of the Gemba Walk in identifying areas for improvement. Consistency is key in making gemba walks a habitual practice and maintaining visibility among employees.

As they implement this technique, leaders should not micromanage employees by making this technique a policing practice because it will lose its actual purpose of building and sustaining continual improvement culture.

To avoid that they should focus on the process not people because 96percent of the problems come from the processes and 4percent from the employees.

For example, if there is a delay in giving customers service within set standards, the leader should examine the workflow, tools, motions, transportation, production, use of resources and identify where improvements can be made, rather than blaming employees.

Subsequent to the above, leaders should conduct the Gemba Walk in the specific department or unit where the identified problem or performance topic is relevant.

For instance, if the focus is on improving customer service, the leader should visit the customer service department to observe how interactions are handled and where improvements can be made.

They should record observations with the aim of providing alternative solutions to the team. These observations should be shared with the team afterwards, along with potential alternative solutions or suggestions for improvement.

For example, if the leader notices a bottleneck in the workflow, they could suggest business processes reengineering to resolve the problem.

After the gemba walk, they should have debriefing with the department, or unit to discuss observations, insights, and potential opportunities for improvement.

They should also make follow- up after a reasonable period to track implementation progress and track outcomes.

In conclusion, by implementing gemba walks effectively, organisations can foster a culture of transparency, collaboration, and continuous improvement, ultimately driving operational excellence and sustainable growth.

Moreover, by actively engaging in gemba walks and leveraging the insights gained, leaders can address the eight types of wastes found in every organisation and create sustainable value for customers.

The Author is a member of African Excellence Forum, a member of Organisational Excellence Specialists in Canada, holds Master of Science in Strategic Management, is a Certified Manager of Quality and Organizational Excellence from America Society for Quality. He is also a Certified Professional Excellence Assessor, Master Excellence Trainer, Lean Six Sigma Greenbelt, ISO 9001: 2015 Certified. Contact: 72211182, Website: www. iqm. co. bw and Email: veronmosalakatane@ gmail. com LinkedIn: Veron Mosalakatane.