Is your company ready to grow? Managing Change

There is a common business language within the organizations using words such as improve, grow, increase, decrease, profit, loss, revenue, lean manufacturing/management, synchronous flow, continuous flow (one piece flow), margin, overtime, layout design, teamwork, leadership, communication, systems, 5'S, continuous improvement / Kaizen, strategic planning / Xmatrix, Project Management, Customer Requirements/Specifications, On Time Delivery, Inventory, Indicators / KPI's, and so we could continue going on and on.

Even though this can be the daily words you've been hearing and talking about, you may have thought why is the growth taking so long or why is change not happening. Everyone seem to be on board but you don't know where to start from? Or maybe you have tried to implement the "right principles" of Lean Manufacturing just by the books without getting any results.

It has happened to me this is why I will tell from experience what I noticed won't let the company succeed. This are the 5 signs a company is not ready to grow (and what can you do about it):

1. People not responsible for metrics. Accountability must be always there, each department or area has to be measured. When something goes good or wrong there has to be someone to look at. Periodic and objective meetings could solve this where each individual expose its own metrics to the rest of the team.
2. Upper management focused on Short term goals. Change is cultural and is a process that takes usually from 6 to 18 months from one company to another. While managing change sometimes people want to see results right away, this could happen but is not guaranteed since it will depend on the people. The team is the most valuable asset that could set the bar really high and be able to see changes really fast. X matrix is recommended to align short, mid, long term goals with the team.
3. Poor-Null Liquidity. Although this one could get controversial I've seen companies implementing changes but then the focus change because payroll needs to be payed, urgent orders have to be fulfilled to deliver on time. Therefore less time is available to buy raw materials and there goes the cycle over and over loosing focus on managing change unless business turnaround takes action.

Any of these Key points sounds familiar to you? Feel free to share your experiences. I'll be willing to discuss or assess you with something going on related to this topic.