Martijn Speulman on improving

Martijn Speulman of Switch Advies is a man from the field. He knows technology and manufacturing from the work floor, and has advanced towards logistics, planning, and management. This company-wide experience was an ideal starting point for understanding and optimizing business processes.

Martijn, you started as a car mechanic. Tell us something about the road to becoming an improvement consultant.

“Over the years, I kept developing actually. I supervised projects in various functions and loved letting the dust settle after finishing a project - to see if the blueprint was the truth or if we needed adjustments to get the best result.

So, smaller and bigger improvement projects naturally came my way, and I got to know LEAN more and more. I used that knowledge to train my colleagues and to lead various internal improvement projects. In 2018, I started working as an independent improvement consultant.”

How does your experience help you with improvement projects? 

“I know what people experience on the work floor; I’ve been there myself. Later on, in planning and logistics, I learned all the other facets of an organization. As a company manager, I also got the overview from a management perspective.

That experience makes it easier to recognize company processes and understand how you need each other to make changes in them and improve.

Change ultimately is all about making a culture change. That doesn’t happen on the work floor or in the boardroom alone; it requires all levels of the organization.”

A culture change requires all levels of the organization.

How do you start a new improvement project?

“Every improvement project starts with the question: which problem do we want to solve? And do we have the root cause already, or are we battling the effect of the actual problem? The next question is: what does this problem cost us? We often think we have a big problem, but we don’t have the data to support that (yet).

A good problem analysis relies on data, rather than on assumptions or visceral feelings. That’s where my improvement process starts. Cierpa Software is an excellent tool to collect and analyze data. You can also visualize the actual costs of fixing a problem, including timesheets. It helps to prioritize and motivate: if you can show people what an improvement project will yield, it’s much easier to get people moving.

It’s also important to start collaborating in the company. You want a collective goal, and need multiple levels inside the organization to achieve it.”

True change can only be achieved when everybody understands why it’s necessary.

How do you get that focus together?

“Improving isn’t achieved because management says it has to, but because you explain to the people why it’s necessary. The awareness changes the involvement of all employees and requires a culture change, from the work floor to management.

So, make people aware of the fact that processes need to change. It requires a willingness to change, both with management and the employees. Managers need to realize they’re there to support the staff and employees have to come out of their shells and realize they have an impact on the whole too.

When you, as a manager, can say to the operator: “It costs us one euro per minute when you have to go looking for a tool, and I can’t pass these costs to the customer, so how can we fix those together? Then waste gets more tangible and easier to handle for the employee, instead of saying: “According to our targets, we have to save ten percent on general costs.”

Or when you purchase a new machine. Do you make sure the employees have all the knowledge required to operate it? A company is as good as the people working in it.

So, prioritize the training and support that every employee needs. If we help the person, the company will improve by itself.”

How do you handle an improvement project

“I start every project with a team representing a cross-section of the organization. This way, you’ll gain an understanding of each other’s work and create room for dialog.

Usually, we start a LEAN project small. Mainly with a 5S process, beginning with a company-wide training session. That’s the start of creating awareness in the organization. It creates a change of mindsets and ensures that everyone speaks the same language,

That doesn’t apply to the work floor only. As a manager, you cannot ask the work floor to work in a 5S structured way when your desk and email folders are a mess. You want to work smart together, and everybody has to do their part. When that idea sticks, that’s when you’ve achieved a culture change.

A 5S process is oftentimes the first step towards awareness inside the company.

Which tangible results make you proud?

“Recently, I joined a company to coach the operational manager. When he left, the assignment changed. Together with the management team, we devised a new plan to shape the company’s growth, which in turn almost tripled production. We did this step by step, always thinking: what are we doing, with whom, and where do we still find room for improvement?

The ERP system wasn’t working perfectly yet, so we still had to do a lot of manual operations. That’s not LEAN. So we talked to Cierpa’s Mathieu van Loon. The question was: what do we demand from the system now, and how do we get there? Every piece of software affects an existing process, and there’s no room for failure; production needs to continue, and people must always know how to handle the new systems. That requires a lot of thought, consultation, and flow charts, but also internal employee training.

Together, we ensured the implemented ERPull system did exactly what the company needed, and we carefully boosted production from 50 trailers per week to almost 250. Those are the results you strive for!”