After meeting with the process owners, the real fun begins! Now is the time to begin spending time with the people that do the hands-on work. The people that ‘make it happen’. The people that make the processes and sub processes GO!
Keep your eyes and ears wide open. You will learn a lot!
Tip – Spend half or full days meeting with the people that do the hands-on work: accountants, human resource professionals, customer service representatives, delivery drivers, salespeople, factory and warehouse workers, marketing professionals, security traders… Even if you have to work evening and early morning shifts – do it. It is worth the effort.
Tip – If you do it right they will show you the ropes and they will reveal detailed information that will be critical to you as you build a strong resilience program. You have to love upper management and the process owners but some of them may have been removed from the hands-on work for a while. The worker bees will show you the real-deal intricacies of the job.
Tip – Building relationships and good-will (social capital) are keys to your success. DO NOT come on like a cost cutting efficiency expert. Stress that you are there to make sure they still have a job if your company encounters any type of disruption. Make it all about them, as you did when you met with upper management and the process owners.
Tip – You will uncover a great deal of low-hanging BC and non-BC fruit working with the people in the trenches. Take legible, detailed notes. Your notes will be golden nuggets as you build out your program and suggest valuable improvements.
Tip – Value the precious time employees spend with you. Most of these folks are very busy. Some are rated on metrics indicating how many calls they answered or how many route deliveries they made. Keep it to the point. Thank them before and after. Give them a couple of your business cards and let them know sincerely that they can call you any time about anything. Send a quick note to their manager giving ‘props’ to the employee.