LEAN HR: A 21st Century Necessity

Building and maintaining the modern workforce has become exponentially more complex since the COVID-19 pandemic. Online job boards and remote work opportunities have inflated the talent pool for a single position to hundreds and at times even thousands of applicants. This means retaining effective talent has become a much more valuable and dynamic process. At the same time, the expanded use of online tools, AI and AR/VR technology have forced employers to streamline recruitment processes, create more detailed job descriptions and find more targeted methods for evaluating skills and performance at every point in the talent management lifecycle. In the current workforce, what was once an annual performance evaluation, is now a real-time process of continuous improvement which enhances and measures performance, talent and career mobility, and leadership development. What was once succession planning merely for high level executive positions is now an ongoing process of predictive analytics utilizing global workforce trends, jobs numbers and continuously evolving lists of necessary competencies and skills.

 To become and maintain a competitive edge, organizations can no longer silo extraneous ad-on programs for employee relations, employee engagement, succession planning, leadership development, DEI, and continuous improvement, just to name a few.  The fact is, the basic rules of continuous improvement assume that improvement must be done by the people that do the work, within their own real-time workflow, not in a board-room, three floors up. Recruitment and succession planning aren’t static events that start and stop. Quality succession planning directly increases the quality of future recruitment. This in turn increases the quality of performance. Assessing cultural bias and insensitivity shouldn’t be viewed as a moment in an annual performance review or an exit interview. Cultural inclusivity is critical to an effective, empowered workforce and must  be infused into workflows.

Embedding continuous improvement measures are the bare minimum in the 21st century talent lifecycle if you want to keep up with your competition.  For those organizations who choose to do more, refusing to settle for being 3 or 4 steps behind: Lean is the tool that will take you to the front of the pack, and keep you there. 

The effectiveness of Lean process improvement is has been more than adequately documented since the Toyota Production System began consistently delivering the most efficient manufacturing system in the world. In recent years, the company has created the Toyota Management System, a set of operating principles and values that empower workers. The system has been used to eliminate errors in nearly every manufacturing sector on the planet. It also has been used to cultivate “safety-first” workplaces, eliminating medical errors and hospital acquired infections in hospitals.

Over the past decade, I employed this system to develop a new merit-based hiring system to replace the antiquated civil service system in government agencies. Before the COVID-19 crisis, a lean system capable of high-velocity performance was a luxury. During and after COVID, it provided a lifeline of systemic agility and adaptability that forced our systems to operate and communicate more often and with more detail than ever before.

This infrastructure along with the leadership support necessary to accelerate our operations, organically resulted in something far more impressive than just effectively maintaining. We excelled as more than just a team, but as a living, interconnected organism of empowerment, adaptation, and acceleration. Mother Jones now works to provide the same experience to every organization that collectively desires the  satisfaction of high-velocity continuous improvement. 

Erin McClelland

Founder

Mother Jones