Team building in Lyto’s: the new initiative by Edoardo Zanisi
02/11/2023
On Friday, December 22nd, at the end of the Steering Committee that confirmed the excellent results achieved by Lyto’s in 2023, I asked our group of managers and our process managers the meaning of the word improvement.
In a couple of minutes the board of the executive meeting room was filled with words including the most significant were Self-criticism, Awareness, Change, Solve problems, Transparency, Growth, Satisfaction, Support of the other, Long-term vision, Collaboration.
We reread the concepts together and commented on them: in a couple of minutes we were able to give a word that was too much abused the concreteness and simplicity necessary to understand and express it, the same concreteness that the numbers of the activities of improvement concluded in 2023 have just confirmed to us.
While it is clear to everyone that improvement is always necessary for a company (or else decline and closure), on the other hand words such as self-criticism, awareness, change, growth, satisfaction show how necessary it is, and never taken for granted, the mental approach of people predisposed and oriented to the improvement of themselves and their process.
How many have the strength to make self-criticism of their own path, perhaps in total transparency before colleagues? How many are aware of the limits of their process and activate plans for change? How many can say that they are satisfied with themselves and their team for transforming problems and non-conformities into improvement activities?
After the first great peak of the predisposition to change, it is necessary to deal with the second peak, represented by the corporate organization. This is composed of direct and indirect processes, with different managers and especially with dozens and dozens of operatives, that every day solve, or rather self-solve, recurring problems that managers often do not deal with.
To enable continuous improvement, it is essential to implement a management system that can stimulate, guide, support, consolidate and maintain the successes achieved by the company organization. We need a system that is simple to implement and accessible to everyone, that collects and shows daily all the problems of the processes, that stimulates and responds professionals to find solutions, even radical ones.
2023 was a year of extraordinary importance and excellent results for Lyto’s. Volumes and operating result are very positive, but not only.
The group of managers is excellent and we continue to work to make it a real team.
Edoardo Zanisi (Lean Manager) and Laura Guariento (Quality and Safety) have brought a tornado of enthusiasm and expertise, and have achieved results far beyond the most optimistic expectations.
Silvia Marcuzzi (CFO) has launched herself as a leader of Project 5S in offices and production departments and has achieved unexpected achievements and successes.
All direct and indirect processes have produced stunning results in terms of improvement.
Although not always homogeneous, the operative personnel, the foremen, the managers of the direct and indirect processes have found and expressed that individual predisposition to change and that self-criticism of their own process necessary to activate the improvement.
The operational implementation of the Lyto’s Management System (LMS) has supported the awareness and sharing of the business organization through the various daily data collection boards and the different daily, weekly and monthly operational meetings.
All this happened with a lean approach, which started from a goal as simple as impactful: to activate a constant and virtuous communication flow between those who work in the company, from the operations department to managers, from the managers of indirect processes to the CEO, to share everyday problems and work to find the best solution, with the aim of permanently eradicating problems.
In twelve months, about 200 concrete improvement activities have been completed, largely managed independently by the processes (Mini Kaizen), almost 40% above the already challenging target we set ourselves at the beginning of the year.
More than 40 Mini Kaizen have been completed by our production departments, the first involved in the implementation of the LMS and able to significantly increase levels of quality, safety and above all productivity, and to demonstrate that the completely Lean approach of the LMS has been able to enhance the contribution of all, regardless of age, culture, hierarchy or skin color.
Our technical department has completed over 50 Mini Kaizen and has been able to make self-criticism a winning weapon in improving not only the activities of its process, but even in helping other processes to prevent errors.
And more than 10 Mini Kaizen of great importance completed at the installation sites have shown that the system is able to easily involve even external suppliers in a real logic of teamwork.
I thank all those who in the course of 2023 believed in me, as well as welcomed and endorsed my operational proposals. And I must express a particular gratitude to my son Edoardo, who in a few months has implemented and made extraordinarily operational the Lyto’s Management System. After two years of study together with the consultant friend Nicola Rebustini and after a year of activity and results, I can not imagine a Lyto’s without this management system.
Marco Zanisi
