Question 2 in the Lean Blog survey about Lean obstacles took the same choices as Question 1 and forced the respondents to choose the TOP reason why they struggled with Lean.

The choice that wasn’t available in the LEI survey came out #1 in our survey — “Lack of top management support.” Click on the chart for a larger view.

The full results, again this is choosing THE top obstacle, ONE choice per respondent (again this is different than the way the LEI survey was conducted, where you could choose multiple answers and “top management” wasn’t a choice).

• Lack of top management support 21.7%
• Middle management resistance 15.7%
• Lack of implementation know-how 14.5%
• Lack of crisis 9.6%
• Backsliding 8.4%
• Viewed as “flavor of the month” 7.2%
• Supervisor resistance 6%
• Failure to overcome resistance 6%
• Financial value not recognized 4.8%
• Employee resistance 2.4%
• Failure of past lean projects 2.4%
• Budget constraints 1.2%

What do you make of that? Click comments to chime in. What do we gain from placing blame, in any direction? Stay tuned for the “5 Whys” discussion that people submitted. We have to ask, for example, “why do we not have support from top management?” What does that mean, in more detail, that we don’t have that support?

Today’s survey winner, receiving a copy of Workplace Management, by Taiichi Ohno (courtesy of Gemba Research) has an email address containing “maupuente”. I’ll email you for contact info to get the book.

About LeanBlog.org: Mark Graban is a consultant, author, and speaker in the “lean healthcare” methodology, focused on improving quality and patient safety, improving access, reducing costs, and fully engaging healthcare professionals. He is also the Chief Improvement Officer for KaiNexus.

Tagged as: 5 Whys Survey