Real Life Work Podcast with Kevin McManus

Great Systems Drive Operational Excellence

What is the 'Real Life Work' podcast? The "Real Life Work with Kevin McManus" podcast is a forum for sharing best practices that lead to better workplaces, communities, and souls. Each week, this podcast connects you with 'real work' leaders who continue to sustain success in the world of work system performance design, diagnosis, and improvement. How does the live podcast work? The live podcast takes place most Friday mornings at 6am Pacific time. All episodes are captured for on-demand listening. They can be found at the common podcast distribution sites. If you want to be part of the live show, you are welcome. Simply message Kevin at least 24 hours prior to the start of the next podcast, and he will send you a log-on code. You will soon be able to view the podcast live on the Great Systems YouTube channel. Who hosts the 'Real Life Work' podcast? Kevin McManus, a 20-year US National Baldrige Examiner and 40-year workplace warrior, hosts the podcast. Kevin’s primary goal is to help people move closer to achieving their personal potential each day. Would you like more information on my 'Real Life Work' podcast? Would you like more information on my work systems improvement podcast? If so, please contact me via one of the connection paths below. Also, please take the time to check out the Great Systems website. Keep improving! Kevin McManus, Chief Excellence Officer, Great Systems kevin@greatsystems.com WATCH over 50 kaizen and workplace health improvement videos on my Great Systems YouTube channel. LISTEN to my ‘Real Life Work’ podcast. It’s your source for proven kaizen, healthy workplace, and operational excellence best practices! CONNECT with me on LinkedIn LIKE Great Systems on Facebook CHECK OUT my ‘Teach Your Teams’ workbooks on Amazon.com FOLLOW me on Twitter: @greatsystems © Copyright 2024, Great Systems LLC, All Rights Reserved read less
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Episodes

How to Measure Training Effectiveness Podcast
Mar 24 2023
How to Measure Training Effectiveness Podcast
This week’s Real Life Work podcast looks at how to use ten training effectiveness measures to measure training effectiveness. Top Ten Workplace Training Effectiveness Measures Often, even the best organizations struggle to effectively measure workplace training. For example, multiple Baldrige recipients in recent years continue to rely on course participation and completion rates as primary training effectiveness indicators. From an overall results and work systems design perspective, these companies are high performers. Why don’t they measure training differently? Some do. They simply do not want to use their limited application space to show results they can more effectively, and completely, share on site. However, only a small percentage of workplaces can use such an excuse. Most don’t measure training effectiveness at all. Some struggle to provide evidence of any formal training. Organizations often measure training cost, training hours, and completion rates. Unfortunately, they rarely combine these metrics for the purpose of work systems effectiveness review. For example, how do training investments affect process error, equipment failure, and workplace injury rates? How do we choose the best training investment if we need performance gains in a specific area? In this podcast, I share a progressive list of possible training effectiveness metrics. Keep in mind those at the top of the list may seem familiar, but they are also the weakest gauges. ">
Explore My Process Measurement Madness
Feb 12 2023
Explore My Process Measurement Madness
in this Real Life Work podcast episode, I let you explore my process measurement madness, and hopefully a measurement best practice or two. Explore My Process Measurement Madness By Kevin McManus, Kaizen Facilitator and Coach In this podcast episode, I let you explore my process measurement madness. My hope is that this podcast inspires you to engage a little more with the practice of proactive, process-based daily measurement. I love measurement. When I would teach the TapRooT® 5-day root cause analysis course, I would always chomp at the bit to teach the Trending module. Why do I love measurement so much? How has measurement helped me improve my own work processes as a small business owner? What types of things do you measure at work? Most, if not all, organizations measure something.  Unfortunately, a very small percentage of organizations have what I would consider to be a high-performance measurement system.  Some organizations measure too many things. Others focus primarily on those numbers that they must track in order to satisfy regulatory and legal requirements. Some leaders tend to focus only on certain input and output numbers, such as those of a sales revenue, total customer volume, total expenses, and total units produced.  Very few organizations trend their performance information in an effort to better understand their work systems. My 40-plus years of experience have led me to conclude this. Less than 10% of the organizations out there have high performance measurement systems.  My experiences as a national Baldrige Examiner, Judge, and leader in organizations that aspire to be high performers, further validate this belief. Even the best still struggle to capture, crunch, and improve daily, transaction-based process results. More importantly, these experiences help me identify what I consider to be the Top Ten Measurement Work System Weaknesses. These weaknesses exist in a majority of the world’s businesses, hospitals, schools, governmental agencies, and service industries. You can find the list in the graphic on this page. LISTEN to my ‘Measurement Madness’ post as a podcast! ">
Best Practices to Stay Union Free Podcast
Nov 24 2022
Best Practices to Stay Union Free Podcast
With all the labor organization efforts going on today, I thought I would share this ‘best practices to stay union free’ podcast. Best Practices to Stay Union Free Podcast By Kevin McManus, Chief Excellence Officer, Great Systems LLC During my work life, I have worked in, and for, both organized and union-free companies. In some cases, we had some organized sites and others that were not. With all the labor organization efforts going on today, I thought I would share this ‘best practices to stay union free’ podcast. Plus, these are simply best practices for leading any workforce. My perspective has always been that is if a company has a union in-house, at some point in time the company deserved one. Current management may lead in a much more positive way, but mental models from past negative interactions still exist. It is a challenge to undo twenty-plus years of bad management with just a few years of ‘good management’ attempts. Like it or not, if you choose to continue to manage in a manner that could be perceived as even a bit authoritarian, entitled, non-inclusive, or unfair, a union could be in your future. I have learned that the following practices are effective in ANY workplace setting, organized or union-free. EXPLORE MORE: Check out the Great Systems website for more free resources! Focus on Building Sound Relationships, Not Staying Union Free People give you so much more at work each day than what your naked eye can see. Conversely, if they are dissatisfied, they will take more from your organization than you will ever know. It’s not a threat. It’s simply the realities of how fairness, or the lack thereof, influences one’s performance on the job each day at any organization level. Workplaces that are fair, fun, and focused on excellence are possible. Plus, you can even find them and experience them if one looks hard enough. They’re just not the norm. Where is your workplace at today? What would your people say if we asked them the same question? LISTEN to the Podcast! To read this post, please follow this link: Best Pr...