SA can gain competitive edge

South Africa has the potential to grow its management skills to, surpasse those of many first world countries. Many first-world companies are losing their competitive advantage in management skills according to Joost Preyde, founding partner of House of Performance, who is based in Holland and provides companies throughout Europe with ‘Lean’ management techniques.

“The key to staying ahead is creativity and continuous improvement.  Some first-world companies that were ahead have fallen behind because they have failed to implement continuous improvement processes,” he said during a recent visit to South Africa.

“This is partly because of complacency and not keeping up with changing management techniques,” he said. “Emerging markets like South Africa, that traditionally have lagged behind first-world countries in introducing new management techniques, are now actively developing these skills and could even surpass these companies.”

“A case in point is Toyota. There have been numerous articles suggesting that Toyota took its focus off the shop floor and stopped communicating with, and getting feedback from, employees.”“Because of past successes, management felt it unnecessary to listen to the brutal facts from the shop floor,” he said. “New methodologies such as Lean, force managers to communicate effectively with the shop floor, independent of cultural differences,” said Lorna Reid, advisor at House of Performance (SA).

“Lean gets all parties communicating to determine the root causes for problems. Sustaining Lean management implies high managerial involvement on a day-to-day operations level. Middle managers are the most valuable source of support when implementing radical change, such as shifting towards Lean principles,” said Reid.

“The law of diminishing advantage suggests that, with specific reference to management, companies with a competitive advantage can loose that advantage if they do not continually develop their management skills. This is what we are seeing in parts of Europe,” said Preyde. “Highly-effective managers are crucial to connect top management’s vision to work-floor ideas.”“South Africa could take a giant leap forward. It has identified that it has weaknesses and is addressing the problem,” said Preyde.

“Lean is an opportunity for middle management to make huge strides forward.  It gives structure and empowers employees down to the shop floor to contribute to the improvement of their organisation.  Applying the Lean philosophy can lead to greater customer and employee satisfaction as well as improved profitability and growth.”

“Sustaining Lean is no small feat because it disqualifies the commonly adopted traditional, hierarchical leadership style,” he said.