Standardization: Enemy or Friend to creativity?

Standardization: Enemy or Friend to creativity?

In this article, I would like to explore a way of working that is central to lean, a mindset that is fully accepted in manufacturing but remains controversial in services: standardization. In services many activities require creativity. Think about marketing and research and development, but also human resources and sales. In this context, standardization is often perceived as an enemy to creativity and intellectual activities. Let's think about it. Is this true? For example, would you like it if your tax calculation were done completely differently every year? Would you feel comfortable if two doctors made their diagnostics in very different ways? I guess not. 

Standardization is not the enemy of creativity. It might be actually creativity’s best friend! I claim to be a creative chef because I always prepare different types of pasta for my family and friends. But if you enter the kitchen of a three-star Michelin restaurant, you will see all cooks doing tasks with rigor, in exactly the same way. The chef is only tasting and giving instructions. So, am I more creative than a three star chef? I don't think so. I'm just less professional. 

Let me push this concept even further: can an artist work with a lean mindset? The answer is "yes", but the purpose is not to standardize paintings—this would obviously kill their value in the market. Paintings have to be unique. Standardization can only be applied to the way of working, the mixing of the colors, the preparation of the canvas. Interestingly, some standardized activities do not need the painter or the three-star chef to perform them at all, so the masters can delegate those activities to better optimize human capital. Rembrandt used to delegate so many activities to his pupils that nowadays it is difficult to clearly attribute authorship!

The principle is exactly the same in business. Lean does not necessary lead to standardization of products and services. It leads to the standardization of processes to deliver products and services. For example, we don't want all marketing campaigns to be the same but we want marketing people to structure the work in a way that they can be creative for the most of their time. 

Another positive side effect of rigor and standardization is flexibility. 

In a recent project I led for a network of clinics, the main productivity issue was the high patient no-show rate. The doctors were very proud and I immediately felt like standardization was a kind of taboo. The doctors had their own habits, different room setups, and different activity splits with the nurses. Yet increasing rigor and standardization had an enormous impact on flexibility because it allowed doctors to switch rooms easily. They didn’t need the same appointed nurses anymore. They could exchange all their treatments with another doctor. This flexibility also allowed them to better manage peaks and valleys and eventually overbooking, which decreases the impact of patients not showing up. 

But bear in mind that the standards should not be set in stone over time. They should evolve and be continuously improved. 

In the end, rigor and standardization enable us to scale up, to control quality, and to manage variable demand as well as employees' development and mobility. So if the ambition of your company is to become a three-star chef instead of a family pasta maker, a mindset shift to standardization will help.

As I said at the beginning, this is a controversial topic in service, so your comments to animate the debate are very welcome!

I talk discuss this topic in the MOOC dedicated to lean that the BCG and the Ecole des Ponts created, which you can audit for free at goo.gl/3UPqHa . 

Pamela L. Asghar

Organizatonal Effective | Employee Engagement | Customer Experience | Training & Development

6y

I do belive standard work is a benefit to both manufacturers and service industry workers. Having worked in both sectors I applied the concepts. In service secrors it feel "formulatic" and rote, but it's efficient. The trick in service is finding a way to bring a warm, human tone to the equation. Otherwise the delivery and exchane are too sterile.

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Nikhil Surve

Strategy | Execution | AI Led Growth

6y

Thanks for doing this. However, I think a layer of abstraction - Frameworks - is missing in the article. The examples that you have taken up (chefs, painters, etc) are almost Frameworks or Logical views of processes. Standardization would be next level of detail. For me, Frameworks tell you 'what' needs to be done and Standards (or best practices) tell you 'how' it has to be done. The 'what' will remain constant (and should be standardized to max) but the 'how' is where creativity must be allowed to a certain extent.

Marco Morisetti

Lean production engineering at Schindler elettronica Locarno - Schindler group

6y

First of all,what STANDARD does mean? Create instructions to follow a process,right?so the creativity can be applied for sure to improve the standard,and when the customer requirement will be change maybe a process redesign will needed and also in this case the creativity is required

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Clarysse Picker

After Sales & Spare Parts Manager

6y

🤔 good question

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