Kaizen

In a book I am currently reading the topic of Kaizen was talked about and I thought it was interesting and useful. The English translation (it is Japanese in it’s roots) is continual improvement. While it can (and I think should) be used for personal development, it is more commonly seen as a work place quality control device.

The general idea is that you take a system, determine how the system works against the way it should work, make small improvements on the problems, standardize the system, and then repeat.

To make this work there are three principles:
Process and results are both analyzed.
Systematic thinking is required (so a benefit in 1 part of the process doesn’t become a liability in another part).
The environment must support learning and be non-judgmental and non-blaming.

I think the idea of this plan – and it makes more sense in many ways than spending large amounts of time and money to research and develop new methods of working, to then have them fail during implementation. I also think it’s a great personal philosophy.