Did you know, one of the international banks from Singapore was able to save 250 million customer hours by implementing Kaizen?

In the year 2009, the bank was well known for being a bureaucratic and slow processing bank. But later the team decided to go lean. They were inspired by the automotive sector and the implementation of continuous improvement initiatives in the sector.

They initiated a project called Red program. They started an organizational transformation journey called Process Improvement Events. They began this program with a five-day process in which they planned to eliminate non-value-adding activities. It leads to a reduction in the time and effort it took to open a retail account by mail.

On the first day, they created a current state map for the process of opening an account. Current state map is a map that shows the current process and glitches in the process that can be resolved or eliminated.

On the second day, the team created a future state map for opening the account and this time they tried to eliminate as much waste as possible. They estimated the subsequent levels of effort and end-to-end time. This was much better but it was a theoretical exercise on paper.

On the third day, they began with decision making. It all started by talking to the senior management who were responsible for the process and risks. Later they asked the executives to review the current and future state map, to go through the change implementation list and share their views on whether or not the team should proceed with the change initiatives.

On the fourth day, based on the inputs from the senior management the solutions were refined and an implementation plan was developed.

On the fifth day, the team presented those solutions to the management and went ahead on implementing the changes. As a result, when it was calculated, by refining that one process they reduced the turnaround time for opening a new account by post from 21 days to 5 days.

Also, in the beginning, they ran a 5 Process Improvement event, later they stepped that up to 50 Process Improvement events and then over 200 Process Improvement events. And at the end of the RED program, they also estimated to reduce customer waiting time by 250 million customer hours.

Hence, the continual improvement initiatives are not restricted to be effective only in the manufacturing sector. They can also be applied to the service sector. Such organizational transformation initiatives not only give tangible gains but also provide intangible benefits to the organization. So, have you embarked on your organizational transformation journey?