There’s no doubt that fear can prevent an organization to be what it could be, but what can be done about it…how many times have you been in a situation where there were problems to solve, but no one stepped up to the plate to solve them because of fear? Piggy-backing on my previous posting, this could be another inhibitor to making 6S truly mainstream. Take for example the following:

A defect is identified, and there is no clear root cause. Short term fixes are employed. A person is nominated to handle the problem solving, and as analysis is performed, the exercise becomes one of self-protection. Groups that are involved begin to work on proving that they are NOT the root cause. The activity becomes so muddy that no clear root cause is ever found. Whatever band-aid that was put in place becomes the solution, and the cycle starts again…

What is the bottom line here? To me – fear. Fear of being the guy or gal that stands up to say their department owns the root cause…just like fear shuts down dialog, fear can also shut down team problem solving.
So the question is, how do we foster change so that we overcome fear? How do we create a safe environment for problem solving effectively with free expression?