Frictionless flow, what a great concept! Businesses desire it, customers crave it, and people love it. Achieving it is more difficult than any of us can imagine.
Context helps sets up any post. In the prior post, The Flow System (TFS) was introduced.
Specifically, this post will cover the definition of TFS and origin story. First, the definition:
The Flow System™ enables business growth by eliminating non-value-added activities by fostering an environment for innovation and the rapid delivery of value and shortening the time to market.
The Flow System™ is a holistic FLOW based approach to delivering Customer 1st Value. It is built on a foundation of The Toyota Production System, also known as TPS and LEAN, plus a new triple helix structure known as the DNA of Organizations™.
The Flow System™ provides an understanding of different methods, patterns, practices, and techniques that enable organizations or institutions to achieve their desired outcomes.
Definition of The Flow System
Also, here is TFS history:
The Flow System™ has evolved from the emergence of product delivery in non-linear environments, also known as complex environments or complexity. It has expanded upon the work done between 1948 and 1975 on the Toyota Production System (TPS is also known as Lean), and the Toyota Way, first published in 2001 by Toyota. The Flow System™ is the evolution of lean thinking that we call flow thinking.
The Toyota Production System has become a model for organizations to achieve manufacturing excellence at the highest level of quality that is achievable. The Toyota Production System has as its primary focus the Customer. The Toyota Production System is built upon the pillars of Jidoka and Just in Time. Jidoka includes having the ability to stop a machine or process if and when a problem occurs. Just in Time includes the elimination of waste by removing non-value-added activities.
The foundation for the Toyota Production System is Standardization, establishing repeatable and predictable processes, and Kaizen, the philosophy of continuous improvement. The Toyota Production System has become the reference system when approaching linear and repeatable manufacturing. However, it is limited when dealing with ambiguous problems, highly variable processes, non-linearity, and unpredictability, all features of complexity.
The Toyota Way 2001 clarifies the values and business methods that all employees should embrace. Represented as the Guiding Principles of Toyota, the Toyota Way is depicted by the pillars of Continuous Improvement and Respect for People.
Toyota is never completely satisfied with where they are and are continuously working to improve their practices by advancing new ideas and empowering its workforce. Toyota respects its employees, shareholders, and stakeholders, and believe talented individuals and good teamwork create their success. Fulfilling its role as the backbone of an organization, an organization’s culture must evolve amid an ever-changing business environment.
The creators of The Flow System™ recognized that existing tools and frameworks could not holistically address complexity as organizations are not optimized to function in volatile and ambiguous environments. They also recognized that complexity thinking is different from lean thinking, and that new approaches and understanding are called for.
The creators of The Flow System™ acknowledge all the great minds that have created the thinking we follow today (too many to mention here) and have preserved the Toyota Production System and The Toyota Way as the inspiration and foundation of The Flow System™.
A Brief History of The Flow System
What Is Frictionless Flow?
Think of the best workday you ever experienced. You started a task and finished it. Possibly, you started and completed several tasks in one day. How did that feel?
Certainly, having a meeting where most actions were taken by team members, not assigned. Discussion was objective and focused on the work at hand, not perceived, individual action.
As well as any work time that is uninterrupted can create flow. Being immersed in work, completely focused on finishing tasks, gives a sense of limitless possibility.
Finally, conversations around product or service design can be frictionless. When the client or customer is describing how they want to feel about the product or service, it is an opportunity to discover why the sense matters. Building emotion into the design and follow-on work fosters momentum.
Reference to TFS —
©2019 Professor John Turner, Nigel Thurlow, Brian Rivera. The Flow System™ is offered for license under the Attribution license of Creative Commons, accessible at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode and also described in summary form at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ By utilizing this Site and any information presented you acknowledge and agree that you have read and agree to be bound by the terms of the Attribution license of Creative Commons. The Flow System™, The DNA of Organizations™, and The Triple Helix of Flow™ are all trademarks of the copyright holders.
