Hazera: Improving Culture to Reduce Future Costs With Shamaym
Challenge
Hazera’s leadership team sought to promote a culture of operational excellence through continuous improvement and learning. The company was already working under an ISO 9001 quality improvement plan, but lacked a healthy culture around learning and improvement. It needed to build a new language and new routines around learning, and give leaders tools that would empower them to guide change.
Process
We started with a program for managers and executives at Hazera’s Global Leadership Forum (GLF), where former CEO Rami Dar presented the 70-member GLF team with the executive leadership’s 2018 collaborative debrief.
Following this initial rollout we expanded the program to the entire Seed Supply organization. Over 3 months we trained managers to deploy routines and practices of debriefing and continuous improvement in their teams, which they implemented during the 6 months that followed.
The program’s expansion led to a steady rise in the number of debriefers and debriefs. As debriefs increased, so did discussion among team members on lessons learned, exhibiting a growing conversation about continuous improvement.
Customer Profile
- Industry: Biotechnology
- Employees: 600
About Hazera Seeds
Hazera (1939) ltd. is an agricultural company which main activity is the production of field crops seeds and ‘conventional’ field crops and vegetable. The Company specializes in the production of propagation materials for vines – wine, table and rootstocks as well as rootstock avocado seeds.
Results
Future Cost Saving and Improved Processes through Debriefing
By debriefing both major and minor mistakes, as well as routine activities, Hazera altered the course of events that would have otherwise led to the same outcomes over and over, and created new, improved processes.
Debrief topics and their lessons include:
- Seed overproduction that cost Hazera $600,000 led to the decision to invest in data analysis, build a crop inspection app, and regularly debrief production plan and allocation, analysis of vendors crop reports, and meeting summaries.
- Loss of 600 seed sachets and 3 hours of work due to an incorrect test date printed resulted in improved communication and supply chain processes between the Packing Department, Supply Planning Team, and IT.
- 5 departments conducted a collaborative debrief to assess communication and trust across departments.
Impact
Culture Change at the Team Level:
In our survey, teams reported significant improvements in attitudes toward learning and mistakes on 8 survey measures, such as:
- Considering the mistake itself, rather than the person who made it.
- Believing their teammates try to understand their mistakes and correct them in the future.
- Believing that when a team member makes a mistake they are responsible to examine why it happened.
- Believing that mistakes are perceived as natural and acceptable in their team.