Tips & Tricks from Graduates

From Michah Himmelmann (SVP):

1. The TMS is very important: it allows to calculate impact !

2. The ZBT is very important - it allows you to break away from the TP, to increase performance even more

3. Top Performer might be different each week, same for Bottom Performer. Try to understand why (that’s an insight).

4. Manager’s time should be split as follows:

   1. 50% for managing people (coaching ICs, as it’s called here)

   2. 50% for implementing WorkSmart Pro (and working on MRU deliverables)

5. Do a lot of deep-dives (EQB), also for units that passed the quality bar.

6. If everything is well for TP, ask “what was the hardest thing you did yesterday?”

From Andrei Aiordachioaie (SEM): What I wish I had known before starting MRU (without previous manager experience):

1. Study the IQB and EQB for the Written Exam.

   1. Personally, I first read the IQB rules for the WE very very late in the process, after I was happy with my WE. After reading the IQB for the first time, I had to rework my WE substantially and search for more insights.

2. Insight / Action / Impact template. Always use it, even when suggesting changes to VP/SVP.

3. We should demonstrate how we improve the bottom performer. Keep in mind that BP can be a different person each week.

4. Quality and productivity variations need to be explained. All significant decreases (for individual ICs or the whole team) need to be analyzed (deep-dive) and the root cause should be addressed.

5. Having the same person as the bottom performer for multiple weeks without significant improvements is a clear failure of the manager. The overall trend should be improving for quality+productivity, and if it’s not, you should have clear reasons + actions.

6. For the final week:

   1. Get the data for the 2-slide deck early. You will have some interesting problems to solve.

   2. If an IC is OOO more than 2 days in a week (3 days or more), his/her statistics should be left empty.

      1. If an IC is OOO only 2 days, you should check the CPU. Don’t work with projections at all

   3. ALways have a backup plan ready, for the case when you get failures at the last minute. Perfect quality is a very difficult target.

      1. I got FTAR failures in Week 4 on Friday, and my WE and 30-day-plan were not prepared. It was very difficult to update the deliverables accordingly, without having the coach review the final version. Other managers have failed because they panicked due to late FTAR failures, and entered a “plan-for-a-plan” in the 30-day plan at the last minute ...

7. The coach is not going to spoon-feed you with insights, he’s trying to teach you how to come up with them yourself and he does that through the deliverables.

8. All interesting insights + improvement suggestions should be discussed with the VP before applying them to the whole TR. For that to happen, you need to be very clear and concise in your communication. VPs and SVPs have very limited time, and they want to make use of it well. Always prepare well before a meeting with the VP/SVP.

9. Write all insights down (Insights dashboard), and check them periodically (at least 2-3 times / week)

From Antony Coppellotti (SVP):

1. The deliverables you produce up to the 2 slide deck should give you the material for your Written Exam. Think of them as the path to get you there rather than a set of actions to do. I did not understand this until I did my first version of the Written Exam in W4.

2. Use the WS Pro tools together to help find the quality and productivity improvements you need for your written exam. Remember to ask yourself why when looking at the ICs data. For example, look at Activities before doing a Gemba Walk or Deep Dive and then if the alignment is poor because chat is high find out why chat is high, maybe ICs are discussing a problem - can you find an alternative to chat that does not involve multiple people all having their time taken up?

3. Remember waste comes in two forms - necessary work that adds no business value and unnecessary work. Efficiency comes from reducing the first and eliminating the second.

4. Using the framework Gemba Walk, Deep Dives, TMS and ZBT find your insights early so you are not under pressure in the last week to find something new. You can then concentrate on Execution.

5. Get your actions underway asap. Start as soon as you find your insight - you only have 4 weeks and you do not want to be in the last week with actions not underway. If you can’t execute the whole action during Remote U break it down to a series of actions with a plan that you at least partially execute.

6. Make sure that you execute on your most impactful actions.