Let’s take a look at an example of continuous improvement practices at the company Atlassian.
Atlassian, a software company that offers products to product managers and development teams, has successfully created and sustained a culture of innovation and continuous improvement. Atlassian achieves this in a few different ways.
Firstly, to drive innovation, employees are given 20% of their allocated work time to spend on personal projects. [1] This is modelled on Google’s innovation strategy, where personal projects often can be transformed into creative new features or products for the organisation. This strategy requires Atlassian to allow their employees the time to work on these personal projects, which is an expensive risk for the company since 20% of employees’ time is given away to experimentation. However, to ensure that this time is used productively, employees focus their personal projects on the team, how it operates, and what they do.
Secondly, Atlassian cultivated a culture of continuous improvement to support innovation. Specifically, Atlassian split their employees into small teams and encouraged them to own their career path by embracing and identifying challenges and strengths. What they found was that successful teams handled challenges differently to other teams, so to help those who struggled, Atlassian implemented a workshopping resource called the Team Playbook. They gathered the practices that successful teams used and created short, purposeful workshops and exercises that enabled teams to learn and adopt these practices. [2]
For example, Atlassion’s Health Monitor [3] helps teams to assess their strengths and weaknesses. Once some weaknesses have been identified, teams and employees can use other plays to strengthen these areas.
Instructions: How do you implement continuous improvement practices?
Taking dedicated work time to innovate and find continuous improvement opportunities can be an expensive cost for an organisation. Considering what you have just learned, complete the following:
- Explain in a brief paragraph:
- How might you go about implementing effective continuous improvement practices?
- What might you do differently to Atlassian?
Implementing effective continuous improvement practices requires a strategic approach that fosters a culture of innovation while balancing the costs associated with dedicating time and resources to such endeavors. Firstly, it’s essential to establish clear goals and objectives for continuous improvement initiatives, aligning them with the organization’s overall mission and values. Encouraging employees to allocate a portion of their work time to personal projects, similar to Atlassian’s approach, can provide valuable opportunities for experimentation and creativity. However, to optimize resource utilization, organizations may consider implementing a structured framework for project selection and evaluation to ensure alignment with strategic priorities.
Furthermore, cultivating a culture of continuous improvement requires more than just providing time for personal projects. It involves actively promoting collaboration, transparency, and knowledge sharing across teams. One way to enhance this aspect could be through implementing regular cross-functional workshops or hackathons where employees from different departments can collaborate on solving common challenges or exploring new ideas. Additionally, providing ongoing training and support in areas such as problem-solving, innovation methodologies, and agile practices can empower employees to drive meaningful improvements in their work processes and outcomes.
To differentiate from Atlassian, organizations might tailor their continuous improvement practices to suit their unique industry, organizational structure, and employee demographics. For instance, instead of solely relying on personal projects, organizations could encourage teams to dedicate a portion of their regular meetings or sprint cycles to brainstorming and implementing improvement initiatives collectively. Additionally, leveraging technology such as digital collaboration platforms or continuous feedback tools can streamline the identification and implementation of improvement opportunities, making the process more efficient and scalable across the organization. Overall, the key lies in creating a supportive environment that values experimentation, learning, and adaptation, while also being mindful of resource constraints and organizational realities.
For me, I shall implement an effective continuous improvement practice through establishing a sound culture of improvement which encourages employees to be empowered to identify and suggest improvements in their work processes without fear of criticism while setting SMART goals and regularly collecting feedback that cuts across employees, customers, and other stakeholder. However, changes noted must be implemented and engage in data driven decision making. Not only this, I will put in place a mechanism that celebrate successes while learning from failures.
As a project manager, implementing effective continuous improvement practices, I will give my team an extensive training on the project.
and what I will do differently to Atlasian: one thing is certain, When all your team members understands your goals, and team work is carried out effectively, the project success is sure. I will take back the 20% free time from the employees then onboard them on a effective communication and practical work ethics.
Being a product manager, Effective communication is a big role to a project success. At atlasian i will teamwork, collaboration and feedback.
Being a PM, keeping open communication is on area where I would ensure is maintained and what I would do differently at Atlassian is having to understand employees and set team leads to track progress and efficiency.
As a PM, I’ll create an avenue for open communication. Will create a culture of innovation and collaboration. This way, regular feedback will be used to assess performance and make adjustments when needed.
open communication, collaboration, and experimentation. I would provide dedicated time and resources for employees to work on projects aligned with company goals. Regular feedback mechanisms and performance evaluations would be used to assess impact and adjust strategies accordingly. While drawing inspiration from Atlassian’s approach,
a PM, I will first of all create a culture of innovation and change within my team by making them accept it as a way of life and see reason why this must be implemented as it can affect the overall business and products goals. This I will do and inculcate from the initial stage of the product development.
I will also encourage continuous improvement through massive customer feedback at product launch. This feedback will highlight each team’s contribution to the creation of the product. So each team is getting a feed back from the designteam to the functionality to the market awareness etc. what I will do differently from atlassian’s is that I will give incentives to each team by paying them for their extra time to effect change so as to encourage and boost their interest in doing so. I will also encourage ideas and notable changes from my team members by creating a safe environment where everyone’s word matters no matter how small.
To implement effective continuous improvement practices, I would foster a culture of innovation and learning by encouraging open communication, collaboration, and experimentation. I would provide dedicated time and resources for employees to work on projects aligned with company goals. Regular feedback mechanisms and performance evaluations would be used to assess impact and adjust strategies accordingly. While drawing inspiration from Atlassian’s approach, I would tailor practices to suit my organization’s specific needs and priorities.
Ways I would create effective continuous improvement practices
1. All team members are troubleshooters. Everyone on the team is constantly at different times and stages looking for issues with the product and ways to eliminate those issues such that it doesn’t affect the output of the product.
2. Constant training on idea generation and problem solving for all team members. So their minds are pricked to tackle product issues at all times.
3. Put metrics in place to identify and reward staff’s functional improvement activities.