“Our work changed a lot during the pandemic.” We’ve heard this phrase quite a bit over the last couple of years as we (the global “We”) have adjusted – and readjusted several times over – to a world in which face-to-face interaction – a fundamental piece of what makes us human, was no longer safe. Now, just over two years since we went from in-person meetings, coffee chats, and sticky note-on-the-wall workshops to shared WebEx screens and 9x9 little square faces on our laptops, we’re slowly starting to venture back into the formerly comforting but now unknown territory of in-person interaction. For local government innovators, this transition “back” – even in small increments, is a welcome (understatement) change.
Sam is explaining his process for identifying an illegal setout and issuing a citation.
One of the “tools” in our “innovation toolkit” that was rendered essentially unusable during the pre-vaccination days of the COVID pandemic was “shadowing”, or as we call it in the innovation world a Gemba Walk. Gemba is a Japanese term defined as “the actual place”. In the manufacturing world, the shop floor is the Gemba or the “actual place manufacturing is completed”. A Gemba walk in the production world would then be a tour of the shop floor, which doesn’t directly translate to shadowing, but you get the idea. A Gemba walk would be the time you go and observe a person doing their work in their environment. The value in shadowing or a “Gemba walk” is that it bridges theory and practice by bringing you to the place where the work happens to observe processes as they happen. Within the last couple of months, the Gemba Walk has made its return, most significantly in one of the programs led by our office right now, which aims at reducing the number of what are known as “illegal setouts” in the city. Illegal setout is a term used to describe trash, recycling, debris, or any category of “solid waste” that is either:
Placed on the curb of a property on the wrong day (e.g. if your trash day is Monday and you set your trash out for pickup on Wednesday).
In the wrong quantity (e.g. if you set out four large couches when the city’s legal limit is approximately the size of one washer and dryer side-by-side).
The wrong item (e.g. if you set out paint, construction debris, or used needles – all items that are not eligible for pickup by the city).
As we sought to learn more about why illegal setouts occur and how we could fix the problem, we wanted to have a deep understanding of how the process of citing, picking up, and billing property owners for illegal setouts worked. We asked staff involved in the process to describe it to us over WebEx meetings, we asked them to list the steps in an email, and we even held an in-person workshop where we brought the sticky notes out and asked staff to map out how their part of the process worked. Still, we felt like we were missing information. We decided that after nearly two years, it was time to reintroduce the Gemba walk into our problem-solving toolbelt.
How We Did It
First, we shadowed Sam, the City’s illegal setouts inspector. His job is to drive around the city and proactively write citations for illegal setouts. Around 8:00 AM, we met Sam outside of City Hall and sat with him as he curated a list of properties that he needed to ensure he visited that day because a resident had reported seeing an illegal setout. We observed Sam writing addresses in a notebook, then erasing and re-writing them. We asked Sam if he was organizing his list based on geographic location in the city. As it turns out, there was a lot more to how Sam was organizing his list than what he had first described to me over a WebEx call. Not only was Sam organizing his routes based on geographic location across the city, but also by when a complaint was called into the city (prioritizing those that were reported first), as well as the description of the illegal setout – how much of a hazard it is to public health, how much of a deterrence to pedestrian foot traffic it might be, and so on. He further explained that property owners have 24 hours to resolve an illegal setout after it is cited. At the 24-hour mark, a city crew is sent out to the property to check on whether the property owner complied or not. If the illegal setout is cleaned up by the 24-hour mark, the property owner does not receive a fine. However, if the illegal setout is still untouched, the crew cleans up the illegal setout and the property owner receives a fine to cover the cost of the City’s cleanup effort. Sam explained that the sooner he cites the more hazardous illegal setouts, the quicker they get cleaned up. A large part of how Sam structures his entire day had gone unnoticed by us until we observed Sam sitting in his truck with pencil and paper, writing, erasing, and reordering his list.
This example highlights several elements as to why in-person shadowing is such a valuable practice for those who desire to learn more about a process, a behavior, or a problem in detail.
Efficiency. Observing a process firsthand allows us to streamline the learning process and extends the depth of knowledge the observer is able to glean. It also enables us to evaluate the use of the space people are working in, how they use it, and barriers within the space that could be affecting their work.
Trust. For a team whose job it is to “shake things up” and introduce change and efficiency to processes, it can be (justifiably) nerve-wracking to be the person on the other end of the observation. By focusing a Gemba walk on building a deep base of understanding and empathy rather than jumping to what can be fixed, we build an added layer of trust and partnership to our work which sets the stage for better communication and openness throughout the rest of the project.
Legitimacy. Going out and observing how things work “on the floor” gives the “process owner” (Sam) reassurance that we won’t try to implement new changes that won’t work in the environment that they’ll be operating in. They are reassured that we are trying to see the problem from every angle and can aid in an easier adoption of new ideas later on.
Quality. As the change-maker, being present in the environment in which a change will be introduced is crucial to the quality of the solution. In the field of behavior modification, understanding the environment a behavior occurs in is absolutely essential to creating a plan for how to modify that behavior and its antecedents – without environmental insight, what interventions will work is essentially a shot in the dark.
Of course, there can be downsides to Gemba walks. As much as this activity can engender trust between the process owner and the change-maker in terms of garnering buy-in for a solution, it can create some level of uneasiness knowing that suddenly a member of our team has been assigned to shadow their work out of everyone else’s in the city. “Surely I must be doing something wrong that needs fixing if I am the one they chose to observe”. Of course, this isn’t necessarily the case, whether we suspect something in the process is broken or not we observe individuals with an understanding and empathetic mindset, rather than a punitive and judgmental one.
This gets to the point of “reflexivity,” or the active introspection of one’s own role or influence on the research process. Whether we like it or not, we all have biases and assumptions which can color how we observe a process or sway what we choose to tune in or tune out. Additionally, no matter how much you or the individual being observed insists that your presence will not disrupt the flow of their routine, just the known presence of an observer can (consciously or not) cause the person being observed to change their behavior to be more “in line” with the perceived expectations of the observer. It’s not that the individual being observed isn’t being truthful, it’s just the human response of wanting to be seen as “socially acceptable” to others. It’s the same behavior that leads us to frantically clean our houses before having dinner guests over – giving the impression that our lives have some semblance of order.
Despite these potential shortfalls, the Gemba walk is at its core one of the easiest yet most effective ways to gain insight into a process we may be strangers to or just need more context around. And while our work has indeed changed quite a bit since 2020, every bit that we move toward practices that center on human interaction as a tool for learning, trust-building, and insight-gleaning, makes our work all the better.