* The best people to ask about how to improve how work gets done are the people who do the work not the people they report to.
* If you can create an environment that allows people to feel that offering ways they can improve their own method of working without fear of being seen as a critic, heretic or fool you will get a lot of creative input.
* Impose the constraint the the change must be something that the person can do themselves, to improve their own way of working.
* Make it clear that it's okay if the change does not work as expected.
* Make it clear that we learn more from analyzing why something did not work than we do from analyzing why something did work.
* Encourage people to try something else if the first suggestion does not work.
* Encourage people to write down their suggestions.
* Implement a system that reviews and says yes/no to the suggestion within one working day of it being written and submitted.
* Keep all the suggestions and their effects in a location where everyone can see them and learn from both the items that worked and did not work.
"Nearly all companies do not work like this. Most companies pay lip service to the intellectual capital of their staff.
- Every Pair of Hands comes with a Free Brain -
Treat your people with empathy and respect and you will nearly always be surprised at how well people respond - it's amazing but they might even start treating you with empathy and respect as a result"
- review notes summarized from Digby Christian