Murli was originally exposed to lean principles when he was working in the aerospace manufacturing industry.
"I was wrestling with the question of, how do we keep making these technical improvements, but we come back a year later and things have degenerated, or there was some kind of backlash to what we were trying to do?" Murli says. "Our Japanese coaches, while they were exceptional teachers on the technical aspects of how you flow work, they were really ill-equipped to talk about the cultural aspects and a human resources strategy."
One big stumbling block in the collision repair industry is the collaborative nature of lean. Autobody techs are highly individualistic. "This is very much a 'lone ranger' type of industry," Murli says. "You have to get the body techs to collaborate with the front office and the mechanical guys and the painters. How do you get the whole value stream really thinking together and flowing the vehicle through the entire system so you have a satisfied customer on the other end?"Murli also says that most people tend to minimize problems in their daily work interactions – the opposite of what lean requires, which is a frequent discussion about problems and how to solve them.
"There's also an issue with leadership modeling," Murli says. "In autobody shops, the mangers who get promoted have worked their way up through the organization by being seen as a person who can fix problems. In lean, the leadership model is not focused on that, but on how well managers help build the problem-solving muscle of the whole organization. They have to train the employees how to think critically."
There are misalignments between the lean model and how the typical body shop operates throughout the repair process. Estimates are written before vehicles are torn down, and parts are ordered after repairs have already begun.
"You keep going down the line, and you find that everybody is incentivized to do what's best for them individually, but there's nobody really incentivized to take that customer's car all the way through the repair process and make it whole, and get them back in their own car again," Murli says.
To re-align with the lean model, Murli says shops should establish relationships with insurance companies based on credibility. "The insurance carrier needs to know that when the car comes out, the shop will have provided a high-quality repair in the shortest cycle time possible," he says.Shops also have to align incentives with their parts suppliers so that repairs don't begin (and parts don't arrive) until every part needed is available.
Pay structures also have to be revisited. "You really have to get out of the percentage of pay method of paying the technicians," Murli says. "That's a tough one with lot of cultural and historical barriers. One way to go is to establish an hourly pay rate with team incentives, where they get a basic wage for showing up at work, and the entire team gets an incentive based on how well cars are flowing through the process."
Blueprinting (or damage analysis) is another important step, but Murli emphasizes that other improvements also have to happen, like establishing community tools, providing visual feedback on performance and other tactics.
"You can't let the major breakthrough of damage analysis overshadow other improvements," Murli says. "You can't forget that daily reflection process. Every day the team comes together and spends 15 minutes talking about how you did and where there are opportunities or improvement. Those opportunities are small ones, but there are many of them. That's what distinguishes mature lean organizations from those that have just put in some basic process improvements."
