Certified Lean Service Professional (CLSP)

Session 01: The Management Demand or Lean Thinking

This session familiarizes the candidate with the key concepts fundamental to services and the management of services, the challenges of a service provider organization, and the principles of lean thinking.  The lesson introduces a basic simulation to help explore individual elements of the service management system, and how they combine to provide a cohesive system for offering, contracting and fulfilling service expectations.

This session is comprised of six lessons:


Lesson 00: Welcome and Introductions

This lesson introduces the facilitator to the class attendees, the attendees to each other, and to the objectives and scope of content of the class.

  • Welcome and introduction
  • Introduction to the Service Management Qualification Scheme (SMQS)
  • Class objectives

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Lesson 01: Principles of Service Management

Service management is a strategy, a method for managing services that has recently been more commonly associated with the information technology (IT) industry.  Service management predates IT and is IT agnostic.  This lesson explores the fundamental concepts and key principles of universal service management.

  • The service industry explosion
  • What is a service?
  • What is service management?
  • Principles of service excellence and the excellence dilemma
  • The Alignment Models – Enterprise, Customer and Service
  • Respecting three vital service equations, (value, expectation, quality)
  • Golden rules for service management
  • Understanding the customer - Line of (customer) visibility, Customer Outcomes, Customer Satisfaction

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Lesson 02: The Service Management System – Based upon the USMBOK

Increasingly, the traditional command and control management method is being replaced by systems thinking.  Services require a specialized system and this lesson explores in detail the working elements of a service management system.

  • The Failure of Command and Control Management
  • Introduction to the USMBOK service management framework
  • Elements of a Successful Service Management System
  • Business planning framework
  • Performance management framework
  • Key service management system artifacts
  • Service governance framework
  • Service planning process
  • Service fulfillment plan
  • Service plan
  • Service portfolio
  • Service catalog
  • Service calendar
  • Service priority scheme
  • Service portal
  • Service Transaction Engine
  • The Service Lifecycle
  • The Service Requirement Lifecycle
  • The Service Request lifecycle
  • The Service Provision lifecycle
  • The Service Operations Lifecycle
  • The Operations Governance Framework
  • The Service Support lifecycle
  • The Service Revision Lifecycle
  • The Service Release Lifecycle
  • The Service Change lifecycle
  • The Service Performance Framework

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Lesson 03: The Service Organization and its Challenges

A mandatory and influential component of a service management system is the human element – the service organization, also known as the service provider organization.  Service organizations, irrespective of industry, face a set of common challenges, many of which are related to the touch points between the service organization and the customer.  This lesson discusses the key concepts of a service organization, and its more common challenges:

  • The Service Organization and Service Provider concept
  • The Service Encounter
  • Line of Visibility and Moments of Truth
  • The Service Organization’s Role Continuum
  • Understanding Your Organization as a System
  • Service Management Knowledge Domains – Roles
  • Service Management Knowledge Areas – Knowledge, Skills and Abilities (KSA)
  • The Service Governance Framework
  • The service provider dilemma and top 10 challenges

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Lesson 04: The Lessons Learned from Traditional Improvement Programs

Traditionally, and especially within the information technology industry, two approaches to making improvements in the performance of the service organization have led the way: process and maturity level.  This lesson discusses many of the lessons learned and common pitfalls of these two predominant approaches and the extent to which either can lead to sustained success.

  • The traditional response – implement a service management best practice framework
  • The traditional list of pre-requisite artifacts
  • The clues and costs of common pitfalls
  • Lessons learned from the ‘process improvement’ led approach
  • Misinterpretation and misuse of ‘plan-do-check-act’
  • Lessons learned from the ‘maturity level’ approach
  • The management demand for ‘Lean’

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Lesson 05: Principles of Lean Thinking

In a landmark book (The Machine that Changed the Word), James Womack and Daniel Jones explained how companies dramatically improved their performance through the “lean production” approach pioneered by Henry Ford and Toyota, and extended these ideas as Lean Thinking.  This lesson explores Lean in general, Lean Thinking and the key concepts that transform management theory into demonstratable , value creating activities.

  • What is Lean and Lean Thinking?
  • Lean Origins and American Roots
  • What makes Lean so special?
  • What Distinguishes Lean from Other Improvement Initiatives?
  • A comparison of ‘Plan-Do-Check-Act’, ‘Six-Sigma’, and ‘Lean’
  • The DNA of Lean
  • Lean Manufacturing
  • Lean Enterprise
  • Lean Production
  • Lean Office
  • Lean Event
  • Lean Fundamentals
  • Focus on the customer
  • Improve the value stream
  • Maintain flow
  • Pull through the system
  • Strive for perfection
  • Respect people
  • Services create value
  • Customer satisfaction is key
  • Key Lean Concepts
  • A3 Report
  • Andon
  • Brownfield, Greenfield
  • Error, Mistake proofing
  • Failure demand
  • The Five Ss of the workplace
  • Flow
  • Forms of waste
  • Friction
  • Gemba
  • Kaizen, Point Kaizen
  • Level Scheduling
  • Perfection
  • Pull
  • Takt Time
  • Types of waste (muda, mura, muri)
  • Value demand
  • Value-add and non-value add activities
  • Value stream mapping
  • Value stream costing
  • Waste reduction model

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Lesson 06: Lean Thinking for Service Organizations

A noticeable disconnect exists today between customers and service providers.  This lesson discusses how Lean Thinking has been extended by Womack and Jones latest book to address the needs of the today’s business environments, dominated by services.  

  • Lean Thinking for Service Organizations
  • Lean Consumption
  • Lean Provision
  • Services create value
  • Lean Assessment
  • How Lean is our service?
  • Are we customer driven?
  • Are our customer surveys workings?
  • The value / failure demand ratio
  • What do our customers need?
  • What matters most to our customers?
  • The Lean Service Management operational model
  • Service level indicators – andons
  • Dashboards and scorecards (andon boards)
  • Incidents – causes of friction, Genjitsu
  • Service requests – Pull
  • Service encounter – Gemba
  • Service portfolio and service catalog - Gembutsu
  • Vital mission activities – Value Stream
  • Service request workshop – Point Kaizen
  • Controls and control barrier analysis – Poka-yoke
  • The service lifecycle – Flow, Heijunka
  • The Service Management Professional - Sensei

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