Model: The Improvement Process
All living things are interested in improvement, whether it’s improving ourselves, our society, our processes, our products, or our species.
But how does improvement work?
Below I’ve listed what seem to be the universal elements of an improvement model.
Many of these come from the process of natural selection, as employed by Darwinian evolution to improve the species.
But others are unique to improvement efforts undertaken by humans, with our abilities to perform analysis and make predictions, and are drawn from things like the scientific method, the PDCA method, and the discipline of configuration management.
Not all of these will be will be applicable to every sort of improvement effort, but they are all worthy of consideration.
Contents
- 5.1 Pick Some Type of Thing to Improve
- 5.2 Define the Thing's Function
- 5.3 Define the Thing's Operating Environment
- 5.4 Determine Performance Measures
- 5.5 Analysis
- 5.6 Consider Relationships to Others
- 5.7 Type Design
- 5.8 Type Design Language
- 5.9 Change
- 5.10 Retention
- 5.11 Production
- 5.12 Competition
- 5.13 Change Disposition
- 5.14 Change Incorporation