Team Collaboration in Medical Device Manufacturing: Nice, Necessary, Recommended or Required?

Team Collaboration in Medical Device Manufacturing: Nice, Necessary, Recommended or Required?

Mark Murphy

Much has been written and said about the importance of employees working well together. There are countless programs, books and initiatives around the subjects of teamwork and collaboration. To apply this topic to medical device manufacturing, it is important to focus on three fundamental questions:

• Why is collaboration important?

• What separates the “walkers” fromthe “talkers?”

• What kind of practical tips can be used to get started?

Why is Collaboration Important?

The essence of why collaboration is so critical to medical device manufacturing is insightfully summed up in “Fifth Wave Leadership,” an exceptional book by author Morris Shechtman. In it, Shechtman writes:

“Competitive advantage no longer goes to the first company with the best new product or service … It’s not that skills and knowledge have ceased to be important. It’s that they’re now just the ante to play the game. As good as technical people are, they don’t give us much of an edge these days. Our success comes from building relationships, not products.”

Having a nice, friendly place to work is all well and good, but the key to consistently adding value to your customers, associates and shareholders lies in the ability of your company’s associates to work together and collectively make decisions.

The primary survival (and competitive) tool of an organization today is adaptability. And adaptability is rooted in collaborative problem solving and appreciation for creative, cross-functional approaches. No matter how talented individual people are within a company, if they are unable to work cooperatively and acclimate to an ever-changing environment, they are leaving their company vulnerable and unable to function at full capacity.

Talent without teamwork is no longer effective in today’s manufacturing world. Twenty years ago, a company could develop a great product, learn how to manufacture it, and then live off of that innovation for a long time.

Now, every day brings new challenges, including cost pressures, technology shifts, and a world economy that is changing at lightning speed.

In medical device manufacturing, the companies that collaborate are the companies that accelerate product development cycles, attract customers, increase shareholder value, experience higher levels of associate satisfaction and retention, and maintain a competitive advantage.

Separating “Walkers”from “Talkers”

To illustrate the difference between collaboration walkers and collaboration talkers, take the analogy of how work flows through individual and departmental relationships the way blood flows through arteries.

As long as relationships remain healthy, work (creativity, productivity, constructive confrontation of issues, etc.) flows freely with substantial capacity.

When those relationships are challenged (which happens even in highly collaborative organizations), the experience feels like a clogged artery. People (or departments) are unable to produce the same work at the same high level as they previously did.

Talkers and walkers take different approaches to unclogging this artery.

Even though talkers may state that collaboration is important, they often do little to nothing to clear up the issues. They often refer to human matters of this nature as “the soft stuff,” implying that it has less value than more important things such as shipping products.

Walkers, on the other hand, put forth the effort to “clean up” the relationship so that productive work can flow again. They view strong, healthy relationships among their associates to be a non-negotiable foundation from which all else progresses (products, new clients, profits, etc.)

Companies that “walk the talk” don’t view teamwork as something that’s “nice to have” or as an added benefit to create a fun place to work. They fundamentally believe that people, relationships, and culture are the very lifeblood of the organization.

Tips to Get Started

Now that we’ve clarified and answered the first two questions, here are a few, simple examples to accelerate your results:

• Take personal ownership;

• Celebrate the process;

• Show, don’t just tell;

• Value humble, inquisitive learning; and

• Do the “hard stuff.”

If you want to work in a more collaborative environment, the first step to achieving that begins with you. It starts with getting your thoughts and actions to be more collaborative.

Ask yourself questions such as:

• How do I interact with others?

• Does what I say or how I say it get in the way of people collaborating with me?

• How can I contribute to the collaborative process?

• When I communicate with an associate about a real problem or a real issue, am I asking constructive questions to help solve the problem? Or, am I coming from a place of judgment and disdain?

This is tough work, but it has everything to do with creating a culture of collaboration. If you start taking steps toward walking the talk and acting in a way that values unclogged relationships, you’ll start to evoke that in others and create a ripple effect. Big strides start with very small steps. And small steps lead to small victories that spread at an increasing rate.

Celebrate the Process

Make no mistake. Creating a collaborative culture is long-term work. This is why it’s important to celebrate as many collaboration “bright-spots” as possible—no matter how minor they may seem.

For example, if you’re a manager and have associates in different departments who have gotten together, shared thoughts, and come up with a solution to a problem, you have two victories there. Certainly enjoy the fact that a problem was solved. But just as important, celebrate the collaborative way in which the problem was solved. Consider taking the team out to lunch to acknowledge their collective work, because this is a victory that will continue to pay dividends.

It doesn’t have to be big or glorious, but try not to let collaborative contributions get lost in day-to-day business operations. Creating a collaborative work culture is a long journey. Make sure you pause along the way to appreciate the landmarks.

Show, Don’t Just Tell

Often, telling people how important collaboration is doesn’t affect us on a gut, emotional level—which is where most change happens. For instance, take a vice president of sales who views it as his or her job to be the polarizing advocate for the customer and views the jobs of the vice presidents of other departments to be the “balancing advocates” of efficiency and profitability.

This VP’s consistently extreme outlook and reliance on tug-of-war positioning creates an inefficient work environment, straining necessary relationships in the process.

An effective strategy to drive home the point that senior leaders need to be holistic business people and not just functional leaders of their particular discipline is the “rope” demonstration. This physically shows what un-collaborative, polarizing behavior does. To demonstrate this at your next leadership meeting, you’ll just need a rope and a volunteer.
You’ll both go to the front of the room and you’ll tell your volunteer and your audience that you’re going to play a game.

Without describing the rules of the “game,” hand the volunteer one end of the rope while holding tightly to your end. Then take a few steps backward, away from your volunteer, and sink into a squatted, tug-of-war position. But do not say a word.

Even though you have not described the rules of the game, you’ll find that your counterpart also will take a few steps backward, bring the rope to full tension, and sink into a squatted, tug-of-war position.

Once that’s been demonstrated, thank your volunteer and let him or her know that you’re now going to play another “game.” This time relax, stand straight up, and take three steps toward the person at the other end of the rope, taking all the tension off the rope. Again, don’t say a word.

Your somewhat bewildered volunteer—still lacking any explanation of the rules—instinctively will do the same.

This very simple, yet powerful exercise takes less than two minutes, but it allows your team to see and feel the effects of polarizing and collaborative behaviors.

When we focus only on our function, needs or department, it leaves the other person almost no choice except to do the exact same thing. Conversely, embracing a more holistic view allows the other person the freedom to reciprocate. These types of collaboration exercises are important because it’s in the seeing and feeling where people begin to understand where their behaviors might impede progress and what they can do to support a more positive, productive direction.

Value Humble,Inquisitive Learning

Collaborative organizations are learning organizations that value different perspectives and are open to accepting input from others.

Take, for example, a design engineer with more than 15 years of experience designing medical devices and a degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He easily could have a “know-it-all” approach. Instead of just personally reviewing the assembly instructions for a new medical device and handing them off to the assemblers, he chose to shadow the assemblers and watch closely as they put the device together using the existing drawings and instructions. He took copious notes, asked them for their thoughts and really listened. As a result of their feedback, he made more than 45 changes to the assembly instructions, fixtures and engineering drawings. He then went back, sat with the assemblers again, showed them the various improvements that their constructive feedback had elicited, and thanked them for taking the time to teach him.

The final instructions were undoubtedly better and clearer as a result of this collaborative approach. But that was only one, small benefit. Far more profound was the message that his actions communicated. He gave voice, respect, and ownership to the people making this device while simultaneously demonstrating humility, learning, and excellence in his own work.

This is the power of valuing collective knowledge versus individual talent and skill.

Do the Hard Stuff

There’s a powerful saying:“Where two or more are gathered, there will be stuff!” What this means is that no matter how good our intentions, we are human. We all have needs, egos, expectations, styles, opinions and life experiences that shape us. One person might say something completely harmless, but another hears it as offensive or even attacking.

Collaboration starts with owning my part in every relationship, being committed to understanding your perspective, and agreeing that the value of the goal is more important than our personal—and temporary—hiccup.

Creating a collaborative work environment for the sake of having a pleasant, easy place to work … where everyone looks like a bunch of smiling robots … should not be the goal. In fact, that quickly will lead toserious disillusionment.

Real collaborative cultures are bold, open and constructively confrontational. They are committed to doing the hard work of tackling real issues, impossible challenges, and cleaning up relationships when (not if) they are breached. This requires courage, commitment, and a deep appreciation that it’s not “you” and “I” as individuals that are valuable. It’s what “we” create together in a fully functioning, productive relationship that’s important.

Any organization that is seriously committed to playing in this advanced arena must embrace that it’s through strong relationships and healthy connections within the organization that great things are accomplished.

So, be prepared to do the hard stuff, but also understand that it definitely will be worth every minute.

Mark Murphy is the president and CEO of Pro-Dex, Inc., an Irvine, Calif.-based design, development, and contract manufacturer for medical device OEMs. For more than 25 years, Murphy has held management positions in both national and international companies, leading associates worldwide in working more efficiently and collaboratively. He holds a BA in Business Administration and an MBA in Finance from California State University, Fullerton.