Improve Communication with KaiNexus

Organizations that involve groups of people in continuous improvement across diverse departments and dispersed locations often struggle with how to manage and improve communications. Far too often, a flurry of emails is sent with requests and deadlines, meetings are spent giving endless updates, and it's hard to keep track of who is responsible for what.

Common Communication Challenges Include

1. Sharing files via email results in multiple conflicting versions
2. Forgetting deadlines
3. Failing to answer emails
4. Losing track of who is responsible for what
5. Forgetting ideas for improvement
6. Failing to include everyone in the improvement conversation
7. Struggling to scheduling timely cross functional team meetings
8. Lacking visibility into completed work or work in progress

The improved communication that KaiNexus provides makes the difference between a successful culture of continuous improvement and one that flounders and stalls out before ever really taking off, yet alone being sustained.

Customer Story: Improving Communication at Four Seasons Produce

"KaiNexus has taken the burden off of us from the administrative perspective, and we can now focus on our associates the ideas they have, and help them solve those problems."

- Erin Edwards, Continuous Improvement Manager at Four Seasons Produce

How Does KaiNexus Improve Communication?

1. Improvement knowledge repository
   
   KaiNexus creates a powerful improvement knowledge repository that maintains a record of all improvements. This information is accessible to all employees at any time, giving people instant access to the tribal knowledge of the organization. The database is searchable, allowing people to look for ideas for solving their immediate problems and enabling them to check on the origins of current processes. The KaiNexus improvement knowledge repository ensures that today’s improvements have a lasting impact.
   
   

2. Share and spread ideas
   
   KaiNexus sends well-timed email notifications to the right people with summaries about the right information, at the right time, so that they get the information they need without being overwhelmed. This includes sharing improvement ideas and impacts so that each idea has the maximum impact. For example, when an improvement is made in one department, the news can be shared with the right people throughout the organization so that other departments can also implement it (or build upon the improvement). These active notifications connect the organization around continuous improvement, automating communication for maximum impact.
   
   

3. A single source of truth
   
   KaiNexus is the single source of truth for all information about improvements. Our software keeps a log of all communication, documents, links, and data in one place, eliminating the need for messy file sharing and complex email threads. Everyone has immediate access to the information they need as they work on each improvement. Tasks are assigned and completed, questions are asked and answered, and updates are provided all in one place.
   
   

4. Increase visibility
   
   Leaders use KaiNexus to keep on top of all opportunities for improvement in their work areas. Using our customizable dashboard and notification options, they have complete visibility into the engagement and impact of every employee and each improvement. They don’t need to request status updates from their busy employees; they simple log into KaiNexus and see for themselves.
   
   

5. Task management
   
   All employees have daily work that they’re responsible for, so it’s understandable that they often lose track of what they need to do to improve that work. KaiNexus empowers people to create improvement tasks for themselves, assign them to others, keep track of impending due dates, and communicate with each other about all of those elements - without resorting to unreliable, inconsistent emails, phone calls, and sticky notes.
   
   

6. Customize notifications
   
   It’s extremely difficult for leaders to oversee the improvement work taking place in their own department, much less the entire organization, using traditional communication methods. KaiNexus simplifies this process for them by allowing them to opt in to automated notifications about new ideas, overdue ideas, and improvements regarding topics of interest from anywhere in the organization. This keeps leaders in the loop, without inundating them with unnecessary information.
   
   

7. Respond quickly to employee ideas
   
   One of the most important ways to increase employee participation in a culture of continuous improvement is to respond quickly to every improvement idea. KaiNexus seamlessly integrates this communication into the improvement workflow by notifying leaders of anything they need to take prompt action on. This improved communication reduces the time between when an idea is submitted, when it’s approved, and when it’s implemented. This fast response and action makes employees happier, thus increasing participation in continuous improvement.
   
   

8. Reduce the need for meetings
   
   Because KaiNexus keeps everyone in the loop about status updates between meetings, meetings become increasingly productive as more time is spent strategizing or making decisions instead of continually getting everybody up to speed. KaiNexus doesn’t eliminate the need for face-to-face conversation, as this is an important part of a thriving culture of continuous improvement. KaiNexus makes that face-to-face time more productive.
   
   

9. Get everyone speaking the same language
   
   When one improvement team manages their work in an Excel file and another has a shared drive of A3s, it’s hard for the teams to communicate effectively for collaboration simply because their approaches are so different. KaiNexus provides an approach to improvement management that is flexible enough to accommodate the varying processes between work areas while providing enough structure to get everyone speaking the same improvement language. This consistency makes it easier to communicate in cross departmental collaboration.
   
   

10. Everyone can work together from anywhere
    
    In KaiNexus, you can build a diverse team of people from accounting, sales, customer service, and HR from multiple locations around the country to work together on a common problem. These people can work together in KaiNexus just as effectively as a team from one office, because they’re able to communicate so easily and effectively.