Steven Ouellette Voices Highest Praise for Hoshin Kanri

From a recent Quality Digest interview with Steven Ouellette (third paragraph from the bottom):

QD: How has, or how should, business/quality education evolve to meet the globalized economy?

SO: [...] I think that what the Japanese call hoshin, or deploying the company’s strategic intents, will be the differentiating characteristic of globally successful companies...

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New Release of PlanBase Hoshin provides Monthly Reviews, Reporting, and Security Enhancements

Monthly Reviews

PlanBase Hoshin now supports monthly reviews as well as quarterly. It takes just 3 clicks to change any existing plan from a quarterly review schedule to a monthly one. You don't have to make up your mind: you can change it from monthly to quarterly and back again as often as you like without loosing any data!

Dashboarding

A reporting dashboard has been added to the Plan Status screen that allows you to filter by status, depth, or function: "Show me what's red!" It is also possible to email all the owners of the strategies in a plan or just the owners that show up in any slice of data you select on this screen.

Language Support

Characters used in most of the world's writing systems are now supported along with the Euro symbol (€). This means you can enter data into the system in Arabic, Armenian, Balinese, Bengali, Bopomofo, Braille, Buginese, Buhid, Cherokee, CJK Unified, Coptic, Cyrillic, Devanagari, English, Ethiopic, Georgian, Glagolitic, Greek, Gujarati, Gurmukhi, Han, Hangul Jamo, Hanunoo, Hebrew, Hiragana, Kanbun, Kannada, Katakana, Khmer, Lao, Limbu, Malayalam, Mongolian, Myanmar, NKo, New Tai Lue, Ogham, Oriya, Phags-pa, Runic, Sinhala, Syloti Nagri, Syriac, Tagalog, Tagbanwa, Tai Le, Tamil, Telugu, Thaana, Thai, Tibetan, Tifinagh, and Yi (partial list).

Security

At PlanBase we are always striving to keep our clients' data as secure as possible. Several new security enhancements were rolled out with this release:

• Accounts are now locked after 13 months of inactivity (a shorter period is available upon request).


• Password expiration is now available upon request.


• PlanBase Hoshin has always picked the strongest encryption a browser/client would support, but now it actually refuses to connect using outdated encryption schemes. Any modern browser and operating system which is still supported by its vendor should continue to work just fine (Windows® 2000 must have all the latest patches applied).

Streamlined Experience

We have worked very hard to make this version even easier to learn and to allow advanced users to perform their work even faster with fewer clicks and less reading. All the new functionality has been added to the online help system which we also make available to our clients as a printed manual.

Find Out More!

If you are interested in learning more about PlanBase Hoshin, please watch our audio/video PlanBase Hoshin Demonstration. You can also Contact Us for more information or to evaluate PlanBase Hoshin for use in your organization.

Windows is either a registered trademark or trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries.

"Spreadsheet Download" Release provides an Excel® report, email links, and more...

What's new in this release?

Responsibilities Screen:

View every objective, strategy, and tactic that you own, and every plan that you are authorized to view.

Document Links:

Link to scorecards, A3 charts, websites, spreadsheets, or any document available on your network.

All Plans Status:

Together in one place, read the top level objectives for every plan you are authorized to view.

Email Links:

Hover your mouse over the icon next to a user's name, and an email link will appear, as well as a phone number.

Download to Excel®:

Create an Excel Spreadsheet with columns such as Plan Creation Status, Review Status, Owners, or other data from your plan.

About PlanBase Hoshin

PlanBase Hoshin is an easy to use, highly secure, web-based planning tool that provides a clear line of sight from the highest objective to the lowest assigned task or tactic.  Presentation-ready status reports present your progress
in a clean, professional format that can be printed or shared online.  Drill down into any part of a plan to discover root causes and formulate corrective actions.

Using PlanBase Hoshin helps organizations to easily and clearly communicate the strategic plan elements to those who need to know.  It increases accountability but it also increases visibility and provides opportunities to recognize outstanding plan participants.  All of which will increase commitment and motivation in your teams.

The PlanBase web site (including a contact form) is planbase.com.

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Excel is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries.

Hoshin Kanri in the News This Week

We found 2 new articles of note on Hoshin Planning in the past few days:

Industry Week:
"Called hoshin kanri (or hoshin planning), the management system... helps Toyota remain competitive year after year by keeping the entire organization's eyes and actions focused on achieving the same goals." Full Story...

iSixSigma:
"The Hoshin objective is an annual 'stretch' goal that, when achieved, will have a significant impact on the business situation that was identified in the annual state of the business review." Full Story...

Press Release: PlanBase Hoshin "Responsibilities" Release Links to Any Document

PlanBase Inc. released a new version of its PlanBase Hoshin web-based planning software that allows it to link to any document accessible from the web.

If it can be scanned, photographed or typed, it can be linked to PlanBase Hoshin. PlanBase announced today that this new functionality is designed to support links to A3 charts, graphs, web sites, or other supporting materials. "It's another way PlanBase Hoshin fits into an organization's existing infrastructure" says Executive Vice President, John Hamilton.

Also in this release is a "Responsibilities" screen that shows each user all of the objectives, strategies, and tactics that they are responsible for and the status of each. The screen can be printed or sent for ease of documentation and review.

Press Release: PlanBase Hoshin Software Commercial Release

PlanBase Incorporated is pleased to announce the commercial release of PlanBase Hoshin a web-based software application that supports the productive development and implementation of Hoshin Plans for achieving breakthrough objectives.

"We know that organizational leaders have been looking for a practical means for getting the full benefit of Hoshin Planning while overcoming some of the common difficulties associated with managing the Hoshin planning process itself," said PlanBase SVP, John Hamilton. He added, "PlanBase Hoshin provides that solution."

PlanBase Hoshin adds value by providing users with a clear line of sight from the Hoshin objective down to the lowest level assigned task; it also provides real-time status reports on each strategy and tactic; identifies who is accountable for each strategy and tactic; identifies deviations from the plan, their root causes and corrective actions; and provides a systematic way for assessing progress. "We estimate that the combined benefit of these features is that the overall Hoshin planning process can be administered with 30-50% greater efficiency over current practices" said Hamilton.

Other benefits include having data for continually improving the process; enriching the catchball process (back-and-forth interactive planning/brainstorming); building commitment as everyone involved with the plan can see how his or her role supports the overall objective; and identifying potential non-value added subtasks which can be eliminated and resources redirected to work more closely aligned with the overall objective.

"We believe that Hoshin Planning is poised for a surge of interest due, in part, to the influence that Toyota, Bank of America, Hewlett-Packard, and other organizations have on the general business community," said Hamilton. "We expect that PlanBase Hoshin will play an important role in helping organizations during this period of accelerated interest in Hoshin Planning," he added.

The PlanBase web site (including a contact form) is planbase.com