In January, 2017, all DSI Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) were red:  long product lead-times; dismal on-time delivery; discontent external customers; discouraged / frustrated internal teams and our sales team was losing confidence. Recently promoted President & CEO, Kristen Knox, decided that a significant transformation was required.

Understanding lasting success requires a long-term plan and a resilient foundation, we approached our transformation as a process and a journey towards Operational Excellence.

The keys to our success boil down to:

• Collaborative & Supportive Culture
• Common Purpose, Aspirations and Alignment
• Management & Leadership

Collaborative & Supportive Culture

Fortunately, we were starting with a good culture. To build upon this, we took a page from Zappos and updated our DSI Values. A letter was written by Kristen, outlining our Values. Managers discussed our Values individually with each of their employees and asked them to sign the letter, showing their commitment. A separation agreement was available to anyone who did not believe they could live by our Values. A presumption of “good intent” (everyone is here to do their best) was reinforced throughout the company, building trust and respect within the teams.

Common Purpose, Aspirations and Alignment

We created our Key Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Principles. This provided a much-needed overview of how every function within DSI contributes to our success. This tore down existing silos and provided a cooperative language and understanding across the organization.

DSI’s Mission has always provided a compelling purpose for the company and many of our employees work here because they understand the positive impact we have on improving people’s lives.

To accelerate life-enhancing research by unleashing the power of information.

We supplemented our DSI Mission with our Operations’ Mission. The Operations’ Mission defines how each and every employee (in Operations) is critical to our success.

By efficiently delivering products, produced by knowledgeable team members, using optimized processes,
that achieve reliability and performance expectations, sustained by resilient internal systems and
incorporating a strong continuous improvement methodology to attain our commitments.

Finally we redefined Roles & Responsibilities to convey ownership and accountability to our employees.

Management & Leadership

Historically we were unable to execute our plans and were severely lacking accountability across the organization. In addition to the Leadership attributes outlined above, it was clear we also needed a heavy dose of Management.

We created an improved methodology for setting goals that utilizes data, identifies gaps, prioritizes and sets commitments to execute. To formalize the need to execute, we implemented 4 Disciplines of Execution (4DX) by Franklin Covey.

Results

With intense focus and perseverance involving all global DSI employees, and in close collaboration with our customers, we attained amazing results. Over six (6) to sixteen (16) months, we slashed our lead-times and achieved desired on-time delivery allowing our customers to perform more studies and allowing DSI to win additional business. Our external customers are increasingly satisfied with DSI’s performance. Our sales and internal teams have never been happier and more engaged.

DSI’s pursuit of Operational Excellence is off to a tremendous start.

Team members

Kristen Knox – President & CEO

Peter Fritsche – VP Global Operations

Eric Rieux – VP Sales & Marketing

Lori Packer – Executive Director, Human Resources