In my 15 years of experience in operation management, I found that the “on-the-floor” problem of every company, from small to large-scale manufacturing company I work for as an employee or consultant, is mostly hidden from senior management due to lack of effective communication with their supervisors.
(a) Change their mindset first by giving them regular training. It’s not necessary you send them into public training, it does not work well anyway. You need to change your supervisors mindset. Rather than thinking reporting a problem is a mandatory, you have to encourage your supervisor to report the problem as their right to ask for help.
(b) Once you find out problems on the floor, you must find out who accountable and responsible to the problem, who the ownership of the activity where the problem came up, then you must help them to work together identify the cause and root-cause of the problem. I called it as “on-the-spot” training. Encourage them to work on the opportunity rather than the problems itselves.
(c) Utilize your punishment and reward system, not only at the person responsible, but also at the person accountable to the problem (the superior level).
These 3 action has helped me build the pro-active way communication within organization. As the result, if you practice it persistently, you will effectively reduce “fire fighting” situation in your organization.