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April 2016

From Our Office

New for You!

I have some really exciting news to share!

First, our redesigned website it up and running!  We love it, and hope you do too. A big thanks to our own Adam Giorgi, the Department of Administration’s Deputy Communications Director, and the support from our tech friends at MN.IT to make it happen.

Check it out here!

Second, we’re launching a new section of the newsletter – aptly titled, “Things We Found Interesting”!  Each month my team and I will be providing links to various articles, studies, tools, reviews, books, websites, etc. We’re curating continuous improvement content so you don’t have to.

Speaking of Things We Found Interesting, Adam Giorgi was recently chosen as a Featured Blogger for GovLoop.com!  You’ll find his first post here: http://bit.ly/26uiISs

Thank you for all the improvement work you do to solve problems that change lives!

Best,

Joe Raasch

CI News

Things We Found Interesting

• Cartoons as Tools
• Continuous Improvement is Good, but is it Lean? 
• The Color of Quality:  How Crayola Uses Data to Deliver the Perfect Crayon
• How Workplace Design Influences Worker Productivity
• A Periodic Table of Visualization Methods (hover over each “element” for details!)
• Why Government Workers are Harder to Motivate

 *Tip of the hat to Austin Kleon for the idea! http://austinkleon.com/newsletter/

Ever Forward!

Here are some of the highlights of the past quarter:

• In the first quarter of 2016 (Jan-Mar), we trained more than 245 public sector employees in Intro to CI, Problem Solving, Performance Measurement, and Building a CI Culture.
• Expanded the CI Advisory Council membership to represent 22 of 24 cabinet-level State agencies (92%). 
• Close to reaching our next goal of 100 followers on our Twitter account (@CI_Minnesota).  We’re at 93.

Don't Miss...

Skills Development and CI Training Sessions

Skills development CI training sessions for the first half of 2016 are almost completed! If you are a Minnesota public sector employee, check out the courses here and get yourself some FREE training. Mark your calendars for the next Continuous Improvement Community of Practice on July 21 from 2:00pm to 4:00pm at the Dakota County Northern Service Center in West St. Paul. More information to come on topics and (free) registration as the date approaches!  More FREE training!  Design Kit: The Course for Human-Centered Design starts on April 26 and registration is open through May 10, 2016. This is a great introduction to design thinking and how this approach can be used to create innovative, effective and sustainable solutions. The 7-week course is sponsored by IDEO.org and Acumen. Did I mention it is FREE? Check it out here!

Other News and Notes

We want to connect with YOU!

Follow @CI_Minnesota to keep up with CI  news and example of people using continuous improvement tools to ‘solve problems that change lives.’ Yammer CI Community of Practice

A better Minnesota starts with you!

Check out Minnesota's Career website: www.mn.gov/careers.

Minnesota Office of Continuous Improvement  |  mn.gov/CI  |  CI@state.mn.us