Christian Anibarro on Terrific Transformations

How Christian came to become a continuous improvement and process transformation expert is an amazing story. He started his journey with at-risk youths, figuring out how to help these kids with their education and their lives. He started analyzing data, using different methodologies, and working with individuals and groups in a way that led him to discover the field of continuous improvement and lean. Putting principles that most of us consider business operations oriented into practice with at-risk youths proved to yield fantastic results.

It’s no wonder Christian is very tuned to the human and people aspect of business transformations. “Anytime there’s a transformation occurring, there’s usually two transformations. And one, which is typically the bigger focus, is the transformation of the business and the processes and the systems, the structures. And what can be forgotten is the transformation of the people,” according to Christian.

He has found that what makes the difference in achieving a successful transformation is establishing the connection among the various stakeholders. “Usually it’s this lack of connection between those who are doing the work, those who are supporting those who do the work, and how they’re understanding what’s, actually happening.”

Christian recommends to really push outside one’s comfort zone when going out into the Gemba to talk, listen, and empathize with people. He has found that this type of genuine care results in important learnings about the people and the organization. “And you’d hear from people in their own words, like ‘it would make me feel valued’. And they would use words I didn’t expect, like joyful. I wasn’t expecting to hear those things.”

About Christian Anibarro:
With over 20 years of experience leading business and process transformation, Christian Anibarro is an entrepreneurial leader who loves unlocking people’s curiosity to solve challenging problems. He is the founder of Impact Consulting, a leadership development & consulting firm focused on process transformation and growth-mindset for organizations ready to scale.

Christian has helped hundreds of teams’ scale and integrate their operations management with continuous improvement systems to unleash people’s creativity and support business growth. He sees his core role as cultivating a culture of problem-solving and experimentation where people believe that “improving the work IS the work.”