Kaizen is the Japanese word for continuous improvement, and a competitive philosophy to strengthen an organization’s capability by utilizing people’s skill to attack problems proactively. In an effective lean manufacturing environment, the people on the shop floor, along with top management, have learned to recognize waste and work to eliminate it continuously. In essence, Kaizen is not a single event, but the practice of proactively attacking problems every day.
But how does an organization become proactive?
1. Bad news first. Bad news indicates a problem or discrepancy. Look at it as a positive- it provides an opportunity to improve.
2. Expose problems. You have to stop production when there are problems. In most plants it’s critical that the line never stops, so team members and supervisors find ways to work around problems. These temporary solutions become part of the process and seldom, if ever, are recognized as a problem.
3. Eliminate or reduce excess inventory. Excess inventory hides problems and create a false sense of well-being. The correct level of inventory needs to be determined based on limitations of the manufacturing processes, such as changeover time, not to cover up instability in processes.
4. Always pursue the ideal condition, or best way of doing business. Understand the current condition and attack the gap between how you are doing business and how you should be doing business.
Kaizen is done on the shop floor, where the value-added activity takes place, and is conducted with actual products and machines. The first step is to understand how the work should be done. This is accomplished by studying the current condition, how it is currently being done:
· Sequence of assembly/processing
· What is a good part/no good part -- is it clear? Is everyone making the same judgment?
· How do I confirm – is this built into the work sequence?
The next step is a circular process:
· Identify the most significant problem for this operator (hard work, struggles, excess motion, etc)
· Eliminate this problem
· Evaluate – do we have the most efficient process?
· Standardize the work
This process may repeat many times before we have a condition that we can consider truly standardized work – as we eliminate one problem, the next most significant problem can be seen.
Kaizen and standardization are interrelated. Standardization helps maintains improvement AND sets the baseline for the next improvement. If you want to learn more about lean manufacturing (the Toyota Production System) and the moving parts, processes, and fundamentals of lean, click here for a step by step explanation!
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