Kaizen

The Leisure to do Kaizen

The most difficult thing about sustaining a lean implementation to the point where it becomes an indelible part of the way of working is not about understanding the techniques and methods of the Toyota Production System, not about bringing people along to the new way of thinking, or bout getting more>>

Kaizen: Do What You Can Do Today

Some of the best kaizen ideas can be truly very little things. It is the accumulation of small changes daily that give us the habit of coming up with creative ideas. If you don't have on in your mind already, within the next few minutes you will have a small more>>

Ambiguous Visual Controls: No Running in the Airplane

The more you look the more you see ambiguous visual controls. Some are well-intentioned, while others appear to be half-hearted attempts to comply with some bureaucratic requirements. Others hint at hidden efficiencies or inefficiencies resulting in questionable visual controls. The fact that we get by in spite of these ambiguous more>>

Jedi Kaizen: Is the Force with You?

The type of quick improvements or "just do it kaizen" is sometimes called JDI. Recently I heard it pronounced "jedi kaizen" in passing. The jedi are a group of monks in the Star Wars series. As monks, they live simple lives and work to do good. Perhaps we can make more>>

Ambiguous Visual Controls: It Is OK to Rest Against Window

Part of the ethos of a lean organization is the constantly improve by exposing problems and then systematically solving these problem. Visual controls make problems visible by providing norms you can see. The best visual controls are simple, unambiguous and direct. I saw this visual control on the window of more>>

True Work, Apparent Work and Busywork

Thanks everybody who posted comments, questions and answers to the takt time competition. We are happy to say that you are all winners. Originally the idea was that only couple of people would win a copy of The Illustrated Toyota Production System, but I have changed my mind and we'll more>>

Calisthenics, Kaizen and Your Daily Stretch

I was lucky enough to witness a shift start at a local distribution center today. Like most Japanese companies and too few American companies the shift leader instructed all 40 or so workers in about 5 minutes of calisthenics: simple stretching and warm-up exercises before starting work. This small, daily more>>

Kaizen and the Way of the Ninja

Taiichi Ohno was fond of saying "use the way of the ninja, not of mathematical calculations". He had fun with language even as he left the people he scolded puzzled by his words. Perhaps in today's language he might say "when doing kaizen be a ninja, not an accountant" or more>>

Kaizen Photos! Now Help Me Write this Blog Entry

Too shamefully busy to write very much lately, so we'll use pictures instead of words to educate and amuse. Better yet and for a change, YOU provide the words. Fill up the comment section below to respond to whichever picture you please. Picture #1: Brad Schmidt Fearless leader of the more>>

A Few More Kaizen Ideas Involving Tennis Balls

The article 50 Great Things you Never Knew you Could do with Tennis Balls on the The Life Hackery website complies a list of dozens of creative things you can do with tennis balls. I carry a tennis ball in my computer bag as a stress relieving tool. If you more>>

101 Kaizen Templates: Production Control Board

The hourly production control board, otherwise known as the hour by hour chart, is used to monitor the progress or output of a process against plan. The advantage of this kaizen template is in its simplicity, near real time performance tracking and in that it promotes the management behavior of more>>

101 Kaizen Templates: Kaizen Newspaper

One of the guidelines to operating an effective suggestion system is to limit the scope of each person’s kaizen ideas to the work they themselves do. Sometimes kaizen ideas are generated and developed as teams but the same rule applies. The theory is that the person doing the job knows more>>

Considerations on Maintaining the Fairness of Kaizen Ideas Reward Systems

Would you rather have 10 people each solving one $250,000 problem per year? Or would your rather have 100 people each solving ten $2,500 problems per year? This may be one of the key ways to distinguish continuous improvement via lean and continuous improvement via six sigma. Both approaches are more>>

Key Points for Managing Kaizen Idea Systems

A sustained kaizen idea suggestion system can be one of the most powerful ways to keep people engaged in continuous improvement. Yet even after 50+ years, Toyota can struggle with this in some parts. Below are the three most common questions we encounter on the topic of implementing and managing more>>

101 Kaizen Templates: Kaizen Idea Suggestion Form

This kaizen idea suggestion form is a simple one-page template you can used as part of a formal suggestion program or to document and record specific improvements made as part of your continuous improvement program. This particular kaizen was a result of a dialog with a reluctant machine operator on more>>

101 Kaizen Templates: Lean Leadership Self Check

The Real Leader, states Ron Pereira today on the Lean Six Sigma Academy blog, "...listens, respects, challenges, disciplines, and genuinely cares about his or her employees. Yes, real leadership is hard to practice. But just like a healthy and happy home life, it’s definitely worth the effort." It's definitely hard, more>>

Kaizen Your Life with the Ten Lessons for Good Health

These ten lessons for good health (健康十訓) are glazed onto my teacup. Reading these while sipping green tea has helped me survive over the years. Lean healthcare professionals take particular note: prevention trumps correction every time. Ten Lessons for Good Health (健康十訓) 1. 少肉多菜 = eat less meat and more more>>

Management by Kaizen Events

Mark Graban made the point today in the Lean Blog that kaizen events are not enough. He agrees with another lean healthcare article that by themselves, the rapid improvement events of 3 to 5 days in duration are not sufficient to achieve and sustain a lean culture. But really, is more>>

The Cadence of Kaizen

Kaizen is a Japanese word meaning "to change and make good," embodying both the philosophy an the practice of continuous improvement in business as well as personal life. We are often asked about the "right" way to do kaizen. The quotation marks exist to point out the irony that doing more>>

How to Sustain Kaizen? Follow Up with the Tenacity of the Terminator

Yesterday Mike Wroblewski asked How do we Sustain Kaizen Results? on his blog Got Boondoggle? This is a great topic and one that fits in with the theme of sustainability that is on the minds of lean thinkers like Toyota President Watanabe. How indeed? Mike gives us eight practical ways, more>>

Lean Journey Advice from an Optimistic Hungarian Scientist

I spent last week in Hungary on consulting assignment. Several times I heard from the locals, "We Hungarians are a pessimistic people" but they are making slow but steady progress with Lean nonetheless. I was also introduced to the fact that for a country of its size Hungary has many more>>

Four Things to Do Before Letting the Lean Consultants in the Door

We are often asked, "What can we do in the mean time?" when shaking hands on an agreement to begin a Lean consultation with a new client. For most companies that are new to Lean, and even some that have been at it for a while, this advice applies: 1. more>>

Top 10 Problems with Problem Statements

The problem with problem statements is that hardly anyone knows how to correctly formulate a problem statement and instead they put a lot of information there in place of sound arguments and justification for action, and people would be better off leaving the writing of problem statements to professionals. The more>>

What is the Standard?

A problem was brought to my attention today. Some of our consultants are not submitting expense reports on time, causing us to be unable to bill clients on time. Simply put, some people are keeping other people from doing their job. This is a problem. It is not a new more>>

Why a Kaizen Newspaper is Called a Kaizen Newspaper

The kaizen newspaper is tool used to perform visual management on the process of continuous improvement itself. Many people who have not been introduced to the kaizen newspaper through kaizen events or as part of a program of team-based problem solving have the wrong idea about what it is. The more>>

Seeing Problems for What they Are, Or Lean Insights from G.K. Chesterton

G.K. Chesterton was an extremely clever early 20th century writer who used many twists of phrase to make his points. His style of thinking and the points he makes at times makes me wonder if members of the Toyoda family read and were influence by his thought. Chesterton said: "An more>>

The First Step to Kaizen the Environment: Problem Awareness

The last few days have been ones of closer observation and increased awareness of what goes on around me, in preparation for today, Blog Action Day, when fifteen thousand bloggers are writing about the cause of protecting our environment. I believe the first step to kaizen the environment is problem more>>

Prioritizing the Elimination of the 7 Types of Waste

Tim Wood helps us remember the 7 types of waste, but he does not teach us about prioritizing the elimination of the 7 types of waste. "TIM WOOD" stands for Transportation, Inventory, Motion, Waiting, Overproduction, Over-processing, Defects but this is by no means the priority in which to attack the more>>

Ten Topics for Hansei After Kaizen Event

For better or worse, the 5-day kaizen event is a generally accepted and standard approach for rapid process improvement as part of a Lean implementation. There are both pros and cons to the 5-day kaizen event, of which more later. The more people learn about the broader definition of kaizen more>>

What Are You Building?

For those of us who are in manufacturers, or in some way involved in making things or helping others make things, we think in terms of what we build, the materials, tools and processes we use. How would you answer if you were asked "What are you building?" through your more>>

Target, Actual, Please Explain

I learned some important lessons today. One which I will share is to never compromise when it comes to placing visual status boards on the shop floor. Visual status boards promote problem solving and kaizen by exposing problems. There are many excuses and reasons people give for why this is more>>

45 Ways to Strengthen Kaizen Habits

I have a suspicion that personal productivity bloggers are actually moonlighting Lean people. The 27 great tips to keep your life organized at Zen Habits contain advice familiar to us as one piece flow, bias for action, "zero" thinking, 5S, and visual controls: 5. Do one thing at a time. more>>

A Kaizen Team's Secret Ingredient: Negative People

Ron Pereira at the Lean Six Sigma Academy is blogging all week about kaizen. Hooray. He started early, advising us in his July 19th post to "snap out of it" whenever we have a negative mindset that make us say "the problem with that is..." during kaizen. For many years more>>

How Many Ways Can You Do Kaizen at Your Company?

The theme of kaizen and the human brain is one of our favorites here at Gemba, and this week's post by Mike Lopez at the Lean blog takes on the important topic of Psychology & Lean. Mike points out that the way in which you do kaizen shouldn't be a more>>

Want to Learn Kaizen? Forget About It

Kaizen starts in the brain, so understanding the working of the brain is essential to doing kaizen better. A June 4, 2007 New Scientist article titled Forgetfulness is a tool of the brain suggests that if we want to learn kaizen, we also have to forget. According to a new more>>

The Top 10 Suggestion System Stumbles and How to Avoid Them

10. Delays in approving ideas. Respond within the day to team member ideas whenever possible. The approval may be a "go do it" or to give coaching to ideas that require further thought and development. For complex or large ideas, respond within a week, or encourage the idea generator (person) more>>

Putting the Zen Back in Kaizen

The "zen" in the word "kaizen" has nothing to do with Zen Buddhism. This is a mistake we often see in books or presentations. Kaizen means continuous improvement, or literally "to change and make good" (改善とは改めて善くすること) but we can recognize a lot of Zen in kaizen, by examining the Four more>>

Do Kaizen Like Toyota

How do we do kaizen like Toyota? Just the fact that we're hearing this question more often is a good sign that either a) there is a growing awareness about there being a right way to do kaizen, or b) Toyota's PR machine is in full swing. We choose to more>>

Warusa Kagen is a Revolution of Awareness

There is a Japanese term that I like but is sadly not used as often as others in the Lean community, and may be indicative of a lack of focus in this key area of awareness. It is warusa kagen (悪さかげん) and means "condition of badness" or "how bad things more>>

How to Use a Kaizen Newspaper

Chris asked: Are there rules for what goes on a kaizen newspaper so it does not become a massive action item list? A "massive action item list" should be cause for celebration. A full kaizen newspaper is a good thing. The fact that this is a concern might say something more>>

How to Get What You Want in Four Easy Steps

About 20 years ago in a catchy pop song Joe Jackson said “You can’t get what you want till you know what you want.” I didn’t think much about those words at the time, but these words seem to contain deeper wisdom as the years go by. There are two more>>

Top 5 Things I've Never Heard from a Kaizen Team Member

#5. "I'm surprised at how little we got done in four and a half days." #4. "I have no concerns about these results being sustained." #3. "Everything went as planned." #2. "There's no more room for improvement." #1. "I wish we could have spent more time in the conference room more>>

When is Point Kaizen OK?

Point kaizen refers to small, isolated improvements that are easy to implement quickly. The impact of point kaizens are typically small but they can have a large impact. Point kaizen are in contrast to line kaizen, plane kaizen, cube kaizen, etc. There is no limit to how small a point more>>

Applying the 80-20 Rule to Kaizen

I'm fond of the 80-20 principle. Any time an understanding of statistics, laws of physics or human biology can make day to day decision making easier, it's a welcome thing. The same is true in applying the 80-20 rule to kaizen. For what it's worth, and in a completely unscientific more>>

Ouch! Change Hurts

There's an interesting article titled The Neuroscience of Leadership in Strategy+Business magazine. Thanks to Kathleen Fasanella for spotting and writing about it on her Fashion Incubator blog. The article has a tempting tagline Breakthroughs in brain research explain how to make organizational transformation succeed. Surprisingly, no exclamation marks. What follows more>>

Visit Got Boondoggle? for the 10 Lessons to Kaizen the Kaizen

There's a great post and invaluable advice on how to kaizen the kaizen event from Mike Wroblewski at the Got Boondoggle? blog today. Mike was happy with the results from a kaizen event at an aerospace firm in Indiana, where his kaizen eventwhere his team delivered results of 36% lead-time more>>

Top 3 Ways Kaizen Events Enable Culture Change

"What is your approach to culture change?" we are often asked when clients are first getting to know us. It's always tempting to pull out a PowerPoint presentation and go through our 12-Step Program for Culture Change, deadpan. But we never do. We don't have one. If only it were more>>

Do Heijunka with Your Kaizen Efforts

Last week we performed an assessment at a tier one automobile manufacturer. This company has done some Lean manufacturing activities. Due to a large number of new product launches at the moment, kaizen activity appeared to us to be at a complete stop. They were not unaware of this, but more>>

Following the Kaizen Process Out of the Lion's Den

I’ll be blogging on the theme of Lean manufacturing, Industrial Engineering and Human Resources Development this week. This is a topic that’s been on my mind for quite a while and it’s time some of it was written down. Industrial Engineering (IE) and Human Resources Development (HRD) are two key more>>

Kaizen in a Petri Dish

Last summer while teaching VSM and demonstrating one-piece flow at one of our client’s factories in southern China I was introduced to the General Manager. He shook my hand. He wasted no time. He had one urgent question for me: “How do we sustain kaizen?” It seemed like an easy more>>

First Face of Innovation: Go to Gemba

I'm reading The Ten Faces of Innovation by Tom Kelley, general manager of IDEO. These days innovation seems to be the trump card of executives and politicians who have grown bored with operational excellence. So I picked up this best-seller with great interest, from my public library. The first chapter more>>

College Dean Concludes: Kaizen Best Learned by Doing

E. Alan Hartman, Dean of the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh College of Business, has been rolling up his sleeves and doing gemba kaizen. He first wrote about his experience with kaizen at the Ariens Co. in the Appleton Post-Crescent in February. Yesterday he concluded "Kaizen best learned through participation" in the more>>

Better Safety and Ergonomics through Kaizen

How does kaizen improve safety and ergonomics? A February 21, 2006 article in Occupational Hazards titled Using Kaizen to Improve Safety and Ergonomics gives a good illustration. Citing a need for speedy resolution of safety issues and the involvement of the experts (the people who do the work everyday) the more>>

Pit Crew Kaizen

One of the aims of a Lean business model based on the Toyota Production System is to deliver products and services just in time, or exactly what the customer needs, when the customers needs it and in the exact amount they need. Production and delivery of the product or service more>>

Dueling Views on Role of Kaizen Events for Lean Transformation

Dueling views on the role of kaizen events in a Lean transformation were expressed in the latest SME Lean newsletter. George Koenigsaecker makes an attempt at answering the question Why aren't there more lean successes? I just finished reading a review copy of Bill Waddell and Norm Bodek's new book more>>

The Cheerful Delusion of the Kaizen Mind

The December 16, 2005 USA Today article titled Optimism Puts Rose-colored Tint in Glasses of Top Execs is an interesting study on strength and weakness of top executives, particularly their sometimes delusional optimism. The main points of the article are that the most effective leaders have in common their ability more>>

Kaizen Blitz for Project Teams

During a Kaizen Blitz a cross-functional team makes rapid improvements in a focused scope of work over a short period of time. This is done based on observing processes, trying new things out and measuring the results. This is very applicable in making project teams more effective. There are many more>>

Quick and Easy Kaizen for Project Teams

My travels this week have made me the late blogger each day. I've had the benefit of being able to read and be inspired by the work of the other Gang of Severn bloggers. Thanks to an ice storm in Dallas I am unexpectedly in the office for a few more>>

Workstream Kaizen for Project Teams

The topic for today is Workstream Kaizen. The word “workstream” has been in my vocabulary for less than three weeks. The more I come to understand what a workstream is in a project team context, the less I like it. Why? The very nature of workstreams generate waste and call more>>

Workgroup Kaizen for Project Teams

Today I'm blogging about Workgroup Kaizen for Project Teams. I'm going to take you behind the scenes for a moment and see what we can learn from a project that a workgroup called the Gang of Seven bloggers is involved in. By reading this, you're involved in it too. I'm more>>

Making the Case for Kaizen for Project Teams

A few weeks ago I got a call from Hal Macomber inviting me to join a group of bloggers for a co-blogging exercise. The topic, he said, was to be "kaizen in temporary organizations". My first thought was "kaizen in a temp agency?" As Hal explained further, I understood that more>>

Introducing Kaizen for Project Teams

I will join six other bloggers next week in tackling the topic of Kaizen for Project Teams. There are five themes, one for each day, on this topic. This was the brainchild of Hal Macomber of the Reforming Project Management blog. The other "Gang of Seven" bloggers include: Norman Bodek more>>

Kaizen, Kangaroos & Kiwis

New Zealand defeated Australia 38-28 in a rugby match on Saturday October 15. This broke a 46-year jinx, as the Kiwis had not won in Sydney in 14 attempts since 1959. Kaizen helped them win. An October 16th National Nine News article credits the use of kaizen, the Japanese philosophy more>>

Developing Team Leaders through Kaizen

Many companies ask some variation of the question. "Why aren't we seeing bottom line results after the kaizen event improvements?" There is more than one answer, but I recently came across a good illustration of one typical situation. This manufacturer of transportation equipment has been doing kaizen for a while more>>

Notes from the Field: Implementation and Continuity Safety Nets

Change is hard. What a cliche. But it has achieved its high rank in the pantheon of "cliche-dom" because its underlying reality is so very common. A fact multiplied many-fold during virtually any serious kaizen event. Cold hard fact: not everyone either wants to or is equipped to adapt to more>>

Kaizen Teams & the Wisdom of Crowds

Every now and then a very intelligent manager or engineer will question the whole approach of putting a kaizen team together to spend 3 to 5 days working on a problem when the solution is 'obvious' to this very smart person. Putting aside the question of why the problem hasn't more>>

Book Review: One Small Step Can Change Your Life - The Kaizen Way

This is an excellent book for anyone willing to try a new approach to making an improvement in your life. It is a 180 page book with small pages, an easy read for a weekend or an airplane ride. The combination of ideas based in science, connections to Dr. Deming more>>

Motivating Smart People to Learn about Lean

Sometimes I'm forced to wonder why smart people fight good ideas. Sometimes I find answers. This was true recently when an engineer at one of our clients who was also the project manager for a factory layout redesign stubbornly refused to see the benefits of what the kaizen team was more>>

The Four Elements for Sustaining Kaizen

One of the most frequent questions we encounter form our customers and prospects is the issue of how to sustain the gains made through kaizen and other continuous improvement efforts. In a recent discussion among our consultants, we came to the agreement that the three traditional answers were inadequate and more>>

Ownership Generates Success

Bear McLaughlin, Operations Consultant October, 2004 During my journeys of training Office and Manufacturing Lean tools and techniques, I致e come across the same key in any business environment, OWNERSHIP, no ownership, means no success. How do you generate ownership and what does that even mean? It is much more than more>>

Why Kaizen Teams Should Be Cross-Functional

The rule of thumb to have a good mix of kaizen team members from different areas is: 1/3rd of the people from the area or process targeted for kaizen, 1/3rd of the people from upstream or downstream processes (customers and suppliers) and 1/3rd from areas that are outside of or more>>

Kaizen Events Build Buy-in

During a dinner meeting I had the chance to exchange views on the progress of the Lean effort at a client company with the President. They are early in the process, having trained all employees and having done two kaizens and are on their third. I felt things were progressing more>>