Got Boondoggle?

We Don't Know

2012-01-20T23:37:00.002-05:00

After a great kaizen event this week, kicking off an eight week project looking at reducing real waste (actually reducing landfill waste generated by the organization), we asked the team members for lessons learned. Our Team Leader, David York, leading his first kaizen experience, shared with our team one of the most insightful reflections I have heard in many years.

“We don’t know what the problems are…..that’s why we make them visible.
We don’t know what the root causes of the problems are….that’s why we ask 5 Whys?
We don’t know what the evidence is….that’s why we collect data.
We don’t know what is actually happening….that’s why we observe.
We don’t know what solutions will succeed….that’s why we experiment.”

Ultimately, it is alright for us “not to know” but in our arrogance and pride, we pretend to “know it all”. Maybe we are afraid of looking of looking stupid? Maybe we wish to look smarter than those around us? Perhaps we believe that our leaders expect us to know it all otherwise we are not worthy?

In reality, acting like we know it all prevents us from improving, learning and growing.

Thank you, David for teaching me this week!

To Get Results, You Gotta do the Work

2011-09-28T17:27:00.005-04:00

Some lessons for our lean journey can be easily seen on NBC’s The Biggest Loser in every single episode: To get results, you gotta do the work. The trainers don’t run on the treadmill for you. You must do all the heavy lifting and all the sweating. It’s hard work and requires you to change your behaviors. Nothing comes for free. And we must make the time to do it daily, no excuses.

No secrets. No magic.

Don’t hire Lean consultants to do the work for you and expect to become lean. Any improvements we might see will not stick. Lean consultants can teach, motivate, influence, demonstrate, coach, yell, scream and cuss, but you will only get results by doing it yourself.

Don’t delegate continuous improvement to your lean department. Kaizen is everybody, everyday, everywhere. A culture change towards becoming lean MUST be led by the top, no other way!

Just like you can’t sit on the couch eating ice cream and expect to lose weight, you can’t sit in your office looking at the computer screen and expect to improve your processes.

Too many executives don’t want the labor pains, they just want the baby.

YOU have to get up and get moving. Go to gemba. Don’t say I can’t, I don’t want to hear I can’t. Do what you can. Go, Go Go. You better toughin up. Improve something every day. Again. (Wow, I could get used to this!)

There are many inspirational quotes after many seasons of the Biggest Loser that may help us on our lean journey. As show trainer Bob Harper said it best, “Believe in yourself, trust the process and change forever.” And former show trainer, known for her hard-core, in-your-face style, Jillian Michaels says, “Shut up, focus and do the work” and “Get comfortable with being uncomfortable” and my personal favorite, “Unless you puke, faint or die, Keep Going!”

As an added bonus, here are a few clips of Bob and Jillian in action. Be warned: They have to be bleeped many times for rough language. One of my favorite parts is when Jillian points to her head saying” You are not getting it here”. It reminds me a little of some the Japanese consultants that used to yell at me years ago.

Boeing Delivering First 787 Dreamliner

2011-09-26T19:02:00.006-04:00

On our kaizen tour last week in Seattle, we included a stop at Boeing in Everett, Washington to observe their production lines and witness a test flight of the first customer production 787 for ANA (All Nippon Airways). The 787 lifted to the sky smoothly from the airstrip, unlike the bumpy journey of their long and costly production start-up which is only 3 years late in delivering this plane.

On my last visit to Boeing, in January 2007, the 787 Dreamliner production hanger sat empty and idle. This is in sharp contrast to the production area today which is in full swing trying to ramp up to 10 planes per month production level and put a dent into the 821 planes in customer order backlog.

From my vantage point on the observation platform, I looked for signs of improvement in their production process comparing the 747, 777 and 787 lines. With only a short observation time, I can not see the whole story however there are some interesting things I noticed and questioned.

The 787 line is completely surrounded by staff cubicles and offices directly on the production floor. This is not the case for the other lines. It appears that the staff has located as close to gemba as possible with the 787 layout. As you can imagine, this cuts the walking down dramatically. With such a huge facility to begin with this should have a dramatic impact to productivity and responsiveness. I wonder why the other production lines have not copied the 787 line and move more people closer to gemba? I also wonder why so many private cubes and not more work team clusters?

Visual management seemed a little better on the 787 line with many project boards, information centers, etc around the area. It is too hard to tell from a distance the purpose of all these boards so I’ll have to assume at this point. All the lines had plenty of shadow boards, kanban cards, flags and other mechanisms to convey orderly design. I wonder if all these boards add value or if they are just for looks?

The much publicized paced assembly line on the 777 line has been scrapped. I applaud Boeing for experimenting with this concept. Failure in these types of experiments is not a waste if we can learn from them. I wonder what Boeing learned?

Sitting near the paint hanger were 2 of the 4 Boeing 747 Dreamlifers specially designed and built to haul large composite components from distant suppliers. Although I find the Dreamlifter impressive in design and ingenuity, I still question the strategy to make these parts off site and have them hauled in using a specialty aircraft. With two of them sitting idol, I wonder how often the Dreamlifters are being utilized?

The biggest disappointment for me was seeing all the product lines more idle than active. In other words, all the production lines had more people standing around (and sitting) than actually working on the plane. I saw the same thing 4 years ago but expected the 787 line to be different assuming a higher sense of urgency, improved production line design and lessons learned on Boeing’s lean journey. In most manufacturing plants, you can understand the lean culture quickly by simple observation. It makes me wonder about the strength of Boeing's lean culture in general?

Regardless of their difficulties, I find myself rooting for Boeing to succeed. As an American and frequent flyer, I certainly wish them the best of luck as they begin releasing 787s to their customers. Now ramp up that effort with a dose a strong continuous improvement and make us proud again!

Sometimes the Best Lean Approach is to Just Jump into the Mud

2011-09-08T16:53:00.003-04:00

“You don’t have to be good to start, but you do have to start to be good.” Unknown Author

Regardless of task, project, or journey, everyone is faced with the same question, where do I start?

This question may take some thought before you decide on what you are going to do or it may leave you paralyzed in fear that you decide to do nothing.

Do you feel overwhelmed?

Do you lack knowledge or skills?

What if you head in the wrong direction? Make a mistake? Make things worse?

Do you fear failure?

Decide on a direction (call it a plan) and jump in the mud (do it).

Yes, you will get dirty! Change is messy and it can be scary. You might even feel some pain, more so in the landing than the jump itself. But most importantly, you make a decision to take action.

I am not saying to be reckless in your action, don’t jump off a cliff to get to the mud hole.

All action has risk. It’s unavoidable. Plan to minimize the risk where possible but it can never be entirely eliminated. So jump.

Once the action is taken, evaluate if you made an improvement or not. What did you learn? Where does it hurt? How can you do it better? (Check)

Make your improvements the new standard or adjust your actions accordingly. (Act)

Jump again. It’s the only way to improve.

You will find at the end of the day that there is no secret, no one-best-way and no perfect method, you just have to power to decide to jump or not.

Top 3 Reasons Apple will be Successful without Steve Jobs

2011-08-25T10:48:00.002-04:00

With the recently announced resignation of Steve Jobs as CEO of Apple, many people are already speculating on the future of Apple. Certainly, the exceptional leadership, sage-like insightfulness and huge creative force of Steve Jobs will be greatly missed. However, there are three reasons Apple will continue to be successful:

1. Culture
2. Culture
3. Culture

Unlike other assets on the Apple’s corporate balance sheet or valuation on paper or products in the R&D pipeline, their corporate culture is much harder to quantify but is their single, most important strength. And it is Steve Job’s greatest contribution for their ongoing success.

I’m certainly not an expert in the inner workings of Apple’s corporate culture and not under the illusion that it is perfect, same goes for my understanding of Toyota’s culture for that matter. So simply take it as my humble opinion.

Culture matters. Big time! Cuture = People

Look at these great companies as a group, Apple, Toyota, Honda, Southwest, Starbucks, Disney, Virginia Mason, Group Health Cooperative, Zappos, TOMS. All different yet their common denominator is a great company culture with a great vision.

Here is my favorite quote by Steve Jobs, “I want to put a ding in the Universe.” What kind a corporate culture can be developed behind this vision?

Years ago this Steve Jobs’quote was taken from an Apple corporate poster, which I think gives a small insight to their corporate culture.

“Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes.

The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them.

About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They invent. They imagine. They heal. They explore. They create. They inspire. They push the human race forward.

Maybe they have to be crazy.

How else can you stare at an empty canvas and see a work of art? Or sit in silence and hear a song that’s never been written? Or gaze at a red planet and see a laboratory on wheels?

We make tools for these kinds of people.

While some see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.”

As Lean Leaders, what can we learn from Apple and leadership of Steve Jobs? Look beyond their approach to “manufacturing” (or lack thereof) or Mr. Jobs’ specific leadership style but rather in the power of their corporate culture.

Are we developing a strong corporate culture or are we just learning Lean tools?

Like It or Not, They are Watching Us

2011-08-24T17:06:00.001-04:00

In the hustle and bustle of everyday work, amid the chaos of surviving our broken systems to get things done while juggling our efforts to fix our current processes, we can easily forget that leading by example is our most powerful tool we have for improvement and creating our work culture. Even when we don’t notice it, what we say and what we do are seen by those around us. And they are always watching! Always!

I was reminded of this last week while guiding a kaizen event during a discussion with a newly hired team member. He told me that their team leader regularly wears his safely glasses on top of his head instead of properly over his eyes while walking through the manufacturing plant. As a result, this new employee was not inclined to always properly wear his PPE (personal protection equipment). What example has been set? What kind of work culture are we creating?

This is just one small example, but what is the impact?

What about a healthcare clinician who does not regularly or properly wash their hands before caring for a patient?

What about cutting corners on quality just to get the order out? Even just this once?

What if we get upset at a situation at work, letting our emotions go and say things that would make a sailor blush?

When faced with adversity at work or doing a less then pleasant task, do we show a positive or negative attitude?

When a problem arises, are we quick to blame others or do we try to find the root cause?

What if we see this any of these behaviors by others, do we speak up or turn a blind eye and what example are we setting then?

Growing up, how many of us heard our parents say, when seen in questionable behavior, “Don’t do as I do, do as I say” and that somehow was suppose to erase the example set before us. Is this our motto as a Lean Leader?

Certainly, just like our parents, none of us are perfect in the examples we set but that should not prevent us from trying to improve our behaviors to set a better example. And a funny thing about leading by example, it takes many good examples on a consistent basis to catch on yet it seems that it only takes one bad example to spread like wild fire through our company culture.

Like it or not, we are always being watched and the example we set matters.

4 Ways to Eliminate "That's Not My Job" Thinking

2011-08-15T12:43:00.004-04:00

How many times have you heard someone say, “That’s not my job”?

As we moved from the craftsman era to specialized, functional silos of modern management over the last century, it has become more and more common to say “That’s not my job”. That thinking is supported by our specialized, functional silo based job descriptions. And it is easily seen in our work behaviors in both manufacturing and service industries.

It is easy to step over a piece of trash at work, thinking “That’s not my job” because we have a janitorial crew to do this task.

It is easy to let a defect go down the line, thinking “That’s not my job” because it the inspector’s job to catch it.

It is easy to let patients or family members to get lost finding their way around our hospital or clinics, thinking “That’s not my job” because that’s somebody else’s job, even if I don’t know who that somebody else is.

Faced with this problem, we could easily blame it on the new generation as being “lazy” or “apathetic”. Or we could say that people are overburdened and overwhelmed with years of downsizing. Maybe we fall in the same trap and think that “it’s not my job” to change our culture.

In the kaizen way, we must eliminate “That’s not my job” thinking and replace it with “How can I improve it?” and “How can I help?” thinking. In a lean transformation, there is no “That’s not my job” thinking anymore.

As Lean leaders, we must embrace this culture change in thinking and here are a few simple ways:

Lead by example: If we want our employees to take responsibility, we need to also take responsibility. When you see a piece of trash on the floor or hallways, always pick it up yourself. Never step over a piece of trash. If you see an undesirable condition, don’t turn a blind eye. Stop the process, and fix it. Before long, people will see you walking the talk and it will become part of expected behavior.

Brainstorm and Document: What does it mean in your place of work to eliminate “That’s not my job” thinking? You may know what the means in your mind but you cannot expect everyone to know what you have in mind. And there are probably many behaviors that you haven’t thought about that would make a big impact in your business to eliminate “That’s not my job” thinking. Brainstorm with your group to discuss the new ways to act and document them. Share the list.

Training: Make it a theme in your daily huddle meetings. Improve your new employee orientation training process by adding a complete section on expected behaviors. Teach people to recognized opportunities to serve our customers and practice them. Try role playing as part of this training.

Tell Stories: In meetings and newsletters, tell the stories of employees where they improved or helped beyond that “old way of thinking”. Maybe an employee saw a family looking lost and learned that they wanted to know where the Hospital cafeteria was located. Instead of telling them the directions, the employee said, “I’ll take you there, follow me. It's my pleasure, I have the time to help you” even if the employee would be late for a meeting as a result. Praise the employee for their action instead of punishing them for being late.

These are just a few simple ways but these ways are hard to do. Be prepared, it will take hard work and sustained effort to make this cultural shift.

As you eliminate “That’s not my job” thinking, more opportunities for improvement will become visible, teamwork is strengthened, processes will improve and customer satisfaction levels will increase. The best part is that it does not cost a lot of money to eliminate “That’s not my job” thinking.

I'm just fine! Wish I Could Say the Same for Health Care in this Country.

2011-07-26T11:47:00.006-04:00

This morning, I read the following email sent to me by my good friend, Jeff Fuchs written to his lean students after a recent medical visit to his local emergency room. Jeff is the Director at The Maryland World Class Consortia and a great lean thinker!

I have copied it below with permission and some edits to remove classroom specific instructions to his students. Please read his story about his patient experience. As Jeff and I both hope, may it help stimulate some healthy and thoughtful commentary as we look to improving not only outcomes but the entire patient-family experience.

From: Jeff Fuchs
Sent: Monday, July 25, 2011
To: (All his Lean Students)
Subject: "I'm just fine!" Wish I could say the same for health care in this country.

All,
I am getting back in control of my in-box after my unfortunate absence on the last of our three days together week. My sincere apologies. As the message header indicates, “rumors of my demise are greatly exaggerated.” Just a reminder: You still have your homework. You still have your capstone projects. And now you have your make-up training on cellular production. More on all that in a while.

I am sorry for throwing your day off last Thursday, but I had to bring my body into the shop for some unscheduled maintenance. As we all heard Sir Ken Robinson observe on Wednesday’s video, some of us just view our bodies “as a way of getting our heads to meetings.” Proper upkeep falls by the wayside from time to time, and this is what happens. A bit of detail is in order. I was up to answer nature’s call at 4:15 a.m. on Thursday, and instead of the usual heartbeat, “thumpita-thump, thumpita-thump, thumpita-thump…,” what I felt was more like “thumpita-thump, eeerrk! thumpita-eeerrk! thumpita-thump…errkk!...”

I grabbed my keys, wallet, cell phone, and a good book and drove to the Emergency Room. You may have missed your day of training, but let me tell you that “class was in session” at the Baltimore Washington Medical Center ER when I showed up for school at 5 a.m. Four hours later, (Let me say that again, “FOUR HOURS LATER”) we were still monkeying around with forgotten paperwork, twice redone blood draws, shift change meetings over my bed, staff that was making three trips to my room to restock inventory, and rolling me through a series of three “patient inventory” transactions between some lab and back to my ER bay of “move, wait, process, wait, move, wait” for X-ray, sonogram, and ECG, respectively.

I told you folks. I TOLD you to your face! “When I am through with you, if I am successful, I will make you as miserable a human being as I am. You will see broken processes all around you.” Welcome to my world. Behold, the sad customer/piece of meat-inventory:

Now seriously, don’t he look sad? Pity the poor victim of broken process.

Naturally, in a case like this I couldn’t resist going into Consultant Mode. In spite of being hooked up to the monitor, IV, oxygen, etc. like a marionette, the monitor kept losing my continuing thumpita-errk heartbeat, so the nurses had to keep walking back to the main desk an average of every 11.3 minutes (but who’s counting) to see if I was dead yet and to reset the monitor. How thoughtful of them to give me an ER bay where I could see their goings on. Their wasted motion, their absence of mistake-proofing or visual controls, their failed attempts to communicate with each other, failed service opportunities, excessive patient transportation, and more. How very thoughtful.

After three hours of fear, boredom, and frustration cocktail, I used a pen left behind by one of the nurses and began sketching out a nurse/patient spaghetti map of my morning on the back of an IV wrapper I found on the floor, along with a crude value stream map. (There are a few things wrong in that last sentence. Please use a black or blue ink pen to circle them. We’ll review your answers next session.) The ER staff found my doodles and efficiency ravings…amusing. I’m sure they did not have much time to be interested in the “bored consultant in room six” at the same time they had to deal with the cut up guy the cop brought in handcuffs, the construction worker who just fell off a scaffold, the guy sleeping on a gurney in the hall who nobody knows where he came from, or the other poor folk who needed their full attention.

The attending physician diagnosed me with “atrial fibrillation”, an eminently treatable condition. We’ll see in a couple weeks what the follow up says. They admitted me for observation, where I was subjected to other process design and systems management horrors which I shall not relate to you with at this time. Suffice it to say, I got an education in that fourteen hours. The lesson for me: Healthcare is broke. It’s broke bad. I mean, if I had a clone army of a thousand Lean Jedi Knights, we’d be swinging our Lean Lightsabers for decades trying to unhose healthcare in this country. Lean Facilitator Certification Program students, your future in this industry is secure.

By the way, one final note on my lean healthcare field trip. The “good book” I mentioned that I snagged on my way out the door was Toyota Kata, the one I described with such admiration on Tuesday morning, lamenting that I had not had the time to read it. Well, there you go. I plowed through half of it. Would have gotten further, but had to watch a really good Jerry Springer and eat my tasteless hospital food (Overcooked mac and cheese, gray asparagus, canned pears, and a drink that arrived completely frozen solid.). So, remember what I said: “A true lean leader is a lifelong learner.”

Put your left hand on the computer screen, raise your right hand, and repeat after me: “A-true-lean-leader-is-a-lifelong-learner.”

Here’s me “enjoying” my incarceration:

Pick up a copy of Toyota Kata. Will change your life. It’s an easy and interesting read. You can finish it in a weekend. Or two bad Emergency Room visits. Whichever.
Thanks, all. I look forward to seeing you again soon!

Very best,
Jeff

Jeff Fuchs
Director
The Maryland World Class Consortia
401 East Pratt Street, 17th Floor
Baltimore, MD 21202
http://www.mwcmc.org/

Thank you Jeff for sharing your story. Despite your scare, you maintained your wit and humor. I wish you a speedy recovery and may God bless you! My prayers are with you.

Masaaki Imai on Gemba Walks in Seattle

2011-07-01T14:34:00.003-04:00

Masaaki Imai June 2011 KAIZEN Institute USA forum

View more presentations from Mike Wroblewski

Last week I had the wonderful opportunity to go Gemba Walking with Masaaki Imai to several Seattle Companies. I will talk about that experience in a follow up post but thought you might like to see Mr. Imai in action in this slideshow.

Children’s Hospital of Saskatchewan Getting Lean

2011-06-28T12:38:00.002-04:00

One of our hospital clients that we are helping guide on their lean journey, in particular, using the 3P lean approach, is Children’s Hospital of Saskatchewan. It is amazing to see the lean thinking that has grown since we started this build project. As you can see in this video, many care providers are participating in this design following the 7 flows with a patient centered focus. One point not highlighted is that several customers (recent patients) also participated in the 3P process to provide their input.

At this time, we have not completed the 3P process. Next up is the design development where we will mock up life size scale rooms to test out the layout and process improvements before we start construction of the new Children’s Hospital.

Stay tuned as we progress on this lean journey!

Dilbert on Kaizen

2011-06-20T19:30:00.006-04:00

Here is a recent Dilbert strip poking fun at Kaizen. Kaizen is NOT something that is done to people as it seems in this joke yet in many companies that is the sad reality. This joke also gives new meaning to having someone with outside eyes on the kaizen team. When done in the correct spirit, kaizen is powerful.

Did this Material Come In?

2011-04-01T14:10:00.005-04:00

On a recent business process kaizen to improve a warehouse receiving process, our team was focused on improving the time from when the material arrives at the dock door and it is entered “correctly” into the system as received. On too many occasions, the material does not get entered properly in the system and ends up lost somewhere in the facility.

Typically, the invoice would arrive in Accounting some time later and the Accounting would write “Did this material come in?” on the invoice copy if the system did not show receipt of the material. Then forward the copy to Purchasing. Purchasing would contact the supplier to confirm shipment and send out a search party into the plant to locate this missing material.

This problem is so common that Accounting got tired of hand writing “Did this material come in?” on the invoice. To kaizen this process, they purchased a hand stamp with “Did this material come in? to eliminate the wasted time hand writing.

How often do we improve the wrong tasks? It is not true kaizen to improve something that should not be done at all. Before we jump to improvements, ask what the function is and what the value is. Take the time to look deeper. Our kaizen should look at improving the value. In this case, why did the material not get entered properly in the first place?

That’s just what our kaizen team investigated. After several rounds of experiments, we improved the receiving process and the time to “correctly” enter the material into the system was reduced by 86%. In addition, we set up a measurement system to closely monitor the process for sustainability and further kaizen. Soon this stamp can be eliminated.

Stand Up Meeting Humor

2011-04-01T12:54:00.007-04:00

I found a copy of this recent Dilbert Comic Strip on a stand up meeting white board taking a poke at stand up meetings. Funny except for hitting people with office supplies. But it does cause me to reflect on stand up meetings...are they done just because others are doing it? What is the value of our stand up meeting? Can we improve?

Free Lean Healthcare 3P Training

2011-03-07T22:23:00.004-05:00

Coming up next week, Chris Schrandt and I will present for an afternoon on the theme of Using 3P to Support Healthcare Facility Design. Both Chris and I are active in health services design projects Canada, the USA and New Zealand. We each bring over 20 years of direct experience in applying TPS principles to manufacturing and service organizations. So if you are interested in learning more about 3P design, please join us next week in Seattle.

We will cover the following topics:

What is 3P (Production Preparation Process)?
7 Wastes and how they affect Health services
Who is our Customer(s)?
Understanding the 7 Flows in a Health services facility
Applying 3P: step by step overview

Kaizen Institute is organizing this forum in collaboration with Gemba Academy and Qualis Health. It will be held in Seattle, Washington on Thursday March 17, 2011. This seminar is free of charge.

The registration details are as follows:

Cost: FREE

Date: Thursday, March 17th, 2011

Time: 1:00 PM - 4:00 PM

Location: Qualis Health
10700 Meridian Ave N #100
Seattle, WA 98133-9008

Contact: Nancy Evans
Tel: +1-888-464-3622

Old Lean Dude

2011-02-28T13:29:00.003-05:00

My friend, Bruce Hamilton (aka the toast guy from the Toast Kaizen DVD) has started a new blog called Old Lean Dude. In his blog, Bruce gives an insightful look with his lean thinking to help us better understand the Toyota Production System. Sharing his reflections and observations on the lean philosophy we can develop our eyes for improvement.

Check out Bruce’s posts and comment back to him for two-way communication. Ask him about learning directly from the master, Shigeo Shingo. Ask him why is the sink filled with dirty dishes and isn’t a dishwasher really a batch process?

Impossible Dream

2011-02-22T15:10:00.006-05:00

There a many times traveling on the lean journey that we get frustrated, worn down and tired. The journey is not an easy one when face day after day with naysayers and harsh critics that cling mightily to the status quo and it’s illusion of security. We face a constant struggle as change agents in seeking zero defects, zero accidents, on-time delivery in the most efficient method possible on a journey that never ends.

It would be easy to just give up and go home rationalizing in our weary minds that at least we gave it a good shot. Most practical, rational leaders might think that way. Maybe we settle too easy in compromise. Perhaps we think it is an impossible dream.

But as lean thinkers we know there is no limit to the world of possibilities with the power of kaizen. We know that developing leaders and empowering others is the right way. We know that in face of adversity we build our character, our strength. We may fall down but we find the courage to get back up. We dream the impossible dream.

Impossible Dream Music by Mitch Leigh and lyrics by Joe Darion
To dream the impossible dream
To fight the unbeatable foe
To bear with unbearable sorrow
To run where the brave dare not go

To right the unrightable wrong
To love pure and chaste from afar
To try when your arms are too weary
To reach the unreachable star

This is my quest, to follow that star
No matter how hopeless, no matter how far
To fight for the right, without question or pause
To be willing to march into Hell for a heavenly cause

And I know if I'll only be true
To this glorious quest
That my heart will lie peaceful and calm
When I'm laid to my rest

And the world will be better for this
That one man scorned and covered with scars
Still strove with his last ounce of courage
To reach the unreachable star!

The video clip was one of my favorite versions of this song, sung by the extraordinary and incredible Jim Nabors (playing the role of Gomer Pyle on the TV series I loved watching as a kid). He has one of the finest and most amazing voices in the world!

For all the lean change agents, keep fighting and reaching the unreachable!

Book Review - On the Mend

2011-02-20T19:41:00.003-05:00

One of several books that helps me enormously to better understand the lean healthcare world is On the Mend: Revolutionizing Healthcare to Save Lives and Transform the Industry written by John Toussaint, MD and Roger Gerard, PhD with Emily Adams. This book makes it simple to understand some of the challenges we must prepare ourselves for in leading change in a healthcare and the application of lean management principles in the healthcare environment.

On the Mend is part storytelling, part case study and part inspirational in writing about the lean transformation of ThedaCare, a four-hospital healthcare system in Wisconsin as seen through the eyes of the authors who lead this revolution. ThedaCare’s lean transformation journey began in 2002 and continues to this day, and the book highlights their early years through 2009.

What I enjoyed most about this book is the easy writing style that made great use of patient examples and conflict issues that brought the story to life while tackling important questions like, “How do we define value anyway?”

There were many topics covered that I found intriguing like the use of the “Collaborative Care Unit” concept. I enjoyed reading about the improvement process of a common heart attack (an ST segment elevated myocardial infarction or STEMI) to go door-to-balloon in 90 minutes or less. And why that is critical. Also covered well was the use of familiar lean tools and ideas like value stream maps, asking the “5 Whys”, PDCA, 7 wastes, spaghetti diagrams and standard work, only these were translated for the healthcare point of view. The authors focused more on the application of these tools and left the technical “how to do” for others to explain.

The authors did a nice job of emphasizing that the lean healthcare focus is on the patients and the care around them, identifying value for the patient and minimizing the time to treatment. Ultimately, it comes down is finding better ways to save lives and improve outcomes which are goals we all can rally behind.

I highly recommend On the Mend to both healthcare and non-healthcare lean leaders to read and then read it again. There are many valuable insights to any lean journey found here to helps us find our way. However, don’t read this book and expect to find any silver bullets. As we know, silver bullets do not exist in lean, only hard work and dedication to the continuous improvement process.

Overall, I think the lean healthcare journey is best described in this book in the words of the authors, “There are no right answers or everlasting solutions, only incremental improvements to be tested and implemented as employees get closer to the goal of identifying what is value to the patient, then delivering it reliably.”

Full Disclosure: I did receive a complementary copy of this book from the publishers to review.

Ambiguous Visual Controls

2011-02-12T22:47:00.003-05:00

It has been extremely exciting this past year to enter the lean healthcare world to learn, share and improve processes with the spirit of kaizen. I will certainly post on my lean healthcare experiences later this year. For now, I'd just like to share an ambiguous visual control that that I stumbled upon during one of my Hospital visits. Do you think this causes any confusion?

I am Insane

2011-02-12T22:37:00.003-05:00

During a recent kamishibai training session, I received the best compliment of my lean sensei career to date. At least I’m taking it as a compliment. The President of the company said to me, “You are insane.”

After conducting a session on leader standard work, I introduced the use of kamishibai boards to senior management which in this case included the President and his staff (plant manager, department heads of sales, engineering, etc). Kamishibai boards are a simple audit card system using layered audits. Audits are one of the key elements of a lean management system to identify process problems and engage all levels of management closer to the process. It forces the attention of management to focus on the process.

We went to a newly constructed audit board created by the team leaders and supervisor, reviewed how to use the audit cards and practiced doing a real audit using the cards. At first, the senior management was a little apprehensive to go out to gemba to audit the process but grabbed an audit card anyway and started their learning process.

Almost immediately, I was getting feedback like, “How do expect me to know if the setup was right and completed in the expected time?”, “If we do these audits, it will take us all day to finish them.”, “How can I tell if the prints are the correct level?”, “How do you expect me to know if we are working to standard?”. It was a little surprising just how much negative pushback was given and this is from the senior staff, the leaders of the lean system.

My response was, “How do you think you will know the answers?”

After a round of discussion among the group, the President spoke up and said, “Mike, you are insane.” He went on to say, “You mean to tell us that we are expected to know our processes on the shop floor?”

I smiled.

Annual Management Improvement Carnival 2010 Training within Industry

2011-01-02T18:42:00.009-05:00

For the fourth and final blog review in my contribution to this year’s Annual Management Improvement Carnival, I will feature the Training within Industry blog written by Bryan Lund.

Bryan Lund started his blog back in September 2007 with his passion for TWI and continuous improvement. I saw first hand Bryan’s passion during his excellent presentation at the 2007 Reliable Plant Lean Manufacturing Conference where we both were speakers. He gave a teaching demo of the Fire Underwriters knot exercise for us to understand the TWI instruction process.

Bryan’s blog, Training within Industry, is an outstanding blend of posts on teaching, improving and leading continuous improvement along with personal reflection to stimulate our own lean thinking. Bryan Lund lives and works in the Burlington, Vermont area.

Here are a few of his best for 2010.

Management Reality
Bryan Lund discusses daily self-discipline and his approach as he takes on a new position in his company with the help of TWI pocket card checklists.

Gandhi gets Lean
Bryan Lund faces the challenge of influencing the behavior of one piece flow over batching 5 at a time with a little inspiration from Gandhi.

Do Not Write Work Instructions
Bryan Lund teaches us to stop and think before we jump to writing work instructions by going through a 5W1H thinking exercise.

5S Thinking
Bryan Lund reflects on the purpose of 5S and questions the tracking success metric of the 5S audit score.

Stealing Monkeys
Bryan Lund encourages us to not steal monkeys off the back of others in the name of help them.

Kaizen Teian First, Kaizen Events Last
Bryan Lund presents his thoughts on growing individual kaizen skill before leaping to the large improvements of kaizen events.

Please be sure to continue reading Bryan Lund’s blog, Training within Industry, in the future and comment on his posts.

Annual Management Improvement Carnival 2010 My Flexible Pencil

2011-01-01T18:27:00.008-05:00

For the third of four blogs reviews in my contribution the 2010 Annual Management Improvement Carnival, I will highlight My Flexible Pencil written by David M Kasprzak.

This is another excellent new blog I stumbled upon this past year which just started last March. I was fortunate to have met David in October at the Northeast Shingo Prize Conference along with bloggers, Tim McMahon and Mark Hamel. At the conference, we attended several sessions together and had multiple opportunities to share ideas and thoughts on continuous improvement. David takes his lean thinking beyond the traditional shop floor and directs his focus on organizational effectiveness and leadership.

David lives and works in the Greater Boston area, dealing with the many challenges of fostering the lean approach at his company, the setting for many of his stories.

Here are a few of his best for 2010.

Why Performance Appraisals are Still Used and Why Team Building Still Suffers
David Kasprzak theorizes the often criticized performance appraisal system with lack of true teamwork in companies today.

The Rules are the Problem
David Kasprzak shares a great story illustrating that the way in which you approach a problem determines the way in which you solve it. I especially like the “Make it look like this” solution.

Employee Recognition Doesn’t Require Vision. It Requires Visibility
David Kasprzak reveals a compelling point of view in support of an open office environment in leading by example visibility.

Rube Goldberg Leadership: Waste and Value
David Kasprzak insightfully applies the 7 wastes to leadership that is thought-provoking.

7 Reasons I hate my desk
David Kasprzak questions whether the most common office standard, our desk, adds value or not.

Change Management and the 5S Framework
David Kasprzak uses the 5S Framework beyond the traditional physical environment and applies it to management systems.

Please be sure to continue reading David Kasprzak’s blog, My Flexible Pencil, in the future and comment on his posts.

Annual Management Improvement Carnival 2010 Lean for Everyone

2010-12-31T15:22:00.016-05:00

For the second of four blogs reviews in my contribution to this year’s Annual Management Improvement Carnival, I will feature Lean for Everyone written by Jon Wetzel.

This year I stumbled across this new blog which started just last December. Jon is the owner and operator of Lean for Everyone, located in Farmington Hills, Michigan, working to help teach new and small companies how to use Lean Six Sigma in their workplace.

I am a new reader of Jon’s posts and became an instant fan. The first thing I noticed about Jon’s posts are his long, intriguing titles that grab hold of you and draw you into his lean story. Many of his posts are inspired by daily activities in his life centered on his home which many us can relate while drawing some excellent lean learning. With a biotech background, entrepreneur spirit (he invented and patented Scented Pen) and the skill to make twist balloon animals (not kidding), you can imagine the cool insights and different perspective bursting from his mind and found in his lean posts.

Here are a few of his best for 2010.

Lean on TV: Kitchen Nightmares – Gordon Ramsay from Hell’s Kitchen a change agent?
Jon Wetzel describes the rapid restaurant improvement event steps that Gordon Ramsay uses to save a struggling restaurant from extinction. If you overlook the not-so-shy, in-your-face confrontational style of Mr. Ramsay, you learn that his recipe for improvement is actual quite appealing.

Lean for Health: I’m performing a kaizen on myself at MyFitnessPal.com
Jon Wetzel writes a series of posts on his personal fitness improvement journey using MyFitnessPal.com highlighting the helpful visual controls found on this website.

Lean for the Home: 4 Simple Steps to Doing a Red Tag Event in Your Closet
Jon Wetzel provides a simple, visual method for seeing the waste in our closet of clothes that we no longer wear.

Lean for Home: Creating an emergency checklist for when the power goes out
Jon Wetzel illustrates the power of the simple checklist and standard work as applied to a home emergency.

5 lean things your accounting dept. can do immediately to help cash flow
Jon Wetzel provides a few simple and effective ideas for our accounting department to look at their procedures with an eye for improvement.

Lean Biotech: I got to dumpster dive in Pfizer’s supply closet. It was not a Lean place
Jon Wetzel connects with his inner Indiana Jones as he pilfers through the abandoned supplies of a closed Pfizer facility, piecing together the remnants to tell the story of their not-so-lean supply chain practices.

Please be sure to continue reading Jon Wetzel’s Lean for Everyone in the future and comment on his posts.

Annual Management Improvement Carnival 2010 - Improve with Me

2010-12-30T21:39:00.006-05:00

It’s that time again for the Annual Management Improvement Carnival which is orchestrated by John Hunter, creator of the Curious Cat Management Improvement Blog. I have the privilege to help by reviewing four excellent improvement blogs, Improve with Me, Lean for Everyone, My Flexible Pencil and Training within Industry. Following suit with the great review formats of Jamie Flinchbaugh and Tim McMahon, I will review each blog in separate posts over the next few days.

I’ll start things off with Improve with Me written by Brian Buck. Brian is a lean healthcare practitioner from Tacoma, Washington and started writing his blog back in December 2007. I sadly missed a couple of opportunities to meet Brian last year as I traveled to Seattle but hope to met him on one of my future trips.

As a regular reader of Brian’s posts, I have gained a broader perspective on improvement. Here are a few of his best for 2010.

Strategy Deployment Challenges at a Hospital
“Just because a project is a good thing to do does not mean it should be done now. It is very easy to spend time and resources on these “good” projects if your organizational strategy is not deployed throughout all levels. The challenge our organization is facing is there are other strategic initiatives losing momentum due to competing resources.” This post links to a nice video feature Dr John Toussaint from ThedaCare Center for Healthcare Value on their hospital lean strategy.

Advice for First Time A3 Authors
“Writing an A3 is a wonderful tool to solve problems and share the thinking that goes into resolving issues. I have some tips to help first time A3 authors that I hope will be valuable for you.”

Doing Silly Things
“It is amazing to me how often people want to implement something or suggest how to change a process without ever connecting their thoughts to a problem or desired outcome. As an internal consultant at a hospital, I frequently get presented with proposed changes where we have to back-track to discover the problem. Here are some reasons I think this happens”

Fire at Will
Brian Buck provides some thought provoking points to the “Burning Platform” approach to drive change.

Don’t Call HR Yet!
“If someone isn’t following standard work then it becomes an individual performance issue. Have you ever heard a leader say something like that? It is important to help leaders understand that there are many reasons why standardized work may not be followed and creating a human resource performance improvement plan should not be the first step.”

A.C.O.W. Tale
“Does your hospital have a system to ensure nurses have working equipment or they know how to get them fixed? I recently visited a hospital where the answer would be “NO”.”

I like Brian’s posts because he presents great examples from his lean healthcare experiences that stretch my manufacturing-centric point of view on lean improvement along with providing his insight to the lean approach.

Please be sure to continue reading Brian Buck’s Improve with Me in the future and comment on his posts.

Managing Mura

2010-12-20T17:45:00.004-05:00

One of our challenges in lean manufacturing is to try to level unevenness, called mura, through the value stream is improve the flow. Mura is one of the 3 M’s along with muda (waste) and muri (overburden).

When thinking of mura, we typically think of the demand pattern for our product or service. A cyclical demand profile is fairly common with many products especially seen in seasonal products like lawn mowers, snow blowers, Christmas trees, fruit cake, swim suits, etc. Even caskets have a seasonal pattern, believe it or not. It seems to be the nature of most products and we accept it.

But what about self inflicted unevenness?

I was visiting a company (not a client) recently that has a problem with mura (unevenness). Every month 50% of the total monthly sales occur in the last week of the month. This pattern is pretty consistent each and every month. As you can imagine, the impact through the value stream is like a pig going through a python every month. During the last week of the month, the plant is running high overtime to meet this demand and the following week they are having down days due to low demand.

I learned that they have a monthly sales target to hit every month. This metric is one of the “Must Do” metric driven by management with all the normal rewards and punishments the go along with it. Hit the target means raises, bonuses, promotion and keeping you job. Missing the target means poor reviews, no increase in wages, performance turnaround plans and job loss.

Under this “Must Do” metric, the sales department made decisions and acted to meet the target every month which, in this case, meant making “deals” that cut the price at the end of the month. It did not take long in the market for the savvy customers to see the pattern of price deals towards month end. So as you can imagine, more and more customers waited until the last week of the month to buy which exasperated the situation.

Bottom line, this mura has not only resulted in higher cost but lower sales revenue (however they are making up for it in volume, right?)

I have seen the same push at year end especially when bonuses are at risk. Do anything to make bonus is the primary short term mindset. Is this happening at your company this time of year?

The main problem with goals like monthly targets, quarterly targets, year end targets and bonus driven targets is they potentially can drive the wrong behaviors. Goals and targets are not bad things to have either professionally or personally, they are great things the have. Just be aware of the behaviors and actions that go along with effort to achieve them.

For simplistic countermeasures: Stop doing that. In this case, don’t make the ritual price cuts at the end of the month. Look deeper at how sales promotions affect the value stream. Try to think more long term and figure out what behaviors (ie number of customer touches) are desired to achieve the results (sales generated). Focus on these behaviors deemed to have the most impact. Brainstorm with your team (sales and operations together) to find a better way.

Management Improvement Carnival #118

2010-12-10T13:10:00.005-05:00

Got Boondoggle is proud to host another edition of the Management Improvement Carnival. Please check out the following posts from follow lean thinkers in recent weeks. Enjoy and learn!

Who is Responsible? by Jon Miller – “The word "responsibility" means to bear a duty. When one is responsible, it is because one has taken on a burden or duty. In keeping with lean principles this should not be overburden, or unreasonable duties, but it is critically important that individuals take responsibility for the role they have accepted.”

Guest Post: Going to Gemba with Grandma by John Wetzel- “I saw something that I would never have discovered if I hadn’t gone to the gemba.”

Hoshin Kanri: Steel, Needles, Tubes and Logic by Ron Pereira – “And as it turns out, during the taping of Gemba Academy’s Lean Lingo course, Brad broke down the characters of this mysterious word. And in doing so, really opened my eyes to what this word means.”

He Should Have Seen It by Mark Rosenthal - “We talk about 5S, separating the necessary from the unnecessary, a lot, but usually apply it to things. What about information?” (Also read the link in this post!)

Voice of Customer (VOC): What does it mean? By Mark Wheeler – “Most companies have some type of VOC program in place. Many programs fall short of delivering measurable value. This failure often lies at the definition level of VOC. But how do you actually define it?

Lean Safety

2010-11-05T16:36:00.005-04:00

Can you kaizen a process making productivity gains without using a stopwatch?

Most of us practice and teach the value of data driven improvements however there are ways of getting the same results without clicking a stopwatch. One such kaizen approach is described by Robert Hafey in his book Lean Safety: Transforming your Safety Culture with Lean Management.

While leading a kaizen event, Bob directed the team to leave their stopwatches in their kaizen toolboxes and use direct observation of the process with an eye towards safety. More specifically, the team was trained to look for only four conditions in Gemba: Out of Neutral, Excessive Weight, Straining, and Repetitive Tasks.

Out of Neutral: A condition when one of our body parts are out of the neutral position while performing a work task, i.e. when our arms go above our shoulder, our shoulder joint is out of neutral.

Excessive Weight: When someone moves or lifts a heavy object.

Straining: When someone strains to exert physical force to an object.

Repetitive Tasks: Anytime someone is asked to repeat short duration tasks repetitively.

As the team took note of each occurrence, they brainstormed ways to eliminate the condition. For instance, if they observed the operator lifting a heavy object, they did not reinforce the proper lifting techniques. Instead, they looked for ways to eliminate the need to lift in the first place.

After implementation of these improvements, the job was easier and better which led to productivity gains. The interesting result was the natural evolution from a batch process to one piece flow based on improvement of these ergonomic elements.

Sounds like a simple and focused way to make a job easier and better looking at muri (overburden) versus our traditional viewpoint of always looking for muda (waste)!

In Lean Safety, many of the lean tools like A3, 5S, standard work, poka-yoke, 5 Whys and process mapping are adapted towards improving safety. The tools are not new however the applications towards safety give us a different take in using our lean tools. In addition, Bob has provided many examples and real life experiences from facilitating lean safety kaizen events. Overall, this is a very good book written in an easy to read format with a passion for safety that all lean practitioners can learn from.

For more information on Lean Safety, Bob has a new blog site called Lean Safety which he started posting his thoughts and ideas on continuous improvement focused on safety.

Welcome Bob to the blogging community! And as Bob says. “You can continuously cope or you can continuously improve, the choice is yours.”

Driving Lean Across the Organization

2010-11-01T16:24:00.003-04:00

One of the more unfortunate expressions, in my opinion, found in the lean community is “driving lean across the organization”. I hear and see this all the time. It can be found in lean books, articles, job postings, job descriptions, reviews, etc. “I want someone who can drive lean across the organization” or “To drive lean across the company, we need …..”

What comes to your mind when you hear the expression “driving lean across the organization”? How would you drive lean across the organization?

Is this what we really need to do to move towards being a lean company? Can we sustain efforts if we drive them? What happens if the driver leaves the company? What about respect for people or engaging the employees?

As a lean leader (both internal and external), I have been asked in the past to “drive” lean across the company. Having someone, especially an outside consultant, tasked with driving lean is not the best way to become lean. Sure, you most certainly will get some fast results but it will not be sustained and it may cause more damage to the organization than the gains you achieved.

To begin changing our lean culture, instead of using the term “driving”, can we choose better words to reflect a better approach? How about leading the way, guiding, teaching or setting the example?

Now, how would you lead the way? How would you set the example of the lean approach within your organization? Would your course of action be different than if you drive lean?

(photo credit: AP Photo/Nasser Shiyoukhi)

If Air Travel Worked Like HealthCare

2010-10-21T15:45:00.002-04:00

Here is a quite funny video on the problems(opportunities) within our healthcare system as presented in an air travel parody and a case for Lean Healthcare. Enjoy and laugh (or cry).

Inspired by Shingo Again

2010-10-21T13:20:00.004-04:00

A personal highlight for me at the 2010 Northeast Shingo Prize Conference this week was the opening keynote speech and the opportunity to learn from Mr. Ritsuo Shingo, President of the Institute of Management Improvement and son of lean genius, Shigeo Shingo. I was overjoyed getting the chance to meet him after his keynote and talk with him about lean thinking including sharing with him my first lean lessons taught directly by his father back in 1985.

Mr. Ritsuo Shingo lean leadership experience is vast in his own right, working 34 years for Toyota in various positions eventually becoming President of Toyota China in 1998. After Toyota, he worked for Hino Motors China and was elected President in 2007. Mr. Shingo recently retired from Hino Motors in 2009 only to take up his father’s quest to teach lean with the Institute of Management Improvement.

One of his major keynote points was on the principle of “Go and See”. He said it was not enough just to go and see rather we should “Go and Watch.” Go and See may imply just taking a factory tour much like a tourist walks around to see the sights. Go and Watch stresses the idea of going to gemba with a purpose, staying in one area for a length of time. The process itself will tell you what is wrong with it, if any. Mr Shingo suggested that every management person should go to gemba at least once everyday, and stay in one spot for at least 30 minutes to observe. This is EVERY person in management, not just the plant production leaders. Can you imagine the impact if just this one behavior became part of our company’s culture?

Another point linked to Go and Watch was the steps to problem solving. Many of us know the steps in one form or another, but he stated them in this order:
1. Grasp Facts
2. Find the Problem
3. Cause Analysis-5 Whys
4. Countermeasure (Both temporary and permanent)
5. Implementation

The key point is that finding the problem comes after grasping the facts. Many of us think we know what the problem is and jump right into solutions. Mr. Shingo stated we should cast out a large nets to capture the all the fish to understand the problem with the fish representing facts. From the facts (not opinions or assumptions) we should separate the unrelated facts from the related facts and arrange the related facts in order (i.e. time sequence). We will find the problem from the fact.

Mr. Shingo went on to explain that his definition of a problem is a deviation from a standard. Without a standard, we will not be able to find the problem. He stressed that it is a management problem by not showing what is the standard. How many of us have clearly established standards? Standards are one of the foundations of a lean system yet for many of us, if we were to be honest, might find that we have a weak foundation.

If we have them, are we following them?

If we are following them, are we improving them?

Perhaps we should Go and Watch.

Lean Bloggers at Shingo Conference

2010-10-20T22:41:00.006-04:00

One of the best reasons to attend Lean Conferences like the NE Shingo Prize Conference held in Providence, Rhode Island this week is to meet fellow lean thinkers and sharing our lean experiences and ideas. As seen pictured above (L to R) are Mark Hamel (Gemba Tales blog and author of Kaizen Event Fieldbook), Tim McMahon (A Lean Journey blog), David Kasprzak (My Flexible Pencil blog) and myself-Mike Wroblewski (Got Boondoggle blog) who met up at this Conference. We had excellent opportunities over the course of the conference to discuss all things lean, attend great sessions, get inspired by lean stories and dig deeper into many lean topics. What a great way to learn from true lean thinkers that not only “get it” but actually “live it” which personally fired me up to get back to work helping others on the lean journey.

But it did not stop with just fellow bloggers. I met and talked with many lean thinkers and practitioners included my new friends at GBMP (led by Bruce Hamilton as seen in the Kaizen Toast Video), Jeff Fuchs (Director of the Maryland World Class Consortia) and many, many others.

Gochiso-sama! This is Japanese for “it was a feast” and an expression of gratitude after a full meal. Our discussions and learning at the NE Shingo Prize Conference left me filled with ideas much like a Thanksgiving feast only without the ready-to-nap feeling, more like ready-to-RUN!

Thanks guys for helping me expand my lean thinking. Kampai, my friends!

TPM in Action

2010-10-05T14:25:00.002-04:00

While recently teaching about Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) using the learn-by-doing approach, we were presented with a great learning opportunity. Our first task was to get our hands dirty in giving the selected machine a deep and thorough cleaning. This cleaning is not just to make the machine look good; we were inspecting the machine while cleaning. This deep cleaning process paid particular attention to those hard to reach spots not normally seen by the machine operator on a daily basis.

We did find many issues with this machine that required repair during this deep clean. This was also accompanied with many comments like “I never knew that before”, “What’s that?”, “I can’t believe how much dirt and chips were under here” and “No wonder it leaks, all the drain holes are plugged up.” There were several other comments made that would make a sailor blush and I’ll just leave it to your imagination.

In the middle of our partial disassembly of the machine to reach those places where the sun don’t shine, we found one major problem, a significant rip in the protective sheath of the main control wiring under the machine against the chip conveyor system. It would have never been seen walking around the machine under normal inspection.

With the wires unprotected and naked to the world, we have the potential of a major breakdown. Not only would a failure involving these wires cause a very expensive repair bill with significant downtime, we have the serious potential of electrocuting someone.

Preventing the loss of life is the highest of priority over any of the six big losses found in the OEE (Overall Equipment Effectiveness) metric.

After doing some root cause analysis, the team concluded the original poor design of the machine (thinner sheath material, plastic elbow joints and poor routing location under the machine) was the main root cause. After the new and improve material arrived the next day (thicker sheath and cast metal elbows), the team replaced the wire covering and re-routed the wiring to the back of the machine (instead of under the machine) making it free and clear of the chip conveyor system.

Our TPM approach included corrective and preventative actions by improving the machine design. The end result is a more reliable, more efficient, safer machine available for making parts.

Is Social Media the Next Lean Tool?

2010-08-31T22:32:00.002-04:00

This year, facebook reports membership at more than 500 million active users with over 50% active each day and more than 30 billion pieces of contact shared each month. This would make facebook the 3rd largest nation in the world behind China and India, easily exceeding the US population.

Twitter seems to be the dominate microbloging player with 75 million estimated users although the numbers are not confirmed. We have LinkedIn, Blogs, YouTube, iPhone Apps just to mention other popular communication tools.

With the growing popularity with these forms of social media and the vast number of communication offerings, can they be used to improve how we conduct business or more specifically, can they be used in a lean transformation?

This is just one of the experiments that Xerox is trying in their Lean Six Sigma initiative according to Aqua Porter, VP corporate Lean Six Sigma Operations in her presentation today in the Lean Manufacturing Track at Noria’s Reliable Plant Conference 2010.

This is not the case of a hammer looking for a nail. No, it is simply a method to bridge poor communication. This includes slow communication, lack of sharing best practices, lack of interactive communication, etc. It is viewed as the way to improve customer dialogue as well as internal communication, both vertically and horizontally within the company.

One application in particular under test at Xerox is the use internal microbloging tool Yammer. Yammer describes their platform as "a tool for allowing companies and organizations to become more productive through the exchange of short frequent messages. The standard Twitter question is "What are you doing?", whereas with Yammer you answer the question "What are you working on?'".

Since this is still a new tool to their Lean Six Sigma approach, the results are still pending. I applaud Xerox for their boldness and open-mindedness to experiment with social media.

Despite the overall popularity of social media and unlike Xerox, the typical corporate viewpoint on social media is not one I would consider “embracing with open arms”. In my experience, the typical corporate viewpoint on social media is based on fear, control and legal protection. It is not viewed as a positive tool and certainly not something to be done “while on the clock”. Does this closed-minded view limit us in tapping into the power of social media might offer?

What do you think? Is your company embracing social media? Does social media mix with the lean journey?

Spare Parts

2010-08-27T13:55:00.003-04:00

What do you see in this picture? Beside a lack of any real 5S, what thoughts come to your kaizen mind about the motors?

Perhaps you may think about what are the motors used for? Do we really need them? Are they critical? How fast can we get one if we needed it? What is our process to decide what parts to keep in stock? Or how much do they cost?

One of the elements of a solid Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) program that does not get much attention is our spare parts. By simply taking good care of our machines and equipment does not entirely eliminate the chance of them breaking down. When that happens, the fire drill begins.

Go to any Maintenance Department in any company in the country and you find many things in common like a storage area for supplies and parts. Since this is typically viewed as a non-production area, we tend to ignore it.

With a kaizen approach, we need to improve all areas of our company including spare parts. With good TPM program, we should develop standard processes that establish the method to what parts we keep on hand.

First, a team based approach is best used to identify the critical parts that we may need. We can use the recommended spare parts list by the manufacture but only as a starting point. Many times this list of parts can include more parts than we should keep. Look at the machine history but also take care not to include a part just because we got burned back in 1982 when it broke down for 6 months.

As a guideline, critical parts can be identified as recent chronic problem areas and difficult to obtain within 24-48 hours. Cost should NOT be a factor. If the chance of a problem is high and we are left waiting days or weeks for the parts to come in, it’s better to keep these parts on hand no matter what the part cost is. Compare it to lost business, customer disappointments, etc to factor in the decision. Discuss this with your team and company management to determine what makes the best sense in your situation.

Once we have a plan, set up a spare parts list by each pieces of equipment and clearly identify them in our stock area.

As all things in lean, this is not a static process, it’s dynamic. The spare parts list needs to be reviewed on a regular basis, perhaps once a year. Machines fall out of warrantee or the manufacturer not long supports this model in either service or parts.

Without a standard process for our spare parts, we may find parts on the shelves like the picture above.

In Defense of Kaizen Events

2010-08-19T12:46:00.003-04:00

Over the past several years, I have encountered a growing negative view towards kaizen events, continuous improvement events, rapid improvement events, kaizen blitz or any other name we assign to a typical week long, team based improvement activity. I have been told by one company executive “That kaizen events are too expensive and the results are not sustainable.” I have heard from many different people that “Kaizen events are just a way for consultants to make quick and easy money.” The negative comments go on as one senior company executive told me that “Kaizen events are a sign of immaturity on the lean journey.”

In reflection, all these comments about kaizen events may indeed be true depending on the circumstances. I have seen kaizen events which are expensive along with a high amount of backsliding from the initial results. Certainly, there are many lean consultants and practitioners out there that use kaizen events as their primary (only) method of getting process improvements. But the comment that had the most impact to me was the last one, kaizen events are a sign of immaturity.

As an infant straight from the womb, our single source of nourishment was milk. In the beginning, that is all we need and the only thing we could digest. Eagerly, we suckle the warm milk and we begin to grow. As our bodies grow and mature, we soon need more than just milk. Our diet starts to change. First we move to soft foods which satisfy our new needs. After a short time, our development continues and we have greater needs. Slowly we add solid food. Before we know it, we have a complete diet.

Much like milk, kaizen events are the sole source of our nourishment as begin our lean journey. It is all we need and we are not ready to consume anything else. The main purpose of a kaizen event is to grow and develop people. To help us practice observing, solving problems and experimenting in a high energy, fast paced environment. Events are great team building experiences. Kaizen events should engage people to improve, a chance to experiment and fail, to learn from our mistakes and to hone our thinking skills. Ultimately, we begin owning the improvement process, growing and maturing as we add more to our lean diet.

If all we feed ourselves is milk, we will restrict our growth and development. As lean leaders, if all we teach others is to warm milk, what results would you expect? The key is add to our diet as we need it and can digest it; going from milk directly to solid food will not work and may cause harm. Adding to our diet as we grow and mature does not mean that we completely abandon drinking milk either as some may suggest. The nourishment found in milk does not change.

Motor Intake TPM

2010-08-18T12:24:00.006-04:00

Here is a simple kaizen for motors which can be part of our Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) program.

1. Remove the motor intake cover over the fan.
2. Clean and repair fan as needed.
3. Re-attach cover and place filter over vent area.
4. Add motor inspection and filter replacement to operator checklist.

It does not take much dirt to collect in the fan to restrict airflow which causes the motor to run at higher temperatures and leads to premature failure.

Which is easier, better, faster and cheaper: Replace a filter or replace a motor?

Beer Kaizen

2010-08-12T00:23:00.009-04:00

If you like the Toast Kaizen Video like I do, here is a funny parody video called "Beer Kaizen" done by KCOE. Laugh and Enjoy!

New Lean Blog 2LP

2010-08-11T22:29:00.002-04:00

I stumbled across a relatively new lean blog called 2 Lean Principals or 2LP for short. It features lean thinking from Jason Ballard and Tom Riney. Welcome to the lean blogging world, Jason and Tom. I hope to learn much from the both of you.

Kaizen using Tennis Balls

2010-08-11T21:55:00.002-04:00

Here is a great “creativity before capital” idea using tennis balls. I have actually seen this used with excellent results in a plant lunchroom. Put tennis balls on the legs of the chairs.

Without this tennis ball protection, the chairs can mark up the floor as it slides around resulting in extra work to clean the floor. In addition, the noise level of chairs screeching across the floor is disturbing to the nearby office and training room. The tennis balls act as sound deadening devices. To some this may not appear too stylist however it is an inexpensive solution that is easy to do! What do you think?

For more tennis ball ideas, check out a post from the past by Jon Miller, A few more kaizen ideas involving tennis balls.

Toxic Employees

2010-08-05T15:05:00.003-04:00

Over my career, I have run across “difficult” people. These include no particular group; they have been bosses, co-workers, employees, team members, rank-and-file, clients, suppliers and customers. Most cases, these difficulties are overcome through improved communication and team building behaviors. In the cases that are not so easily improved, I typically find a “toxic” employee.

What I mean by toxic employee is one with a negative attitude and makes it part of their mission in life to drag everyone around them down to their dark side view of the world. They are the hard core, concrete heads that fight all improvement efforts. They seem to always have a sarcastic comment about every topic and management decision. If things go their way, all is good but stand back if things go counter to their liking. They could be openly negative or take little shots from a distance. They sap the energy and life force from everyone around. In general, most people don’t like to work near them.

What do you do in a situation like this?

But what if this employee is a rock star salesperson or contributor but has the bad attitude? Do you put up with the attitude issue for the great performance?

Does performance override character? Or do we want performance and character?

What if this person when confronted, justifies their behavior with “it’s the truth and I’m the only one with the guts to speak out”? What if this person is a top executive with political ties to the company President yet others below feel the pain?

What if this person is not an employee but a customer?

Is it following our “respect to people principle” by not addressing this person’s behavior?

Do you have toxic employees in your organization?

Back from my Summer Break

2010-08-05T13:50:00.003-04:00

As you may have noticed or perhaps not, my posting has been non-existent for the past couple of months. No worries, just focusing on my clients, traveling and taking a little family summer vacation hiking in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park to recharge. New and exciting posts about my lean learning will follow. The mountain water was extremely cool on a hot, humid summer day!

The Surprising Truth about what Motivates Us

2010-06-17T00:59:00.003-04:00

Here is an amazing presentation by RSA animate with a talk by Dan Pink on what motivates us. Great information. Enjoy and learn.

Tear Down This Wall

2010-06-11T19:01:00.002-04:00

“The Air Conditioners versus Non-Air Conditioners”, this is how one employee explained it to me today, from his eyes on the shop floor, of the great wall that still exists between management and shop floor operators. This wall that can feel as vast as the Great Wall and as high as Mount Everest remains one of the most difficult and lasting challenges in our quest for productivity.

Salary versus Hourly.

Management versus Shop Floor.

Management versus Union.

The list of labels that designated each side of the wall goes on and on.

From my first days on the management side of the wall in the early 1980’s, many of the ways we treated each side differently, easily seen by the perks like reserved parking lots, separate dining facilities, country club memberships, huge bonus and stock options etc, have long gone the way of the dinosaur. Well, at least some of them have disappeared. This has certainly been a positive step to bring down the wall but we still have a long, long way to go.

Don’t be fooled into thinking that this is not a big problem today. This wall still very much exists and continues to divide us. Just as we must see the waste before we can eliminate it, we must acknowledge this great divide before we can eliminate it.

If I knew the answer to this problem, I probably could go to sleep tonight a very wealthy man. Like many of the problems we face, there are no easy, quick fixes. It will take focus, a willingness to solve the problem along of plenty of hard work. Building trust and true culture change takes time.

As company leaders, do we put the same passion and drive into tearing down this wall as we have for cutting costs?

Altering slightly the words of President Regan in his famous Berlin Wall Speech, June 1987:
“If you seek profits, if you seek prosperity for the company and all the stakeholders, if you seek productivity: Come here, to this gate. Mr. CEO, open this gate. Mr. CEO, tear down this wall.”

Northeast Shingo Prize Conference 2010

2010-06-04T13:30:00.001-04:00

The Northeast Shingo Prize Conference will be held in Providence, Rhode Island on October 19-20, 2010. This is another conference I will be attending this year and thrilled to be invited as one of the speakers. Please stop by if you are attending.

Reliable Plant Conference 2010

2010-06-04T13:28:00.001-04:00

The Reliable Plant Conference 2010 will be held in Nashville, Tennessee on August 31 thru September 2nd. I plan on attending and honored to be included as one of the speakers in the Lean Manufacturing section talking about my favorite topic SMED. If you are able to attend, I would enjoy meeting with any fellow lean practitioners.

Show Me the Results

2010-05-21T22:02:00.002-04:00

One cultural aspect of American business that is both a driving force and a curse is our obsession with getting results. It does not matter if we are looking at company performance or individual performance. It does not matter if we are looking at strategy, marketing, sales, manufacturing, or finance. Neither does it matter if we look at our lean progress or any other business approach, our business metrics or our stock performance. Bottom line, everything and everyone is rated and evaluated on results and only on results.

Just as in sports, all the matters is the final score, who won. What do we see in the majority of sports headlines…who won, who lost and the score.

For most of us, this is just a fact of life, a given, part of our competitive nature, our culture. I can not argue against results entirely, results are important.

Sometime we can easily quantify the results making them objective. Sometime we can not. Results that are subjective are like beauty, it is in the eye of the beholder. Despite our efforts to make all results objective and quantifiable, in many cases, subjectivity remains.

Overlooking this problem, we obsess over results. What is our stock price? What were our quarterly financials? Did I hit my quota? What is our 5S audit score? What is our OEE? What is my direct labor costs? Was this project a success? What are each employee’s talent matrix rating? Just tell me the score.

But does this tell us the whole story? Are we focused long-term? Does it reflect the struggle? What about the knowledge gained? Does it matter? What impact will it have on our future? What was the cost of our success? Were there any negative consequences in getting our results? Do we care?

In our obsession with results, do we actually miss something, perhaps something greater?

How to Kaizen

2010-05-19T20:51:00.001-04:00

It is not important to know “how to kaizen” as it is “to kaizen”. It does not matter so much if we start with 5S on our lean journey as it is to start our lean journey. It does not matter how to use each of the lean tools as it is to use the tools to solve our problems.

Kaizen is a messy, bumpy struggle to improve. However, it is in this struggle that we will learn and gain knowledge. This is the only knowledge that will truly help us succeed in lean.

Each of our lean transformations will be different. It will not be like it says in any one book or how some other company operates in their lean approach.

Do not wait for perfect kaizen rather just kaizen continuously. Results from any kaizen are secondary to the act of kaizen itself. The only failure in kaizen is to no longer kaizen.

There are no right and wrong ways to kaizen, only the way we kaizen and better ways. There is always a better way.

The Winning Poker Hand of Corporate Metrics

2010-05-13T00:16:00.002-04:00

When we say company metrics, many of us quickly think of Cost, Quality, Safety, Delivery and Morale. All are important metrics for any company however we tend to view them differently. Specifically, we focus our time and attention to one or maybe two metrics while virtually ignoring the rest because some are valued higher.

The King of all metrics is Cost.
The Queen is Quality.
The Ace is Safety.
The Jack is Delivery.
And the lowly 10 card is Morale.

Many companies consider these to be the top company metrics. In my experience, the overwhelming majority of companies focus primarily on COST as THE key metric. How do I know?

Just look at your company’s key performance indicators (KPI).

How many ways is cost charted, measured and analyzed? Could it be…
Sales dollar per employee?
Sales dollar per Direct Labor Manhour?
Direct labor cost per department, per shift, per plant, per product, per on and on?
Overtime cost?
Piece part cost?
Purchasing variance?
Overhead cost?
Capital budget?
EBIT?
The list goes on and on.

The metric that the majority of companies focus the least amount of their attention is Delivery. How do I know?

How many ways is delivery charted, measured and analyzed? Could it be…
On-time Delivery?
And that’s about it.

Quality, safety and even morale have more than one KPI.

Similar to delivery, morale does not rank high on anybody’s list of metrics. Many of us may think morale is too vague, not quantifiable and too hard to measure much less have any control in improving it. So we tend to ignore it, unless it is close to contract time for those of us in union shops. Besides, we can still post stellar financial results with low morale.

In any management meeting when the company metrics are reviewed, how much time is spent discussing cost? How much time is spent discussing delivery? And when was the last time morale was even mentioned?

Quality and safety are somewhere in the middle and time spent on these metrics is directly proportional to the number of safety incidents or customer complaint issues of late. No issues, not much discussion. But when an incident occurs, the discussion time goes up.

As a lean thinker, how should our time be spent with regard to our metrics? In my opinion, we should spend the majority of our time on Delivery, Quality, Safety plus Morale and spend less time on Cost. If you think about it, improvements in delivery, quality and safety are process focused while Morale is a good indication of employee engagement (ie employee suggestions). Focusing on these areas will end up improving cost.

As for single delivery KPI of on-time delivery, this is the perhaps the easiest one to achieve in most cases…just increase our inventory level, right? But is this the best course of action? Is on-time delivery the only measurement we should concern ourselves with? What about leadtime?

How many companies focus on leadtime reduction? Now how many of us relentless pursue leadtime reduction with the same passion as we tend to do in cost reduction? In our kaizen, do we focus on eliminating waste to reduce costs or shorten leadtimes? Do we understand the difference?

If we focused the majority of our time and attention on cost, our King card, it would be like holding a handful of kings. The best poker hand we could hope for is a four of a kind. But if we aligned the whole organization to follow suit, holding each our metrics in our hand, we beat a four of a kind every time, royally.

Is U.S. Productivity at its Limit?

2010-05-11T20:32:00.002-04:00

According to the USA Today, printed in the Friday, May 7th, 2010 edition, a glimmer of economic hope is seeming given with news of U.S. productivity and our job market. The slowing of U.S. productivity to a mere 3.6% annual rate in the first quarter and applications for unemployment dropping over the last three weeks led analysts to predict an increase in hiring as growth in production, the output per hour of work, is predicted to slow even more.

As quoted in this article, Nigel Gault of HIS Global Insight stated, “Companies are close to the limits of what they can do with their existing staff. They are going to have to start rehiring people.”

Hogwash! Not even close! Yet Mr. Gault's prediction may end up correct despite the flawed data, in my opinion.

Instead of looking at their spreadsheets and computer models, these analysts need to go to gemba to see for themselves. The only problem is that they probably don’t know what to look for if they did. From my gemba perspective, limited to the small sample size of companies I know about, U.S. manufacturing companies have only made a small dent in productivity. They same goes for our service industries or any other category for that matter.

There are still vast amounts of waste remaining in our processes if we only could see it.

So I believe that there are still enormous opportunities in the U.S. to substantially increase our productivity.

On the other hand, I see limitations in what companies are doing to improve and the rate of their improvement. The majority of companies in the U.S. are not relentless pursuing a path of waste elimination and continuous improvement. As demand picks up (not really noted in the predictive analysis), companies may in fact start rehiring.

Management Improvement Carnival #97

2010-05-10T20:43:00.015-04:00

Got Boondoggle is proud to host this edition of the Management Improvement Carnival. Please check out the following top posts from follow lean thinkers in recent weeks. Enjoy and learn!

Don’t Do 5S by Jamie Flinchbaugh – “So make sure that using 5S, at any point in the journey, is solving actual problems that you currently have. Start with the problem statement, then pick the tool. Don’t start by picking the tool.”

The Will, the Willow and the Frog by Jon Miller – “There are many stories from many cultures that remind us that with faith and will, nothing is impossible. The irony is that if you don’t believe this, you will never find out whether it is true.”

Leadership: The Power of Influence by Tim McMahon – “The challenge is to get people to follow in a direction they might not otherwise go.”

Continuous Improvement by Lee Fried – “Thus, there is no way an organization can claim to be promoting continuous improvement through events or projects. It will only occur when improving the work is the work.”

Kaizen in the Laundry Room and My Domestic Shortcomings by Mark Hamel – “Kaizen opportunities are often best identified (and done) by those who do the work.”

Lean Thoughts During Saturday Errands by Mark Graban – “In the course of these errands, I had some thoughts about lean or related to it (or just fun thoughts, maybe), including: Why 100% utilization isn’t possible or optimal, Visual controls with moving tape and Good “flow” from a store to a dental practice office.”

Some Growth is not Visible by Pete Abilla – “When you think about it, that’s how a culture is created. Not through some big program, or some big push top-down. Instead, true, long-term cultural change happens over a long period through many, many, small micro-interactions.”

3 Tips for Continuous Improvement by Ron Pereira – “In this article, I want to share some ideas for how to approach things such as workout programs and continuous improvement as they are surprisingly similar.”

Toyota the Bad Guy by John Shook – “Even so, we must recognize that even at its peak as an organizational GPS, Toyota was never as good as its reputation in some ways, but better in others. Both at once.”

The Human in the Loop by Mark Rosenthal – “If we truly want to construct a work environment where people make the best possible decisions, it behooves us to rid ourselves of decades old stereotypes and convenient beliefs about why people decide what they do.”

The Secret to Successfully Running a Lean Office: Daily Management by Jeff Hajek – “Daily Management is a proactive, systematic approach to balancing capacity and expected demand. In a nutshell, it is a process for using Deming’s PDCA cycle to manage a workday.”

Should I Pursue Waste Elimination or Lead Time Reduction? by Michael Balle as the Gemba Coach – “To respond to your question directly; there is no debate: Kaizen without a pull system will be disappointing.”

Bagel with a side of Jidoka by Evan Durant – “And the more we explore the concept of Jidoka the more we are forced to challenge our assumptions about what exactly the human and machine elements are. Often there are untapped opportunities to separate the two.”

We can't Handle the Truth

2010-04-07T22:43:00.003-04:00

In the movie, A Few Good Men, Jack Nicholson playing the role of a hard-core, old-school, tough-as-nails Marine Colonel delivers the famous line in a military court, “You can’t handle the truth” in answer to Tom Cruise’s cross examination demanding the truth about a code red.

This is a problem for many of us. We can’t handle the truth. Maybe our huge egos prevent us from seeing the truth. Perhaps it is rooted deep in our survival genes to protect us from harm both physical and non-physical. Maybe it is our arrogance from our over-the-top self-image or self-importance. Whatever the reason, we can’t handle the truth if it is not in alignment with our thinking.

We all believe in truth however the truth is not always easily believed. What blinds us from seeing the truth? What in our minds automatically blocks us from seeing the truth? Why do we not want to believe the truth? How do our perceptions create different lenses in seeing the truth?

According to Jon Miller in How to scold like a Kaizen Sensei, the role of the Sensei is “to speak truth to power in ways that a member of the organization could not.” This honest, insightful and raw truth telling skill has very powerful results depending on the delivery by the sensei and the reaction of the learner. Regardless if you are an outside consultant or inside the company, there is a risk in truth telling.

It is easy to see why this truth telling skill does not work coming from within an organization. Unfortunately, the proverbial “kill the messenger” is alive and well in American business. People who speak the truth are often labeled as a non-team player, a disrupter, a trouble maker or the current tag of being “not a good fit”. End result the person either quits or is fired.

Have you ever compromised the truth to keep your job? What about keeping silent? How does your company leadership handle the truth? How do you handle the truth?

It doesn’t take much to see that the truth can get watered down, altered or hidden entirely inside a company, especially as it moves vertically up the ladder. We may believe, at least in the short term, that this is the best way considering the risk, political correctness and social politeness but at what cost? In the long term, is the cost greater? Doesn’t this render our problem solving capabilities as impotent? Isn’t our continuous improvement quest towards perfection halted without seeing the truth?

“New knowledge is the most valuable commodity on earth. The more truth we have to work with, the richer we become.” Kurt Vonnegut, Breakfast of Champions

Management Magical Mystery Tour

2010-04-06T16:36:00.003-04:00

I strongly believe that one of the keys to a successful lean transformation is management involvement, not just management support. Involvement means full contact, hands-on, go and see for yourself approach. Involvement means leadership. That means more time away from the comfort of your desk and spending this time on the shop floor, in the office areas, in the warehouse, or going to customer sites.

Company executives have gotten so comfortable with seeing their company through the lenses of reports, emails, charts, graphs, boardroom meetings or what their staff tells them that many never venture out for a first hand experience. Charts and graphs are fine tools however I would prefer to know about my operation by experience. Which gives you a better understanding of Hawaii – a) reading travel brochure, looking at pictures and hearing stories by people who went there or b) by your own travel adventure walking on the warm sands of Maui, taking in a deep breathe of ocean air and seeing the waves crashing onto the shore?

Unfortunately, we get distorted glimpses of C-Level executives going “undercover” in TV shows to see first hand what is going on in their company as some great revelation. Kevin Meyer has a great post, MBWA is not a Gemba Walk, that I tend to agree with.

Closer to reality is the planned visit by the high level leader to a site which turns into huge parade of leaders trying to look their best, normally part of a Management Magical Mystery Tour. It’s just like if you invited your priest or pastor over for dinner, you get your house all cleaned up and a special meal is planned and prepared (not a typical night at home, right?).

The plant is notified well in advance so the facility is cleaned up (even to the extent of hiding stuff out of view until after the show) along a pre-determined tour route. Everybody practices and rehearses their lines for the presentation. The smell of fresh paint is hanging in the air. We are ready. Places everyone.

The show usually starts in a conference room with a presentation by the plant staff. If the plant manager is cunning, he will give the executive time to pass on some words of wisdom which can easily take up some of the time for the planned tour. At best, the tour will be rushed which minimizes the chance for problems to surface. It is even possible that the tour is canceled because the meeting, which there was great discussion, took all the time allocated for the visit. Then the C-Level and his entourage travel to the next site.

The only thing missing is the official tour t-shirts. What a wasted opportunity.

How can we get out of this management magical mystery tour routine. First, the C-level executives should visit so often that the event is not special. Second, a visit should not always be a planned event that prompts a show and tell. Third, the C-level executives should not make it a visit to punish but a visit to learn, teach and mentor. Fourth, visit with a purpose and not make it a social hour. It’s nice to talk with people but don’t let that become the mission. If a problem is found, help by coaching and not seeking to blame someone. This would be a good start.

A true lean transformation changes the way the entire business operates from sales to the shop floor. This requires a hands-on, personal approach that cannot be delegated to staff or outside consultants. It is a new way to run the business that requires behavior changes. It is not a project or event. It demands leadership based on first hand experience and it must start at the top.

Cats and Dogs in Manufacturing

2010-04-02T16:37:00.004-04:00

Many times in manufacturing career I have struggled in dealing with the dilemma of producing the cats and dogs. The cats and dogs are those parts or products that are typically the small volume, hard to make, mainly less profitable, or generally the pain in the ass parts that cause us headaches and disrupt the harmony in our manufacturing flow.

Since our lean manufacturing focus is to improve flow, how do we deal with our cats and dogs?

Do we outsource our cats and dogs so we can maximize our internal efficiency by producing only our high runners? Do we discontinue making the cats and dogs entirely if they are not profitable? Do we outsource some of our high runners to work on the cats and dogs? Do we separate the cats and dogs from the rest of the pack?

It would be easy for us to take the path of least resistance and either outsource them or drop them from our product offering. Life is too short so why struggle with the headaches day after day. With our short term thinking and pressure for quick results, we can present convincing arguments to get rid of these cats and dogs and do it fast. Especially if we are not making any money on them, it should be a slam dunk to get rid of them. Let’s just focus on our core competency and we will be more profitable.

Sounds logical or not?

From my experience, I do not completely trust our accounting systems in determining the profitability of individual parts or products. With the typical standard cost method, erroneous data, estimated inputs based on some formula or worse, some average and our sometimes strange allocation of costs; how can we really make good decisions on true profitability on a part by part basis? Just take a stopwatch to gemba and do a simple random audit to see that our data is as reliable and trustworthy as a celebrity in rehab.

If we outsource these cats and dogs, passing the headache on to others to deal with, we will only add additional waste to our overall process. We will need to increase our efforts to insure the quality of these parts now on the outside, increase our inventory levels to protect our delivery to our customers and most likely soon end up paying more for these parts. Before long, we will end up dropping them because they will be deemed unprofitable.

In the book, The Birth of Lean, Taiichi Ohno faced the same dilemma at Toyota; his thoughts on this issue were described as follows:

“A lot of people in the company thought that we should outsource small-volume parts to low-cost contractors and make the large-volume parts on our own, like bicycle manufacturers did. They figured that we could build an export business by getting the contractors to supply parts on a just-in-time basis and by assembling vehicles from those parts and from the parts that we made in-house.

I argued for taking the opposite approach. I insisted that we should produce low-volume items in-house and buy large-volume parts-stuff that anyone cold make inexpensively-from outside suppliers. Making the low-volume parts in-house would mean high unit costs, and that would pressure us to tackle kaizen improvements and cost reductions.”

What a great viewpoint, to send out the easier, high-volume parts and keep the hard ones in-house to pressure our kaizen efforts. Think about that for a moment. Do we trust outside suppliers to kaizen better than we can internally? Do easy, high volume parts present the same kaizen opportunities that low-running parts provide? Which would challenge us to be better problem solvers? As for our customers, which kinds of products are growing in demand, the generic, high-volume products or the custom, low-volume products? How about the trend in the future?

What do you think?

Mocking Boards

2010-03-17T17:11:00.003-04:00

As we embrace many of the lean ways including shifting to a more visual management approach, be careful not to turn a good visual management board into a mocking board.

Let me explain. Recently, while on a gemba walk through a plant, I spotted a new TPM board by one of the machines. TPM stands for Total Productive Maintenance. From the aisle, I could see some cool stuff on the board including a TPM map, TPM checksheets, timelines, problem logs, problem tags, etc. Excited and curious about this new visual management board, I approached the operator and asked her about it.

Her reply surprised me. “Oh, that. It’s my mocking board.”

I asked her what she meant by mocking board. She explained that the board was just put up a month ago by maintenance. She even attended a training session on filling out all the forms and how to do tasks to check on the machine herself. The first couple of days, they (the maintenance guys) were responsive to fixing items on the machine but than nothing.

For weeks nothing more happened despite all the tagging and logging of items requiring attention. She had asked her supervisor, on several occasions, on the status when maintenance was going to fix the items. No answer and no action.

As a result, she now views the visual board as a mocking board. All the items stay on the list, always in front of her, mocking her, because they are still undone. It is a visual monument to all that is wrong and broken with her machine with no activity to fix it.

Wow. Here are the beginnings of a cool visual management system that is quickly turning into a clear message that as managers we do not care.

The good thing is that this problem is quite visible and all we have to do is see it and take action to correct it.

Where's the SMED?

2010-03-15T20:43:00.003-04:00

The SMED system which stands for Single Minute Exchange of Dies, developed by Shigeo Shingo and published in his 1985 book, guides us to achieve a machine setups in under 10 minutes. The quick changeover thinking has been around for a couple of decades now but many companies still have not achieved this level of changeover. To this day, we have setups taking 60 minutes and longer. Why?

Are these long setups not viewed as a problem?

Do we just accept the status quo of long setups?

Do we even track and monitor setups?

Is it easier the just buy faster (more expensive) machines than to roll up our sleeves and figure out how to reduce our changeovers?

Is it not a priority? Are we too busy with out limited resources (yet we let go resources in the last layoff)? Short term thinking wins again?

Where’s the SMED? Can any company report that all of their setups are 10 minutes or less?

Best Kanban Signal of All

2010-03-05T10:00:00.001-05:00

There are many types of kanban. A kanban could be cards, bins, containers, trays, carts, spots on the floor, golf balls, ping pong balls just to name a few. What’s the best kanban signal?

First, what is a kanban? A kanban is simply a signal used to authorize production in a production system. Any method of signal works can work well if we are disciplined to follow and maintain the system. A kanban is typically tied directly to the physical parts making it easier to keep in synch with demand. As parts are pulled for consumption, this signal is sent to the supplying workstation or source as authorization to make more parts to replace the ones used.

However, before we automatically jump to using any kanban system just because we believe it is the “lean” thing to do, is there a specific problem or need in the first place? This is one of the most common mistakes made on the lean journey. We see a lean technique and rush to put it in use everywhere we possibly can. It’s like holding a hammer and running around looking for nails to hit, soon everything starts looking like nails. We rarely take the time to really understand our problems or needs before we act.

What if we can produce products for our customers in one week while the customer delivery expectation is two weeks, would we set up a kanban system to replenish parts? No, just build to the actual customer order which is the best kanban signal of all.

In this example, there is no need for a typical kanban replenishment system at this time. But if our leadtime extends beyond our customers delivery expectation, we certainly have a need to set up a production system to satisfy our customer with the least amount of inventory. After gaining a better understanding of the problem, we might consider using a kanban system while we are working on reducing our production leadtime within our customer delivery expectation.

Lean Six Sigma Survey

2010-03-03T14:42:00.002-05:00

James Marsh, Senior Researcher at Sheffield Hallam University is requesting our help in the lean community on his research project exploring Lean and or Six Sigma and its environmental benefits/tradeoffs. It takes 5-10 minutes to complete and is completely anonymous.

Please click on this link http://www.psychology.nottingham.ac.uk/staff/sea/LSS

Thank you for your help!

Top 14 Ways to Reduce Changeovers

2010-03-03T13:42:00.003-05:00

If you are looking to boost your output or increase your responsiveness to customer demand but want to avoid the significant capital costs of purchasing new equipment, take a look at reducing your changeovers or setups. If you typically spend one hour to changeover a machine and run 8-10 setups a week, you are wasting a whole day a week or up to 52 days a year of potential machine time. Try focusing on these few things and you can spend less time in your changeovers almost immediately.

1.Have Everything Ready for the Changeover Next to the Machine Ahead of Time. This means everything- material, tooling, tools, fixtures, paperwork, check gages, etc. Our goal is not to leave the machine to search for anything while doing a changeover. No more walking around and searching. Create a home location staging area for these items or use a tool setup cart and make it easy to find these items in order of need during the set up all within reach. Anyone can really lead this activity once trained in what needs to be collected up-the machine operator, the setup person, the leadperson, the supervisor, a temp employee, or even one of the office employees. Even if you don’t do any of these others items list below, DO THIS ONE.

2. Use a Checklist. The easiest and simplest way not to forget any items needed for each changeover is to list everything on a checklist and use this list to verify things are not missing ahead of time. A pencil and paper is all you need to create a checklist.

3. Fix Broken Equipment. What gages, tools and equipment are broken and we force the setup operators to workaround these problems? Find what is broken and repair it.

4. Keep up with Current Events. Make sure all the data (program numbers, machine settings, etc) are the latest and greatest. The only thing worse that not having information is to have conflicting or wrong information. Review all the standard set up documents and make sure all the right information is recorded and consistent.

5. Just Ask. By simply talking with the set up operators and asking what would be helpful to make setups easier, you can find out what they need. If you ask, be prepared to act on this information fast. If not, you will be sending a message that management doesn’t care and this valuable source of information can be lost in the future.

6. Look for Cheat Sheets and Share the Knowledge. Some operators who perform changeovers have a log book or set up notes to help them remember setup information. Use this information to look for helpful “tricks” or techniques that is undocumented. Officially record this information to eliminate the need for having personal notebooks and share it.

7. Improve Homemade Work Aids. Perhaps the setup operator has made up some cool homemade work aids to position, lift, gage hold, align or perform some other function in a setup. How can we improve this homemade devises?

8. Double up the Changeover Team. Most setups are done by a single person which can add to the wasted time in a setup especially when we need to work on both sides of the machine. What would happen if we used a two person team for changeovers? More likely we can cut our setup time in half and do tasks in parallel.

9. Don’t Skimp on the Tooling. Invest in additional sets of tool holders so the tooling can be pre-set ahead of time. But before you wake up your purchasing person to start ordering all this brand new tooling, do a plant wide sort (step 1 from 5S) and see if there are any underutilized tooling that can be used. Check the auction pages for potential sources of used tooling. Go to local shops or manufacturing facilities to see if they are willing to sell any of their tooling. You don’t have to duplicate all the tooling immediately to make a big impact, target a few critical setups and concentrate on getting a few holders to start.

10. The Best Changeover is No Changeover at All. What opportunities are there to dedicate equipment to certain parts thereby eliminate the setup completely?

11. Don’t Screw Around. How much time are we spending bolting, fastening, blocking and clamping the tools? Can we reduce the number of bolts and clamps? Can you use ¼ turn bolts or other quick clamps? Can we replace manual tools with an air ratchet?

12. Throw Away your Hand Tools. Taking the last step a bit further, can we eliminate the need for hand tools all together? Instead of using allen head screws or bolts, can we use hand twist ¼ turn fastener?

13. Put it Away Later. Sometimes in our eagerness to maintain an organized workplace, we have conditioned ourselves to put things away immediately. This is a great behavior but don’t delay a setup with putting items away. Wait until the machine is up and running and then put everything back in it’s home location.

14. Don’t Go the Mountain; Make the Mountain Come to You. What resources demand the setup operator leave the machine? For example, do we have to take the first piece parts to a Quality Lab for approval? Instead of going to the Quality department what if we had the Quality department came to us? Take a close look at our quality procedures and requirements with the goal of approving the part at the machine with no waiting. What do we need to make this happen? Can’t we get the quality inspector to be at the machine when needed? Do we really need to use that monument QA equipment instead of portable check gages or go/no-go gages?

Leaving Batesville Casket

2010-02-01T16:33:00.005-05:00

It is with mixed emotion that I am officially leaving my position as Lean Sensei at Batesville Casket Company. I am happy with all that we accomplished the last several years however not satisfied since there is so much more to do. All the milestones I first set out to accomplish were completed and the lean journey at Batesville is stronger as a result. I wish all my friends at Batesville many years of continued lean success.

Looking forward, I am extremely excited about my new adventure working with Jon Miller as part of the Gemba Research team helping others on their lean journey. If you ever considered bringing in lean consultants on your lean journey, please contact me. Our staff at Gemba Consulting North America are all top notch lean practitioners with many years of successful lean experience. I will continue posting ideas, thoughts and stories as I continue learning and sharing on the lean journey.

Go to Gemba

2010-01-21T12:34:00.002-05:00

Knowing is better than guessing.
Seeing is better than hearing.
Doing is better than talking.

Pursuit of Perfection

2010-01-19T12:06:00.002-05:00

One focus on the lean manufacturing path is the pursuit of perfection. When this point is brought up, many people don’t believe perfection is possible so this objective is pushed aside as not realistic so why try?

The same goes for goals of zero inventory, zero machine breakdowns, zero accidents, zero defects and zero customer disappointments. How many of us believe these goals to be impossible? So why try?

After all we are just human and humans are imperfect and make mistakes. So why try?

All systems are imperfect including lean manufacturing so why try?

Looking to religion, as Christians we are on a path to live by the example that Jesus Christ has given us. In other words, we try to be Christ-like in our words and actions. Many other religious beliefs, if not all of them, teach each follower to become better in their life. All religions acknowledge our human imperfections yet each pursue a path of perfection in life. Perhaps the quest to be better is at the core of being human.

I believe that is our purpose in life-to become a better person so “trying” is what life is all about.

The same goes for our pursuit of perfection in lean manufacturing. It is all about the never ending pursuit of perfection. Emphasis is on the pursuit and not on perfection. Are we moving to be better today than yesterday? Can we be closer to perfection each day? Do we learn from our mistakes?

Do we see the gap between where we are today and our vision of perfection? Do we view this gap as the impossible or as an opportunity? Do we view this gap as a pointless journey or a path of many small steps?

English Speaking Lean

2010-01-05T20:40:00.006-05:00

After reading Mark Graban’s post, 10 Things I Wish Lean Practitioners Wouldn’t Say in 2010 on his Lean Blog, I thought it was interesting that 4 of the 10 things were aimed against using Japanese terms. Mark clearly states he is not opposed to Japanese terms but asks if we might be “getting a bit carried away in embracing Japanese words.” He further suggests that we should avoid using Japanese words in an English-speaking environment, and just use simple, plain English.

But perhaps simple, plain English is not what we believe it to be. Although it is difficult be exact with our dynamic and expanding vocabulary, it is estimated that over 80% of our English vocabulary has come from other languages (source: Wikipedia.com). Most of our English words come from Latin, French, Italian, and Greek origin to name a few. Due to contact with other cultures over the centuries in conquests, commerce, travel and immigration, the English language has adopted or derived many words into our fold. As our world gets smaller and contact increases with the speed of the internet and television, I can easily speculate that our “English” language will add many more words in the future and at a much faster rate.

If we choose the path of halting the spread of Japanese words in our lean approach except for select few like kaizen or gemba, would we be promoting the status quo (oops, Latin)? Maybe we should form an ad hoc (Latin, again) committee to set a policy on the use of Japanese words in our company? If we can’t decide, we can leave it up to the head honcho (Japanese) to put the kibosh (Yiddish) on this glitch (Yiddish) in our improvement path.

Instead of sending our kids to Kindergarten (German) we should say we are sending them to Pre-First Grade. Or should we simply say we live on a quiet, dead-end street instead of a cul-de-sac (French)? Instead of going out for sushi (Japanese), let’s go out for some raw fish..yummy. States like California (Spanish) and Colorado (Spanish) would be shopping for new names. No more going out on Karaoke (Japanese) night , let’s just go out to the local bar to sing off key to taped music after drinking some liquid courage. We would also give up using words like café, chipotle, chocolate, ballet, protégé, entrepreneur, blasé, gaffe, whiskey, banana and mosquito.

My personal bias is to use the Japanese words in talking and teaching lean because I was taught by Japanese Sensei for the first 10 years of my lean journey. It has become second nature to me and I embrace the words as I embrace the lean thinking.

This does not mean that Japanese words need to be used by everyone, it is up to each person to decide on their own. The use of Japanese words is not to impress or exclude, it is just to seek greater understanding of the meaning. Hopefully we won’t get lost in translation.

Update added (1/7/2010)
There are certainly many great comments on this topic. Thanks to all!
Please check out these other posts on this topic by :
Mark Rosenthal's post on The lean Thinker
Brian Buck's post on Improve with Me
Ron Pereira's post on LSS Academy

Be Prepared

2009-12-30T16:57:00.002-05:00

Be Prepared is the motto of the Boy Scouts and most likely the simplest method for productivity improvement. Lord Robert Baden-Powell, founder of the Boy Scout movement, coined the motto for all scouts to be prepared in mind and be prepared in body. Scouts who do their best at living by this motto would be in position to do the right thing at the right time. In other words, when the moment arrives, a scout is ready for anything.

How does this relate to productivity and the lean approach?

On a tactical level, take machine changeovers or set ups for example. In my experience, the single biggest element that takes time in a typical changeover is collecting everything you need like tools, fixtures, dies, clamps, sheet up sheets, materials, gages, etc. I would certainly not be surprised if 50% of current set up time is consumed in just this activity.

If we want to make a significant impact in reducing set up time, work on designing a system or process that ensures everything we need to change over is at hand prior to the set up change, every time! A person or persons performing the changeover should never have to leave the machine or wait on any item.

No capital spending required, just planning, practice and discipline to “Be Prepared” when the set up time moment arrives. Discipline is the key ingredient which can be harder to find than this year’s hot Christmas toy on December 24th.

Go to gemba and watch any machine changeover. How prepared are we when the machine is stopped?

Using this same “Be Prepared” motto, are we prepared for meetings, kaizen events, daily production, material delivery, customer requests, etc? How much smoother and efficient would all our activities be if we spent time on being prepared?

Here is another simple example, getting ready for work in the morning. How much time do we spend? How about bathroom time, dressing time, eating time, etc? If we were to select, iron and layout out our clothes the night before, would we save time the next morning? What about shoes, car keys, laptop, or those notes needed for this morning’s meeting? If we had all our grooming items, towels, etc ready to go the night before, would we save time? What if we filled up our car with gas the night before? What are all the things we can do the night before to “be prepared” for getting ready for work in the morning?

But being prepared is more than just having things ready ahead of time, it means to “be prepared” for anything. To be mentally ready, knowing what we should do in case different events should occur and be ready to face difficulties and challenges.

Going back to the morning work routine example, what do we do if the power goes out in the night? What do we do if we have no power in the morning? What do we do if we break a shoe lace? What if bad weather hits? We could prepare for all these events ahead of time and be ready when the time arrives. (Sounds like the beginnings of a FMEA – Failure Mode and Effects Analysis).

As lean thinkers, we might consider adopting the same motto, Be Prepared. What do you think?

Do our Customers Really Benefit from our Lean Effort?

2009-12-29T16:42:00.002-05:00

One of the principles of the lean approach is long term thinking with focus on adding value to our customers and society. We are taught to eliminate waste, things that don’t add value to the customer.

We improve flow, reduce set up time, improve productivity, eliminate waste and reduce cost. Kaizen events successful hit targets and employees are trained. 5-S activities are done daily, audits are conducted and our facilities look better. We create value stream maps and work hard to transform our company to our future state.

Somewhere in all this lean activity, our customer focus can be lost. We do all the things that we believe will make us leaner. But have we truly adding value to our customer? If not, why not?

Do our lean efforts hit the bottom line and stop there? Is our lean effort all about improving our margins? Is our lean effort all about head count reduction?

It is not enough to just eliminate waste and reduce cost. Our customers don’t care about our 5-S audit scores, the number of kaizen events we conduct, if we use ERP or Kanban, or the number of our inventory turns. Our lean efforts must add value to the customer. It must be seen and felt by our customers.

Bottom line: Are we giving our customers what they want, when they want it, at the highest quality and affordable cost? Is our lean system effort supporting this mission?

Thank You God for Giving Me Problems

2009-12-14T21:00:00.003-05:00

I just finished reading an inspirational book “Play to Win, The Make a Difference Gameplan” by Tom Karbowski , a co-worker from Southern Indiana. In his book, he wrote the follow prayer, reprinted with his permission:

Thank you God for giving me problems.

When I am at work and get frustrated, thank you for giving me a job. There are many people who need employment and would welcome the opportunity to confront the challenges I face.

When my customers complain about problems, thank you for giving me the opportunity to meet the needs of others. My competitors would love to be in my shoes.

When I am frustrated with my career, thank you for allowing me to live in a country that has a vibrant economic system. I can always do something else or start my own company.

When I am unhappy about the pace of change in the world, thank you for allowing me to live during such incredibly exciting times. The possibilities for improvement are endless.

When I am exhausted because I have too many things to do, thank you for giving me such an interesting and full life.

And when I am annoyed with my spouse or children, thank you for giving me a loving family and for all the happy times when they make me laugh with joy.

When I am sick, thank you for allowing me to live in a country with such a wonderful health care system.

When I am unhappy with elected politicians, thank you for allowing me to live in a democratic society. I can change the future with the power of a vote.

When I do not understand something, thank you for giving me the ability to learn and the curiosity to search for a better way.

When my prayers go unanswered, thank you for providing me with patience until I understand your will.

And when I have a true problem, thank you for giving it to me. All problems present an opportunity for me to enhance my character and deepen my faith. When I resolve this problem, I will be a better person.

Becoming better problem solvers is part of the lean way. How we go about solving them is part method (scientific method) and part attitude (positive). Regardless of our opinions on politicians, our economic system, our health care system, our companies, our jobs, etc, even if we are currently facing money problems, loss of a job, family problems, etc, we all have the same choice that only we can make, are we going to face our problems with a positive attitude or a negative attitude?

Lean is Good

2009-12-11T13:54:00.001-05:00

I recently stumbled across a new lean blog called “Lean is Good” posted by Bruce Baker with added insights from Bryan Zeigler and Scott Maruna with recent posts like “5S Shadow Boards are Bad”. I hope to learn more from reading his lean insights. Check it out.

Thanks Bruce for sharing your lean thinking with us.

What is Lean?

2009-12-08T12:11:00.002-05:00

What seems like an easy, simple question may turn out rather difficult and complex to answer. If we are to embrace the lean approach isn’t it critical that we understand what it is we are embracing? If we don’t agree on what is lean, how do we know what action to take in becoming lean, determine if we are making progress and align everyone in the same direction?

Wouldn’t our definition of lean be important in a lean transformation? Determining scope, objectives, metrics?

If we asked the lean experts, consultants, practitioners, the CEO’s or our shop floor associates, what would be their answer? I bet each person we ask would give us a different answer. It seems to me that our answer to this question is highly dependent on our experiences on the subject. Our understanding on lean is formed by many factors including the influence of others, what we are told, what we read, along with our personal hands on experiences. In our mind, we collect all these inputs to formulate our viewpoint of lean.

Some would answer that lean is a set of tools to identify and eliminate waste. Waste (muda) elimination is the prime focus to shorten the leadtime from customer order to receipt of cash. Head count reduction and cost cutting can become the face of lean for many.

Others would answer that lean is improving the flow or smoothing work by eliminating unevenness (mura). Value stream maps will lead us to the promised land of the perfect work flow.

Another answer would be to simply focus on making all jobs easier and better by eliminating overburden (muri). Perhaps we think automation is the key to making jobs easier and we get the added bonus of head count reduction.

Some may say that we need to focus on all three (waste elimination, unevenness and overburden) together.

Another prospective is the only making what the customer needs, when the customer needs it, in the quantity the customer needs using minimal resources of manpower, material and machinery. This is the classic just-in-time thinking.

Some would say that instead of describing lean as a production system, it is better to describe it as either a business system or enterprise system. This is the beginning thoughts of a whole system approach to becoming lean. From there we could expand our thoughts to the entire supply chain including our customers, our suppliers, our supplier’s suppliers, etc. along with all transactional processes included.

Added to the mix is the focus on people development (we build people), quality focus, safety focus, problem solving, scientific thinking, long term thinking, A3 thinking, morale, kaizen events, kaizen mindset, lean accounting, new product development, contribution to society, customer focus, being flexible, being agile, being nimble and so on.

Beyond this we still have the culture and leadership of the company to consider.

With all these difference prospectives on what is lean, is it any wonder why so many stumble, struggle and eventually fail in becoming “lean”?

And would this also affect our opinion on what is not lean? Would this indeed influence our opinion on an individual’s knowledge of lean and determine how we rate a company’s leanness?

Is leanness measured only in results or does it included how we achieve results? Does the speed of getting the results impact our measure of leanness? Do we measure leanness on the number of lean tools being used? Let’s see, 5-S check, Kanban check, Regular kaizen events check, A3 no, TPM no, VSM no, (add as many tools to your checklist as your experience tells you)….sorry you are not lean.

Maybe we make things too complex and the answer is really simple.

What’s your viewpoint on what is lean and does it affect your effort on becoming lean?

Poka Yoke The Office Style

2009-12-02T22:58:00.003-05:00

From the popular comedy show, The Office, Dwight give us some potential poka yoke advice on mistake proofing, also known as idiot proofing from the early lean days. I wonder if anyone has practiced this thinking?

Management Improvement Carnival #82

2009-11-20T21:42:00.003-05:00

I am quite honored and excited to once again host a session of the management improvement carnival started by John Hunter through his awesome blog site Curious Cat Management Improvement Blog. On to the good stuff, here is a sample of some of the great posts on improvement from some of the best lean thinkers.

The Kipling Method vs. the Ohno Method by Jon Miller “Are you a Kipling person, taking the accepted tool or situation as given, or are you an Ohno person, constantly challenging the norms and looking for better ways?”

Lean is about More than the Myths by Tim McMahon “It’s important when you are starting out your lean journey to understand what lean is really about.”

17 Lessons I learned from Japanese Consultants by Jeff Hajek “Over the years I have worked with some premiere lean consultants from Japan. Here are some of the many lessons I learned from them.”

When the Neck Bone Isn’t Connected to the Head Bone by Bill Waddell “There’s a reason why the best manufacturers tend to be pretty vertically integrated. They take core competence to mean everything in the chain of creating value for the customers-not everything that is easy or cheap.”

Lean Inventories Do Not Excuse Failing to Deliver by John Hunter “The retailers need to design their system with lean thinking in mind (not lean-as in cut expense without thinking).”

Keeping Lean Japanese by Brian Buck “There is a trend towards removing the Japanese language or jargon from Lean transformations in the U.S. I understand why organizations would want to make lean thinking and the corresponding tools easier to digest, but I think we should seriously consider keeping it Japanese.”

Helping Make A3 Work, Part 1 by Jamie Flinchbaugh “I’ve been spending a good amount of time lately helping leaders from various organizations improve their lean thinking by utilizing A3 problem solving. In the following few blog posts, I’ll answer some of the common questions people have about A3 and it’s use in organizations.”

My New Stand Up Desk by Ron Pereira “Now, you might be wondering how I increased the height of my desk. Well, my goal was to not spend a cent on this project so I got creative”

A Problems First Culture by Mark Rosenthal “Problems first” is one of the mantras used by Phil Jenkinson, the CEO character in The Lean Manager by Michael and Freddy Ballé. Now that I have had a few weeks to let it sink in and synthesize with my mental models, I am seeing a concept that is so fundamental I would think it would be hammered into students in every management and leadership course taught in the world.’

When Flows Collide

2009-10-14T23:03:00.003-04:00

Originally, I was not going to post about this issue but the more I thought about it, the more we can learn from it. The issue deals with lack of communication, poor customer service and colliding flows.

I recently rented a car at the Jackson, Mississippi airport from a well recognized, national rental car company. The experience was typical up until the point of returning the car at the end of the week. Normally, I just pull up to the proper return lane, get scanned in by the attendant, mileage and fuel levels checked, receipt is printed and off I go to catch my flight. Not this time.

I pull into the proper return lane and no attendant is in sight. I patiently wait and look around but no attendant showed up. Strange, I never had to wait before at this airport.

Finally, I see an employee from this car rental company pull up in one of their rental cars. He tells me that they got rid of the attendants in the return area as part of cost cutting and I need to go inside to their airport counter to return my car.

As most frequent travelers do, I plan some time for delays and problems but not too much since I dislike sitting around the airport any longer than I need to. In this case, I had a few minutes to spare however the clock is ticking. Stress levels start to elevate.

As I swiftly walk to the airport entrance, I happen to notice a small sign that states we need to return the car keys at the rental car counter inside the airport. The sign is small and located near the walking exit to the airport.

I rush to the counter only to find a line of customers waiting for service by only one attendant. This is the point where flows collide. Both customer picking up cars and returning cars are in the same line. Aghhh!

I feel the stress rising higher and try to push it back down. If worse comes to worse, I will just drop the keys on the counter and head quickly to the security line. I can always get a receipt online later.

After what seemed like forever, in reality just 15 minutes, I get to the counter to return my car. I got through security and made it on-time for my flight home.

Does it have to be this way?

Where was the customer communication when I first rented the car to tell me to allow time to return the car at this counter instead of the usual return attendant?

What about the sign? Could it be placed closer to the entrance instead of the exit? Could multiple sign be placed in several spots? Could the sign be larger and easier to see?

Could the colliding flows be separated at the counter? Should return customers get priority over pick up customers? Can a drop off box be used with an offer to email the receipt directly to you-no effort on the customer’s part?

Based on this situation, where in our processes do we fail to communicate properly and create colliding flows?

What about shipping and receiving? What about loading and unloading trucks? What about picking and putting away material on racks or shelves? What about work flow in cells?

What about patients checking in and checking out? What about receiving and dispensing supplies? Are there colliding flows in the ER?

Go to gemba and see the flow (or lack of flow). What colliding flows can we see and improve?

Lean Thinking

2009-10-09T19:34:00.001-04:00

What is our standard?
What is our current?
What is our gap?
Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?
What is our current state?
What is our future state?
How will we get there?
Are we ahead or behind?
What are the countermeasures?
Please try.
What if we fail?
Please try again.
What if we succeed?
Please try again.

AME Kentucky 2009

2009-10-01T12:41:00.003-04:00

It’s just around the corner, in a couple of weeks the “Journey to Greatness” begins. The AME Kentucky 2009 Conference runs from October 19 thru October 23 in Covington, Kentucky. This world class event is a great opportunity to learn, network and understand more about the lean journey. Listen and learn from 8 keynote speakers, 60 practitioner-to-practitioner presentations, 30 workshops and 40 plant tours.

Our Batesville Plant is on the tour list and I will be speaking on our Kaizen approach on Wednesday, Oct 21 at 10:00 AM. I hope you can make it and welcome the opportunity to meet face-to-face with fellow lean practitioners to share and learn.

The Lean Manager Book Review

2009-10-01T07:44:00.004-04:00

I have just finished reading the newly published book from the Lean Enterprise Institute, The Lean Manager, written by Michael Balle and Freddy Balle. The Lean Manager is a business novel about a lean transformation and a sequel to their international bestseller, The Gold Mine.

The format of a business novel has been popular for several years with some done well and others not so well. In general, I am not especially fond of the novel format due to poor story lines, poor dialogue, extra noise in the story line, and poor pace that drags the story along or slaps together the ending. If done well, I love the novel format.

In the case of The Lean Manager, it is hands down the best business novel on lean transformation that has been written yet and I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. Michael and Freddy did an outstanding job on all accounts providing a strong story with outstanding dialogue and many, many powerful insights into the lean transformation.

I started highlighting and taking notes of many of the best points which ended up being too numerous to list but I will share just a couple with you. I will not reveal all the golden nuggets found in the book so you can explore it on your own.

“People are natural problem solvers. Once we understand the problem, our mind will follow seamlessly to adopting a solution.”

“When a solution is forced onto us where we do not see a problem, chance are we will fight tooth and nail against it, no matter how clever the new approach.”

“There are very few operational experiments which cannot be reversed quickly, and hence, a bias to action is perfectly reasonable in routine process.”

“Requires radical transformation of managerial behavior.”

1. Problems have to be solved one at a time.
2. Managers need to remain close to people as they conduct experiments.
3. Managers have to be maniacs about check.
4. Drawing the right conclusions from the experiment is often really tough.

“Improve Management Practices”

“Only way to be more competitive is to improve management practices continually.”

“Managing by problem solving”

“Develop people by kaizen so that they know more.”

The major themes in The Lean Manager include: Kaizen Spirit, Go and See, Teamwork, Mutual Trust, and Clear Direction. Each theme is strongly woven into the story line with added company politics, disappointments and frustrations as the fictional plant manager, Andy Ward, struggles to save his plant from pending closure.

Although The Lean Manger is an excellent book, there are a few points that I did not like. For starters, it uses the crisis of plant closure to create a sense of urgency and drama to the lean transformation. Why does it take always take crisis to drive the motivation for a lean transformation?

Second, I absolutely love the character Phil Jenkinson, CEO in this story. Where are all the Phil Jenkinson’s in this world!!!! I have never meet a super CEO like this that is a master coach, long term thinker, lean knowledgeable, shop floor comfortable, hands on leader yet keeps his ego in check and lets his people learn by doing. He is as close to perfect as a CEO can get for a lean transformation. This makes a great story and provides an outstanding example however this character is far from the norm.

In addition, there was just one mention of using six sigma in this story during a dialogue between Amy Woods (consultant) and Andy Ward (plant manager) which is less than positive. The story portrays the six sigma approach as “one guy working in a corner and looking for brilliant solutions”. In my experience, this is not a true application of six sigma. Those few paragraphs could have been eliminated to remove the negative swipe at six sigma and the lean transformation message would still remain powerful.

One important point to remember while reading this story is not to turn it into a roadmap in a lean transformation. It would be easy to pick up many points in the book and turn it into a roadmap which would not guarantee success. Look at the problems you are facing in your company and determine your own path. Use the story as a discussion platform with other leaders in your company on what it takes in a lean transformation and how are we going to head there.

Despite my few critical points of this story, I highly recommend this book to all of us working on lean transformations. It captures the true essence of a lean transformation in all its accomplishments and struggles with eloquent emphasis that we cannot force a lean transformation and we cannot do this alone.

Disclaimer: Thanks to my friends at The Lean Enterprise Institute for providing a review copy of The Lean Manager. This book review is my personal opinion and I was not compensated nor obligated to provide one.

Batesville Casket Winner 2009 Assembly Plant of the Year

2009-09-30T16:28:00.002-04:00

It was announced today that our Manchester, Tennessee facility has been awarded the “2009 Plant of the Year” by ASSEMBLY magazine and The Boston Consulting Group. Our Manchester Team has been very successful in applying and sustaining the lean approach on a daily basis. We pause to celebrate this honor within our entire organization and then it’s back to kaizen.

Unclutterer

2009-09-24T23:47:00.003-04:00

Check out the link for a cool blog site, Unclutterer, dedicated to getting and staying organized. Plenty of information for both work and at home. The staff of writers led by their Editor-in-Chief, Erin Doland, provide some great organizational ideas in the spirit of 5S.

Lean Horse Race

2009-09-24T23:14:00.003-04:00

Most companies want to get results fast. There is a strong push to get results quickly or more importantly to impact the bottom line immediately. If the results are not achieved quickly, we may rush into actions to get the results. This more than likely includes reorganizing, moving people around or taking short cuts like layoffs for quick impact. Other commonly used tactics for getting quick results include plant shutdowns, outsourcing, budget slashing (travel, training, R&D, etc), playing cash flow games and financial shuffles to polish the numbers.

Unfortunately, prevalent management thinking seems to be locked into short term thinking mode. Just look to the business news.

The lean approach is a proven way to get results but it is not easy to implement nor is it as fast as many would like. Many companies that turn to the lean manufacturing approach want to get lean fast.

Even among those who promote the lean approach, there are differences of opinion on the best path, the right focus and on speed. Some of us look to get the low hanging fruit with kaizen blitz while others of us preach the slow and steady approach by building the foundation first. Some of us push the use of lean tools first while others push the thinking behind the tools first. Some of us consider the value stream map as the center of the lean approach while others view it as just another lean tool.

We even see cycles where certain lean aspects are hot topics. This happened with kaizen, 5S, Kanban, lean office, hoshin kanri, lean accounting, value stream maps and A3 thinking. These cycles do not change their value only their buzz factor.

No doubt that results are important but which way is best?

There is an old Japanese saying by Matsuo Basho, “Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Seek what they sought.” We need to find our own path that works for us while heading in the right direction.

As for speed: Which is better, a fast horse or a slow horse?

It all depends on whether you’re headed in the right direction or not.

Purpose of Lean Tools

2009-09-18T19:47:00.000-04:00

What is the main purpose of lean tools?

What is the main purpose of 5S, Kanban, Visual Management, Glass Walls, hour-by-hour charts, Pareto Charts, Cause and Effect Diagrams (Fish Bone), Takt Time/Cycle Time Bar Charts, Spaghetti Diagrams, Concentration Diagrams, Value Stream Maps, and so on?

The main purpose is to immediately make problems visible.

Then we must focus our effort on solving them daily.

Everybody.

Every day.

WORMPIT

2009-08-13T17:25:00.002-04:00

Last week, I learned a new acronym for remembering the 7 deadly wastes of manufacturing, WORMPIT. It certainly provides a more vivid image of “deadly” wastes than the acronym TIM WOOD, wouldn’t you agree?

Waiting
Over Production
Rework (defects)
Motion
Processing (over or excess)
Inventory
Transportation

Worms have long been a symbol of decay and death. In nature, worms are attracted to decaying organic matter and dead vegetation. If the environment is also dark and damp, you don’t have to wait long and soon the worms will appear.

Using WORMPIT to help describe 7 deadly wastes may bring to our minds many images of something dead. Our businesses will most certainly face the same fate where wastes are allowed to exist in our processes.

If our business processes are full of waste, don’t allow it to become a WORMPIT. We should change the environment, by shining a bright light on all our problems. We must look for all the wastes and work to remove them every day. To begin, “all you need to do is follow the worms”.*

*(Lyrics from “Waiting for the Worms” by Pink Floyd – Another Brick in the Wall, Part 3).

The 7 Flows of Healthcare

2009-08-07T11:53:00.000-04:00

1. The flow of patients
2. The flow of clinicians
3. The flow of medications
4. The flow of supplies
5. The flow of equipment
6. The flow of information
7. The flow of process engineering

The 7 Flows

2009-08-04T00:54:00.006-04:00

“All problems can be solved by looking at and understanding the 7 flows.” Chihiro Nakao

In the book, Lean Thinking, authors James Womack and Daniel Jones, outlined lean thinking in terms of focusing on clearly specifying “value”, lining up all the value creating activities along a “value stream”, making value “flow” smoothly at the “pull” of the customer in pursuit of “perfection”. Following these deceptively simple concepts, many of us struggle on the path to becoming “Lean” as we constantly get stuck in the muck of waste, status quo and egocentric leadership.

Let’s look at just the concept of flow. Sounds easy enough to understand, right? Most of us know what is meant by flow and what is not flow. Flow is going down the highway at full speed with little or no traffic whereas getting stuck in a bumper-to-bumper traffic jam is not flow.

But how do we make value “flow” smoothly?

Many years ago, I was taught by one of my Japanese sensei, Nakao-san, the 7 flows in manufacturing.

1. The flow of Raw Material
2. The flow of Work-in-process
3. The flow of Finished goods
4. The flow of Operators
5. The flow of Machines
6. The flow of Information
7. The flow of Engineering

We must first observe each of these flows to gain full understanding. In our observation, take notes and sketch out the seven flows as we see them. It is very important not to skip this step and actually sketch out the seven flows regardless of our artistic skills. Why do you think it is important for us to sketch them?

As we are sketching the seven flows, what are some of the things we should be observing?

To help us think more of flow, here are just a few things to look for while in gemba.

Raw material, WIP and Finished Goods Flow
What is the standard work? What are the locations and distances? What are the container types and sizes? What are the packaging materials and what do we do with it? Are there any machine cycle times? How is the transfer of material accomplished? What are the conveyors, carts, forklifts being used?

Operator Flow
What is the standard work and operator’s cycle time (determine pace of the line slowest to fastest). What are the operator’s body movement..arms, hands, head, eyes, legs and feet . Observe the “go gets” of operators getting things to do their tasks.

Machine Flow
What is the machine cycle time? What are the set up requirements? What is the machine process and is it right sized only for what is required? Are there unused features in the machine? What steps are required to operate the machine? What are the requirements of properly maintaining the machines? Are the machines purchased or in-house built? Observe the machine wastes (collection, disposal, size and shape, recycle coolant).

Information Flow
Observe the transfer of information. What information is needed? What is the path of information? What are the decisions made by the operator? How many decisions are made by the operator? What does the operator do when a problem occurs or has a question? How does information of problems get passed on? Who responds to the operators needs? What information is on production control boards, production schedules, kanbans, manufacturing plans, etc?

Engineering Flow
What is the tooling required? What are the process controls and quality checks? Are there “go-nogo” gages? Observe any hanedashi devices (means the mechanisms to automatically eject a part from the machine to free up the operator to only load the machine).

Can you think of other items in observing the seven flows?

In each of the seven flows, observe the stops, the hesitations, the delays, the re-dos. We should also consider all seven flows working in harmony to improve flow. From these detailed observations of the 7 flows and our gained understanding of the process, we will see how to make value flow smoothly.

You Don't Have to Be a Rocket Scientist

2009-07-30T16:48:00.012-04:00

During our summer family vacation to the Grand Canyon last month, we took the opportunity to see Meteor Crater about 35 miles (56 kilometers) east of Flagstaff, Arizona. Both my children like dinosaurs, space and nature, so it was on their list to explore during our vacation.

Meteor Crater is the first proven crater site in the world. The crater is an impressive size of about 4,000 feet (1.2 kilometers) in diameter and 550 feet (168 meters) deep. It is estimated to have been created when an iron meteorite about the size of a school bus hit the Arizona desert about 49,000 years ago.

With a highly unique surface of rock and moon-like terrain, it is considered one of the prime locations for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to conduct lunar testing. Since the mid 1960s, NASA regularly visits Meteor Crater to test rovers, spacesuits, communication systems and other equipment for space missions.

One of the stories that our guide told us as we hiked along the crater rim was about the first testing conducted by NASA in 1968 at Meteor Crater. According to our guide, the most important geology lesson taught to our astronauts was that in the formation of the crater, the impact shoots the core rocks to the surface. That means to take core samples; you don’t need to drill and should focus on collecting the rocks on the surface rim. That piece of valuable information certainly changes the action plan on collecting moon rocks.

The other interesting story was about the space equipment testing, in particular the spacesuit. Since no human has ever stepped foot on the lunar surface up that time, our NASA scientists had plenty of things to consider in designing and testing the spacesuit. Things like pressure, temperature, oxygen deliver systems, and even mobility to bend down to pick up moon rocks. Of course, safety of our astronauts is the prime concern and failure is not an option.

As the story goes, while moving about the Meteor Crater in the testing of the spacesuits for our first moon landing, one of the astronauts falls down and tears his spacesuit on the rocks. As you can imagine, a tear is considered a catastrophic failure and most likely caused the NASA team to jump into rapid problem solving mode. As a result, successful modifications were made to the spacesuit before sending astronauts to the moon.

I have not been able to confirm all the facts of this spacesuit tear story so I will speculate here. I will assume our NASA scientists most likely had developed some form of FMEA (Failure Mode and Effect Analysis) to list all the potential failure modes of the spacesuit and planned countermeasures. These countermeasures would have been considered in developing the spacesuit design specifications.

Even with an excellent FMEA competed by rocket scientists at NASA, a tear in the spacesuit occurred due to a simple fall over the rocky surface.

I consider this an important lesson in the value of going to gemba. Even if we can’t actual go to gemba, in this case, the moon, we should simulate the gemba conditions the best we can to see what happens. And most importantly, you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure it all out. Even rocket scientists can’t think of everything and need to see by testing things out first to get the facts. To see and understand, go to gemba.
(Photos by NASA)

Courage

2009-07-17T16:57:00.005-04:00

“Courage is being scared to death, but saddling up anyway.” John Wayne

There are many traits we add to our leadership list to help us on our lean journey and courage is one of them. It takes courage to turn plans into action. It takes courage to experiment. It takes courage to try something new by removing the warm blanket of comfort that the status quo provides.

It takes courage to admit we don’t know everything, say we made a mistake and make problems visible.

It takes courage to speak up and voice our ideas or thoughts especially if they do not align with the thinking of others.

It takes courage to make decisions and do what is right.

It takes courage to keep trying, get up when we fall down and try again.

It takes courage to stand firm with our principles and values when pressured act against them.

From my all-time favorite movie “Braveheart” with outstanding soundtrack, Sir William Wallace (Mel Gibson) states “Men don’t follow titles, they follow courage.” A title of President, VP or Plant Manager does not make us a leader, only our words and actions grant us that privilege. More importantly, it is not just our prepared speeches or written memos that reveal our courage in leadership, it is in our daily actions and simple comments. It is the little things we say and do every day where our courage can be seen.

Without courage, we cannot improve.

Toyota's Two Primary Job Demands

2009-07-09T22:51:00.001-04:00

While recently visiting the Toyota Georgetown plant, I learned that there are only two primary job demands on all Toyota Team Members:
1) Come to work on-time everyday.
2) Pull the andon cord when there is a problem.

Interesting, think about that for a moment.

Raise the Flag

2009-07-08T22:01:00.003-04:00

During a recent kaizen event at our Chihuahua, Mexico plant, the team observed one of our interior associates repeatedly walking back and forth from her sewing station to a line side station to check on material levels. She walked over 30 steps one way and was responsible for sewing and delivering these parts along with sewing parts for the cell next to her. She was given this added sewing operation to fill in some of her available time but the process was not set up to make it easy for her to do both.

Seeing the opportunity for improvement, several of the kaizen team members worked with this associate and the line side associate to come up with a better process. The result was a simple flag made from paper and scrap wood.

The new process is simple. When the material level reached a pre-determined point, the line side associate would raise this flag to signal the need for more parts. From her sewing station, the associate can easily see the flag prompting her to sew the parts and deliver them. Once the parts are delivered, the flag is taken down.

This is another example of simple visual management to make jobs easier and better.

To be Vertically Integrated or not to be Vertically Integrated?

2009-07-07T17:34:00.003-04:00

One thing that is pretty noticeable when touring any of the major automotive assembly plants (GM, Ford, Toyota, Nissan or Honda) is the lack of sub-assemblies being built on or near the final assembly line. Except for a parallel engine final assembly line which consists mainly of pre-mounting hose and framing, the majority of non-painted frame components are all shipped in from the outside.

When observing the automotive assembly line in action, the associates on the line assemble components directly to the moving vehicle. There are no sub-assemblies like seats, steering wheels, instrument dash boards, etc being built to the line. All these sub assemblies are delivered to the line ready for installation.

At first glance, this separation appears to make it easier to flow the final assembly process. So basically, automotive final assembly consists of delivering parts to the line, picking up parts as car passes by and installing the parts on the car. Please excuse my oversimplification; I am sure it is far more complex and challenging. Aisles are straight and wide given free access to deliver parts on both sides of the line. Is this assembly heaven?

But what about the inventory created by this separation? How far does the supply chain expand? What level of Muri (overburden) is created with the extra communication and coordination for this subassembly supply chain? If this concept works so great, why does Boeing have such difficulty in their supply chain?

By contrast, many assembly plants I am familiar are the opposite in that we are highly vertically integrated. Our assembly lines are not as straight nor do we have spacious aisles however we put as many of the subassembly processes closest to point of use as possible. This eliminates much of the WIP inventory and leadtime in the supply chain but we have our own challenges with this approach. As an example, we cut the material, shirr, sew and stuff a pillow for every casket all line side to our assembly line to the exact order by color, by fabric, by style within pitch. No inventory, no semi truck needed, and no computer system.

During the early days of automotive manufacturing, Henry Ford was extremely vertically integrated all the way back to the iron ore mines. He believed in controlling as much of the supply chain as possible to reduce the cost (waste) as possible. Over the years, the automotive companies retracted from this thinking thereby expanding their supply chain. I guess if you can find someone who can produce it cheaper than you can; it made perfect financial sense to let them make it for you so you can focus your attention on your core competencies.

But isn’t manufacturing suppose to be a core competency of a manufacturing company?

Simple Visual Management at Home

2009-07-06T16:25:00.001-04:00

Like probably most of you, we have pets at home. In our case with the benefit of living in a rural Indiana area, we have several pets both inside and outside of our home including 4 cats, 4 dogs, 2 horses, fish and even some chickens for fresh eggs.

Our kids do an excellent job of making sure all our animals are properly taken care of on a daily basis regardless of rain, sleet or snow. But basic chores like feeding can become chaotic if you don’t plan a routine.

One of the challenges we faced was making sure all our pets are feed on regular schedule without missing a meal or over feeding. As we know from our lean thinking, both missed cycles and over production are equally undesirable. What a perfect challenge for creating a visual aid.

With the help of our creative kids, they made a simple visual indicator to help us see each mealtime: breakfast, lunch and dinner. After each meal, we simply turn the heart to show which meal was completed. Any one of us can see if the meals are on track with this visual aid. More importantly, visual aids do not need to be fancy, expensive or complex to work. Simple is better.

Honda Greensburg Plant Tour

2009-07-02T17:41:00.003-04:00

Earlier this month, I had my first opportunity to tour the newly operational Honda plant in Greensburg, Indiana referred as HMIN. After recently touring Toyota Georgetown and Nissan Canton in the past couple of months, I was excited to take a look inside Honda. As you can image, it was an excellent adventure.

All of these plants are extremely similar in design and layout which may not be much of a surprise to some of us. All are crystal clean, highly organized and quite disciplined. Each plant has spacious aisles acting as main arteries supplying material to each station to the heartbeat of pitch.

In the Honda plant, the material along the assembly line is designated into three categories: working cart, full cart and empty cart. The working cart contains the parts currently being used and the cart is designated by blue corner tabs on the floor. The full cart contains the parts next in line for use and marked with green corner floor tabs. The empty cart is well just that, an empty cart. These parts were just consumed on the line and the cart is moved into the red corner tabs location on the floor.

All the material is delivered on carts and individually segregated by use of foam, cardboard slots or trays. Forklifts are restricted to the dock area and tugger carts deliver the material line side.
Each workstation had a posted sheet with the workstation layout of material showing part flow. Also included on these sheets are three contact names and numbers in case there are materials problems. Quite interesting is that there no other posted instructions line side…no standard work charts, no job instructions. I was told that these documents are kept in a notebook at the team coordinator line side station and standard work is audited every station, every day by the team coordinator.

Honda does practice it’s version of built in quality as part of each team member’s standard work. In short, these steps were posted on several team boards.

Step 1: Parts confirmation (confirm you have the correct part and confirm quality of part).
Step 2: Perform Process (follow all quality points to operational standard).
Step 3: Confirm quality to ship (check your own work visually, or by touch and feel).
Step 4: Prepare for next unit and abnormalities (prep parts and put abnormal parts on straggler cart).

Part of the culture at Honda Motors Indiana (HMIN) includes ALL employees wearing the same white uniform and green Honda ball cap. No one has their own private office, instead all desks are grouped in large rooms. Interestingly, every desk was completely void of personal items, paper, etc. When I asked about it, I was told that personal items on the desk are allowed however one of the work rules is to completely clear the tops of desk nightly of everything (except desktop computer monitors). Laptops go into desk drawers along with the personal items. It was strange to see so many desks with nothing on them!

In such a short time, I was only able to get a glimpse of the Honda Way. I hope to develop a deeper understanding each time I get a chance to visit in the future.

Back from the Edge

2009-06-30T20:27:00.003-04:00

After several kaizen weeks in June, I took my family on a trip out west to explore the Grand Canyon. It was amazing to stand on the edge of this wonder of the world and realize how tiny we are in comparison. More on this and plenty of catching up to do on our lean journey in the days ahead.

My Haiku Mission Statement

2009-05-23T09:32:00.003-04:00

Simplicity has been one of the important characteristics in my life in the last few years, both professionally and personally. It is actually liberating seeking the path of simplicity. It is also a huge undertaking to shift towards simplicity so I take daily steps.

When I read Kevin Meyer’s post Twitter, Haiku and the Simplicity of Mission last month, it hit home. I love the simplicity of Haiku poems. Haiku uses only 17 syllables arranged in lines of 5, 7 and 5 syllables to describe simple ideas or events, usually connected to nature. It is also a great format to focus your thoughts concisely. Using this format, I tried to develop a Haiku to reflect my personal business mission statement. Here goes:

My Business Mission Statement
Develop leaders.
Live the lean philosophy.
Teach it to others.

Simple words but extremely challenging, especially "live the lean philosophy". Just as I try to embrace simplicity, I will take on this personal business mission in daily steps.

Management Improvement Carnival #64

2009-05-20T20:58:00.015-04:00

Moore’s Law and Lean by Brian Buck-“I think it is easy for people in Lean organizations to get stuck in the mode of always going after PERFECT instead of focusing on 50% BETTER.”

Japanese CEOs and Leadership by Mark Graban-“When do you ever hear a Western CEO say “sorry” or “we were lacking”?”

8 Ways to Get Total Involvement by Jon Miller-“In a true high performance work culture we should aim for total involvement in daily improvement activities.”

Total Company Involvement by Pete Abilla-“When the hearts and minds of everybody in the organization is moving toward the same end then you know the companies’ mission has became a living and breathing inspirational catalyst for good.”

Leadership & Standard Work by Jeff Hajek-“The more you can standardize the routine processes of leadership, the more you can use your rime for the high impact things leaders want to do.”

How Interruptions Drain Productivity by George Ambler-“Time is a leaders most valuable resource. The way a leader uses their time demonstrates to the people around them what’s really important.”

Daily Scrum against the Board by Xavier Quesada Allue-“A good way to know if your team is using their taskboard to really manage their work is to look at their daily standup meeting.”

Mapping a Path to the W.O.W. Side by Gianna Clark-“Consistently delighting customers and providing exceptional handling of issues and errors using the R.A.P.I.D. methodology are two ways to create customer with W.O.W. (What’s needed-On time-With value).

Leading by Example

2009-05-12T18:17:00.002-04:00

“Preach the gospel at all times; only if necessary use words.”
Saint Francis of Assisi

It is not what we say, it is what we do. Leading by example is a powerful method for success on our lean journey and in life, probably our most powerful. It removes doubt, builds trust and strengthens our message. It helps others to better understand and inspires action. It even helps us gain a deeper understanding. It shows what is important.

Can you guess who is shown in the pictures above? This is the President of a company in Japan participating in their daily 5S. Each morning the entire salaried management team works side by side to clean and organize their plant. From washing floors, trimming hedges to cleaning bathrooms, no task is left undone.

What kind of message do you think this sends to his employees?

The simple truth is that you don’t have to be a CEO or President to lead by example. Every day, each of us has the opportunity to lead by example and it is our choice to take advantage of this opportunity or let it pass us by.

Do we preach 5S and yet our own desks are disorganized and piled high in clutter?

Do we preach daily continuous improvement and yet we don’t want to change how we do our own tasks?

Do we preach standard work and yet we avoid creating or following any standard work in our daily tasks?

Do we preach elimination of all waste and yet we can’t imagine giving up our one-sided, color paper copies of our monthly policy deployment even though we have access to the digital copy?

Do we preach establishing a no-blame environment and yet when there is an error made, the first question out of our mouths is “Did you write the employee up?”

Do we preach about the benefit of using outside eyes and yet we don’t want any outsiders (especially corporate) messing around in our area to look for improvement opportunities?

Do we preach make all problems visible and yet we kill the messenger of any bad news or hide problems from others?

Do we just talk about the lean philosophy or are we trying to live the lean philosophy?

Positioned to Seize Opportunities

2009-05-07T07:56:00.001-04:00

For another insider view of a lean initiative, check out the Industry Week article on “Lean Initiatives Help Sealy Prepare for Market Rebound” using a Q&A format with my friend and former boss, Mike Hofmann, Executive VP of Operations at Sealy. Despite the significant impact the current economic crisis has on their business, Sealy is looking to the future guided by their lean philosophy.

Are we thinking to the future during this current downturn?

Are we positioning ourselves to seize the opportunities ahead when the market rebounds?

Wisdom of the Week

2009-04-22T11:24:00.000-04:00

A Native American elder once described his own inner struggles in this manner.

“Inside of me there are two dogs. One of the dogs is mean and evil. The other dog is good. The mean dog fights the good dog all the time.”

When asked which dog wins, he reflected for a moment and replied, “The one I feed the most.”

Whaddaya Mean I Gotta Be Lean?

2009-04-21T18:28:00.004-04:00

I just finished reading an excellent, new book written by Jeff Hajek, “Whaddaya Mean I Gotta Be Lean? Building the bridge from job satisfaction to corporate profit”. Most business books are written for executives and managers which makes Jeff’s book unique in that it seems to be written more for team leaders and team members. This book provides an excellent format to answer many questions that people have at the start of a lean journey beginning with what’s in it for me.

Chapter 4 on “What is lean?” is one of the best overall descussions of lean I have read in quite some time for those wanting to understand the basic concepts without adding details that only end up confusing people.

Chapters 8 and 9 are filled with outstanding, useful answers to real problems or situations on the lean journey with suggested actions that are spot on. I especially loved Jeff’s positive responses to each of the problems that help bridge the conflicts that might become obstacles to success.

Even the experienced lean practitioner can learn from these examples to improve their coaching and influence skills.

Nice job Jeff on providing so much valuable information on the human side of implementing continuous improvement all in one book.

Jeff Hajek the founder of Velaction Continuous Improvement, LLC. Please visit his website at http://www.velaction.com/ for more information.

Get Your Boots On!

2009-04-20T21:09:00.002-04:00

At the Printing Industries of America Lean Conference in Lexington, Kentucky a couple of weeks ago, I learned a new saying, “Get your boots on!” According to Mike Hoseus, co-author of The Toyota Culture and former Toyota-Georgetown (TMMK) manager, this is how “Genchi Genbutsu” is affectionately known by among the team members at TMMK.

As most of us have learned, Genchi Genbutsu, is Japanese meaning roughly “Go and see the problem”. This values practical experience over theoretical knowledge and places emphasis that we must go and see the problem to know the problem.

During the morning session on “Building and Sustaining a Lean Culture: The Quality People Value Stream” presented by Mike Hoseus, currently Executive Director of the Center for Quality People and Organizations, a little more about the Toyota Culture was revealed. One of the first points is that culture starts with values and beliefs which drive our behavior. Toyota places critical emphasis in establishing its values and beliefs as the foundation of its culture. Another key point was the alignment of company goals and employees’ goals under a common purpose of long term mutual prosperity.

To this point, Mike compared vertical organizations to horizontal organization. A vertical organization focuses on production, budgets and SOPs, just make the numbers, leaders are separated from the work, people’s ingenuity is used to beat the system and supervisors manage people. By contrast, a horizontal organization focuses on the process, the common purpose of long term mutual prosperity, makes problems visible, people’s ingenuity used to improve the system and supervisors work with the people to solve problems.

One of his examples to describe our actions to a goal was weight loss. Suppose we want to lose 25 lbs. Which courses of action do we pursue? Do we buy a digital scale, set up a process to take daily measurements and chart the results on a computer program and call it part of our visual management system? Or do we set up a daily exercise process with a diet program?

Mike also emphasized providing an environment to think and establishing a culture to make problems visible. All the lean tools are primarily focused on making problems visible. We must learn to admit to having a problem and commit ourselves to solving the problem. Mike told us that at TMMK over 6,000 andon pulls occur daily that make problems visible. Even with this incredible number of andon pulls, the line only stops about 7% of the day (93% uptime). The 6,000 daily problems are overwhelming to say the least. When asked how does Toyota go about solving all these problems and Mike simple said “one at a time.”

According to Mike, there are three stages to problem solving.
1. Reaching: Problem solving that results in getting to the goal.
2. Maintaining: Problem solving that focuses on maintaining the goal.
3. Raising: Problem solving that focuses on increasing capability beyond the goal – “kaizen”.

Mike Hoseus described the Toyota leadership model as an inverted triangle with team members as the largest base on top all the way down to the company president on the pointed tip on the bottom. He described the servant leadership approach that leadership develops the capacity that allows team members to improve what needs to be done.

Standards were another key topic of discussion. Without standards, there is no problem. The first question should be, what is our standard? Followed by, does everyone see the problem? And, what are we going to do about it?

In summary, Mike Hoseus stated that connecting the product and people value streams is the key. Lean can only be effective with both and Lean can’t be sustained without both. At Toyota, they believe that their competitive advantage is people and problem solving.

So what values and beliefs do we need to start with to drive our lean culture? Maybe we can start with this: Another problem? Life is good! Let’s get our boots on!

Lean Synergy

2009-04-03T17:13:00.000-04:00

Paul McCartney and John Lennon
Abbott and Costello
Ben and Jerry
Peanut Butter and Jelly
Kiichiro Toyoda and Taiichi Ohno

These are great examples of synergy. Each is extremely talented individually but put them together and WOW! It is a thing of beauty, pure magic. Just stand back and prepare ourselves to be amazed by the result.

Synergy is the interaction of two or more forces so that their combined effect is greater than the sum of their individual effects, or simply put where 1 + 1 = 3.

In a true lean system, there are several synergies.

Just-in-Time and Autonomation
Continuous Improvement and Respect for People
Production Flow and Information Flow
Team Kaizen and Individual Kaizen

You may recognize the first two as the pillars to the Toyota Production System (TPS) and pillars to the Toyota way. Taiichi Ohno uses an analogy in explaining the relationship between the two pillars of the Toyota System in his book, Toyota Production System, “A championship team combines good teamwork with individual skill. Likewise, a production line where just-in-time and autonomation work together is stronger that other lines. It is in the synergy of these two factors.”

Each is worthy on its own however working together the resulting effect is far greater. Many companies make the mistake of concentrating on just one aspect of lean, or in using some of the tools, or narrowly focusing on only one of the pillars on their lean journey. Some improvements can be gained but this is not REAL lean and there is no WOW. Only by combining these components in a total business system is when lean synergy is realized.

It seems like just “yesterday”, we started traveling down “the long and winding road” of our lean journey. It is a constant struggle to become lean, nothing short of a true “revolution” is needed. We put in many “ a hard day’s night” to get where we are today. At first our associates told us to “let it be”, and there were many crisis moments of uncertainty when we need “Help!” from our lean sensei and would cry out “Hey Jude”. Our lean sensei would only respond by saying “Tell me what you see”.

With the power of synergy, one day it will all “come together”, but we know that we are “getting better” everyday. One day maybe waste will be “nowhere man” and we can shout “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da”. Just “imagine”.

Root Beer Game

2009-04-01T21:18:00.003-04:00

During our Logistics District Managers meeting this week, we incorporated the Root Beer Game into our lean training session. The root beer game is a supply chain management simulation game hosted online by Harvard Business School derived from the classic “Beer Game” originally created by MIT in the 1960’s.

With this computer simulation game, we broke into teams of four and assigned each member a role of retailer, wholesaler, distributor and factory. Each role had the mission of satisfy their customer demand while keeping cost at a minimum which was measured by inventory carrying costs. In our session we simulated 40 weeks of production to see the effect. The total time to run the simulation, report out and discuss key learning took almost 3 hours.

The main focus of the simulation is to demonstrate oscillation in the supply chain and how variability increases up the chain which is described as the “bull whip” effect. Discussion also includes the effects of forecasting, lead time, information flow, batching, impact of promotions and uncertainty.

It was pretty cool watching the reaction of the teams and individual responses as the game progressed. Some of the comments heard included:

“I don’t know why it is doing this.”

“Oh, what an idiot!” (Gently reminders to the group of respect for people and the no-blame culture aspect of lean were needed.)

“We didn’t buy that ERP module.”

“We used the roll-the-dice strategy.”

“That was fun, can we do it again.”

Overall, it was a great learning experience for all. It does require a license based on the number of participants which cost $37.50 per license. We also need a bit of help from our IT staff to link the computers together and connect to the Harvard server during our allotted time window, but it was not a major problem. If you are looking for a good supply chain game as a teaching aid, this one does an excellent job.

For another write up on their beer game experience, check out the great post by Pete Abilla at Shmula called The Bullwhip Effect.

Upcoming Continuous Improvement Conference 2009

2009-03-30T16:17:00.000-04:00

Next week, I’ll be traveling to Lexington, Kentucky to attend the Continuous Improvement Conference 2009 hosted by the Printing Industries of America to speak about Batesville Casket’s lean journey. This conference dates are April 5th - April 8th at the Lexington Downtown hotel and Conference Center by Hilton.

As a general observation, the printing industry has just started looking to lean manufacturing to raise performance however the case studies should prove extremely educational in their adaptation of lean. One of the highlights at this conference is Mike Hoseus, co-author of Toyota Culture, teaching how to build and sustain a lean culture the Toyota way. Attendees will also have the opportunity to take a plant tour of the Toyota Motor Manufacturing Kentucky (TMMK) in nearby Georgetown, Kentucky.

I will certainly pass on lessons that I learn from my experience at the conference next week. If you are looking for another opportunity to learn and network with fellow lean practitioners, please join us in Lexington.

Added Bonus: If you click on the Printing Industries of America link above and have about 65 minutes to listen, there is access to a pre-recorded webinar with Scott Redelman from Toyota Industrial Equipment Manufacturing (TIEM), forklift manufacturing facility in Columbus, Indiana (or click here). The webinar is in a Q&A session called Talk with Toyota. Some of the questions cover the basics for those new to lean and there are a few select points that can help those of us further down the lean path.

Speak Lean and Carry a Big Stick

2009-03-26T20:28:00.001-04:00

One of the lessons I have learned while on the lean journey is that there is not a single, clear path to success. Each company must struggle to find the best path for them. We can’t just copy Toyota and expect it to work. In most instances, there are no wrong paths on the lean journey as long as we stay true to the principles, only perhaps just better paths than the one we have chosen.

Yet, in my experience, how we choose to go about trying to implement a lean manufacturing business system is critical and some ways are clearly wrong and dangerous. One such way is not so much a path rather the means of traveling down the path. We may focus on the right goals, using the right tools and understand the right principles yet we chose a steam roller as the means of travel.

This is the top-down, drive the change, my-way-or-the-highway, Leader-is-the-Law, autocratic style of management. A tell-tale sign of this Management By Intimidation (MBI) mode on the lean journey is the “Speak Lean and Carry a Big Stick” approach where we use fear, manipulation or threats to get results or force change. It is a favorite approach used by many consultants and so called change agents.

Here are just a few examples of this autocratic style in action to drive change:

“Do as I say or else…”

“Do it my way because I am the boss.” (Parent-Child relationship)

“Do it my way because I know more about lean than you (Classic my lean experience stick is bigger that yours!)

“You have no choice; I already cleared it with your boss” (The go-over-the-head move)

“I have the blessing of (insert the name of our company President, Owner, VP, Big Cheese, Big Kohuna, Top Dog, etc) to do whatever it takes.” (Organizational Trump Card move)

“You are doing it all wrong, you don’t know anything about lean” (Public ridicule is an especially powerful tool)

“With your understanding of lean, I bet you think a prime fishing spot can be found on a value stream map?” (Ridicule with sarcastic wit)

“I learned from ex-Toyota Leaders, so I know what’s best.” (Show me your Toyota lineage papers)

“Get on the bus or …..” (Jim Collins fan)

“You did a good job but…” (Insincere praise followed by criticism)

“That is a horrific cell, no material flow. Either you are incompetent or stupid, which is it?” (Forget using insincere praise followed by criticism, get right down to it, baby)

“I may be harsh but at least I have the guts to say it” (Tactless Truth Trap usually used to justify harsh criticism)

“We don’t have time for nice, we need results NOW!” (It’s not my fault, blame the clock or calendar)

“We have material flow issues, I want you to put in a Kanban system here” (Make the decisions and give the solutions)

Have you heard any of these on the lean journey? Have you caught yourself saying any of them yourself?

Back in my first days of learning the lean approach, our Japanese sensei was persistent in getting us to change and came across quite rude and obnoxious in his manner. This did not help us see the waste any better and caused immediate friction. One of my fellow engineers became very vocal in challenging our Japanese sensei and his new ‘lean” ways. The next day our team, minus one vocal engineer, had a meeting with our Senior VP to tell us to we must get on board with lean or suffer the same fate. No doubt, this was a powerful message (big stick) to all of us at an early stage of our lean transformation. It certainly set the tone however at what price?

We may argue that the Theory X approach is efficient. Just look at the great results gained especially in a short period of time. The end justify the means right?

In my opinion, we can rationalize this type of management style to get to sleep at night however it will still be wrong when we wake up in the morning. Before rationalizing that I am perhaps too soft or not demanding enough, I only ask that you please consider a few questions first.

Is this “Speak Lean and Carry a Big Stick” approach inline with respect for people?

Which approach works better long term?

What happens when the autocratic leader leaves the company?

When we don’t involve people in making decisions, do we get buy in?

What about employee empowerment?

By establishing our command and control style, how can we expect people to have local ownership?

Are our associates following us because we built trust, understanding and teamwork or are they just more fearful?

Are we making people think and grow?

What kind of culture do we want to build in our company?

Do results matter more than people?

Each of us must decide what works best for us and our company, just choose wisely.

Trying

2009-03-26T18:35:00.003-04:00

I found a profoundly simple excerpt in Taiichi Ohno’s book “JIT for Today and Tomorrow” that was part of an essay called “What are Techniques?” written by Soichiro Honda.

“Life comes from three types of wisdom: seeing, hearing, and trying. I think that among these three, the most important on is trying. Yet most technicians emphasize seeing and hearing and neglect trying. Of course, I, too, see and hear, but try even more. It may seem obvious, but failure and success are opposites. As happiness and sorrow coexist, so do failure and success. We seem to succeed more often than we fail. Everyone detests failure, so there are fewer opportunities to succeed. People seem surprised with Honda’s success, but the only secret is that we know what we are doing. My intention is stronger than that of other technicians because I try harder. There is a big difference between reading a book and giving instructions, and attempting something first and then giving instructions. In the latter case, we feel confident. That is why I think trying is the most important factor.”

How often do we try things? Do we limit our success by avoiding failure? Do we promote and reward failure avoidance over error recovery? How can we influence more trying? When we talk with our fellow associates, do we ask them “What did you try today?”

No Blame Thinking

2009-03-12T15:45:00.003-04:00

It's not who's wrong, it's what's wrong. It's not who's right, it's what's right. All other thinking leads to hiding the truth, distorting the information and covering up the problem. Our focus should be on solving the problem as a team.