Lean can present itself in many ways. To some, Lean appears as a grassroots initiative and as bottom-up improvement by everyone, everywhere, anytime. Others experience Lean more as a top-down initiative, driven by management and accompanied by standards, audits and specialists. Indeed, Lean can be seen as a many-faced phenomenon; almost as if Lean has a Multiple Personality Disorder.
So, what is Lean’s true face? How do we explain Lean’s different personalities to the workforce? (more…)
Most of us are confronted with this question: how to create productive change? We all face the same difficulties in getting teams and organizations to another level of performance using sometimes fundamentally different principles. Developing and communicating an enticing vision surely helps, but a certain sense of urgency is always required. But here I notice that it is often difficult to strike the right balance. In some cases, plants and teams are confronted with sheer impossible objectives, resulting in continuously being in the “red area”. In other situations, I see that we don’t create a challenging enough environment for teams to become productive. Management “cushions” the team and each time they are confronted with difficulties, padding is added in the form of capacity, lead-time, surface, tolerances, safety stock and others just to make sure the team looks good and can continue to work in peace. So how to strike the right balance?
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Most of my readers probably heard about the machine effectiveness measure of OEE, short for Overall Equipment Effectiveness. It is a composite measurement of the effectiveness of a piece of equipment, composed of three elements, i.e., availability, performance and quality. And I regularly see this indicator on the shop floor, posted near or on multiple machines. But when I try to engage a shop floor discussion on its actual use in improving operations, I am often disappointed. A blog post on four reasons why I dislike OEE for shop floor control and improvement.
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Some time ago, 3M was in the news about the way they used “social networking” internally to generate new ideas. This electronic suggestion box generated an “impressive” 700 suggestions in only 2 weeks, according to news site cio.com. And of course, every suggestion is welcome, but I’d like to put the 3M efforts in a somewhat larger perspective. Then 700 ideas in 2 weeks means about 18,200 ideas per year. Now 3M has some 75,000 employees, so this implies 0.24 ideas per employee per year. So do we still think this is impressive? Furthermore, cio.com mentioned that the ideas were submitted by some 1,200 employees, so by 1.6% of all employees. Cio.com published the article to illustrate a “best practice” in employee involvement. Honestly, I’m not very impressed. Are you? (more…)
We often speak about the two pillars of the Toyota or Lean system, and when doing so we think of the two well-known pillars of just-in-time (JIT) and built-in quality (jidoka). JIT thereby focuses on manufacturing only the necessary products, at the necessary time, in the necessary quantity by deploying pull flow (kanban), one piece flow and leveling. Jidoka, built-in quality, or autonomation focuses on quality control by stopping the process when abnormalities are detected based upon elements such as standardized work and visual control. But is this correct? Where is “Respect for People” in all of this?
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In my work with companies trying to transform into a Lean company, it continues to strike me how difficult they find it to sustain, or anchor, improvements in their daily work habits. The improvements that were suggested are well-meant, on-target, but still, they don’t seem to stick. I often see that the teams developing the suggestions as well as the organization as a whole are not always conscious of the context required in which change can truly root. Because of this, improved standards are quickly compromised, the organization returns to its previous habits and, as a result, performance doesn’t improve. It may even lead to increased skepticism towards future initiatives making it increasingly difficult to improve. What can organizations do about this? When talking about anchoring change, it is maybe interesting to try and learn from the captains and mates that actually anchor ships: six lessons from the sea. (more…)
Kanban implementations are often disappointing and short lived. Companies are promised better service, lower inventories and level demand. But more often the system is abandoned after a short period as it has turned the shop floor into chaos… What went wrong? (more…)
Isn’t it just fantastic what we people have managed to do in the field of measurement and control technology. The nicest gadgets ensure our production equipment and processes remain in control. Nothing can halt technology, so it seems. And who knows what the Internet of Things (IoT) will have in store for all of us in the future. A future that most probably is nearer than we think.
But let’s stay somewhat closer to home for now. What about all these business processes that aren’t fully mechanized or automated? How do we keep those in control? What can we learn from trying to apply the concepts of measurement and control technology to these type of processes? (more…)
Over the last few years a lot has been written about Lean leadership. For instance about what the differences would be between Lean and traditional leadership. And what the characteristics are of a Lean leader. One of the aspects often missing, I feel, is “discipline”. I have always told my managers that they weren’t paid more because they would supposedly be more intelligent or because they studied for a longer period of time, but because I expected them to be the most disciplined in respecting standards. As without the manager’s respect – also interestingly described in the “broken windows” theory – the organization as a whole will flout its own rules. (more…)
Throughout the years I have had the opportunity to work for and with many organizations and teams. And all of them had their own way of dealing with problems. Some were not aware of their problems, and also saw no need to change this; others did see their problems, but — like some kind of Pavlov reaction — declared these as just being part of doing business and swept their problems under the carpet. Other organizations certainly are aware of their problems and some see these even as opportunities to improve their business. Finally, in certain organizations, even the absence of problems is seen as a problem. In what kind of organization are you working? (more…)