1. An American
translation of Toyota’s production system.
"Where there is no standard there can be no Kaizen"
The
phrase Lean can be traced back to a 1990 book entitled “the machine that
changed the world”. This work was authored by James P. Womack, Daniel T. Jones
and Daniel Roos and was a study of Toyota’s production system. Unfortunately
through that translation, much of the effectiveness of TPS and Lean have been
lost, for example, Kaizen is commonly translated to mean simply continuous
improvement. This however does not do a Kaizen culture justice. The word Kaizen is often followed by
blitz or event. This is an obvious oxymoron. How can you have a culture of
CONTINUOUS improvement that is dependant upon events which by nature have a
clearly defined beginning and end point?* These events are generally led by
leadership figures from within the organisation, with little to no engagement
of the standardised work owners, and have a short term goal. The result of this
is that Kaizen culture has been demeaned in the minds of organisational leaders,
with many failing to realise the value in “a million $1 improvements”.
Establishing
a Kaizen culture expectation is a crucial step in facilitating a Lean
transformation the engagement of everybody within the organisation in that
culture is also critical.
2.
A hands-on
system of management.
"Don't look with your eyes, look with your feet. Don't think with your head, think with your hands."A Leader should "wash their hands at least 3 times a day"
In a Lean management system the Leaders have
to be part of the system, not something greater than it or detached from it but
actually part of it, a critical member of the team. ALL leaders should interact
with the system on a daily basis, they should seek out knowledge and
understanding and they should challenge the existence of waste wherever they
go. The leader of a Lean organisation does not live in an ivory tower, as they
cannot function there, they situate themselves in the gemba and they practice
genchi genbutsu constantly. How else can they truly understand the business
that they are leading and the problems that are being felt by their people?
3.
A
transformational management system.
“Standards should not be forced down from above but rather set by the production workers themselves.”
Traditional management styles have the
almighty leader sit on a pedestal, they are the all-knowing eye, there only to
be obeyed, and this unfortunately is just how many of today’s management
figures like it. This type of leader is seldom seen in the Gemba as they view
that place as beneath them, surely the whole point of working hard to become a
manager is to put distance between you and real work right? Wrong!
Transformation is not a one man task, and make no mistake, transformation is
exactly what becoming Lean will require, it requires the buy in and engagement
of everybody. You cannot tell people they have to change and just expect them
to follow your direction, change is a much more personal and emotional beast.
If a Leader is to be successful they have to appeal to the emotional drivers of
their people, the reason that people work for their organisation and not
someone elses, the reason they drag themselves out of bed in the morning and
show up each day and what it is that makes them feel valued. You could call
this their purpose.
Leaders in Lean organisations are servants to
the workers, those that actually add value in the business. Their role is to
ensure that they provide their people with robust, reliable and repeatable
processes and ensure that anything that gets in the way of this is challenged
and removed. They must also provide development opportunities for each and
every member of their team.
4.
Focussed on
removing waste.
“Wasteful action is not work”
By now most people are familiar with the
concept of removing waste and, when asked, most practitioners can recite the 7
wastes, or at least a common acronym that relates to them such as TIM
WOOD etc., but this is only one third of the story, Muda. Two, much less well known
waste types, but of equal, if not more importance are Mura and Muri or Unevenness
and Unreasonableness respectively. So
why are these waste types not spoken about or attacked with the same gusto as
Muda? In many organisations they reside in the “too hard basket”. They are often
the result of deeply engrained behaviours and practices of senior leadership
figures and/or a belief that they are helpless to do anything about it.
Mura or unevenness leads to Muri. One day
everyone is rushed off their feet and are failing to make the numbers, and the
next day there is very little work and people spend their time undertaking non
value adding tasks just trying to look busy. These swings can be daily, weekly,
seasonal or cyclical. The result is broken down people and equipment, as both
are bored or idle one minute and pushed beyond what is reasonable or even
possible the next.
Often Leadership decisions, in this situation,
focus on balancing their human resources to match the customer demand, as this
is easier than the option, which is to look at how they can best manage their
inventory to level out the production over the period (Heijunka). Unfortunately
this constant shift in resource base is demoralising for people and attrition
rates, as a result, will be high.
5.
A strategy
for long term prosperity and growth.
“All we are doing is looking at the time line, from the moment the customer gives us an order to the point when we collect the cash. And we are reducing the time line by reducing the non-value adding wastes.”
All
too often I hear organisational leaders state that their strategy for implementing
Lean practices is in order to “reduce costs”. Cost reduction is a result of a
Lean transformation, without a shadow of a doubt, but as a strategy this
approach is seriously flawed.
Ohno’s
statement above is a demonstration of an alternative strategy. Note, there is
no mention of cost reduction only in Lead time reduction and waste removal,
and, in fact, the deliverable from the application of each of the Lean tools is
time. Each time we remove or reduce a waste we give back time i.e. we can do
the same amount of work quicker or, as an alternative, we can do more work in
the same time. We now have more capacity. The difference between success and
failure of your Lean transformation lies in what you decide to do with this
extra capacity.
An
organisation with a strategy of cost reduction will make redundancies, thereby
ending their Lean journey as this demonstrates to your people a lack of respect
for them and their abilities.
An
organisation with a growth strategy will seek to fill the new capacity with
value adding activities by increasing throughput through increased sales,
R&D or introducing new and/or innovative revenue streams.
6.
Focussed on
pull and value from the customer perspective.
“It takes great effort to follow the rules of a pull system ... thus a half-hearted introduction of a pull system brings a hundred harms and not a single gain.”
If
we can get to a point where we only deliver what the customer requires to the
quality the customer requires when the customer requires it and in the
quantities the customer requires then we have very little waste and therefore
very little in the way of excess cost. To get to this point is a long and
arduous journey that requires an organisation to be stable and their processes
to be predictable and repeatable. It is for this reason that Pull should be
seen as an advanced principle and should not be introduced too early. Take a
look at a diagram of a TPS house or temple. You will see that pull sits within
one of two supporting pillars (the JIT pillar), these pillars both sit on top
of a foundation that consists of standardised work, Heijunka (work balancing)
and Kaizen unless these elements are well embedded within the organisation and
have become “the way we work” the organisation will fail to make any attempt
toward Pull stick. 5s is a simple tool (that sits within this foundation) to
manage and sustain and yet most organisations can’t even manage to make this
stick, pull then is way out of reach.
7.
The development
of a learning organisation
“Having no problems is the biggest problem of all.”
The
tools of Lean are there in order to develop the thinking of the people within
the organisation and to push their understanding to a deeper level. In particular, practical problem solving or
A3 problem solving. Problems should be viewed as precious gems, prized for what
they offer us. They give us the ability to challenge ourselves and our
processes and develop ourselves whilst at the same time facilitating the
existence of continuous improvement. When someone raises a problem to a leader
they must welcome the opportunity with open arms not tut or look to the sky for
divine intervention or even dismiss the person as a nuisance or annoyance,
there should be an expectation that those affected by the highlighted problem,
solve and remove it. The leader is there to support this process and should do
this in any way that is deemed necessary and/or possible.
8.
A system of
2 unequal parts.
“When you go out into the workplace, you should be looking for things that you can do for your people there. You’ve got no business in the workplace if you’re just there to be there. You’ve got to be looking for changes you can make for the benefit of the people who are working there.”
TPS
is often shown (as in the illustration for this article) as being made up of 2
parts, continuous improvement and respect for people. The interesting thing
here is that these 2 parts are actually unequal in size (here I am referencing Toyota’s
own publication “the Toyota way” of 2001). The dominant part is respect for
people.
When
Lean fails it is almost always due to the lack of understanding or even an
attempt at improving in this area. In fact, most Lean transformational attempts
completely ignore this most important part of a Lean management system in
favour of a quick application of the Lean toolset , which all fall into the
continuous improvement side of Lean. The reason for this is that tool
application is easy, the results are obvious and ROI can be reported against.
It results in changes happening without people within the business having to
change their behaviour i.e. they can continue to demonstrate a blatant
disregard for respect for people as has been built into traditional,
transactional leadership styles. The result is that benefits are short lived
and eventually any benefit that was gained is lost by the collapse of the
system.
On
the other hand those organisations that make an effort to understand respect
for people (and it will take some effort) and facilitate changes in their
people’s behaviour to demonstrate this respect, whilst at the same time
carefully facilitating the introduction of the tools, to develop their peoples
knowledge and understanding, will witness a slower uptake of the system and a
slower ROI but over time the system will grow and sustain and the application
of the PDCA cycle (continuous improvement cycle) will pick up momentum, soon
overtaking the level of benefit that the first scenario could ever achieve.
9.
A new way
of doing business.
“The key to the Toyota Way and what makes Toyota stand out is not any of the individual elements - but what is important is having all the elements together as a system. It must be practiced every day in a very consistent manner, not in spurts.”
To
be successful with Lean an organisation will need to be brave, have a certain
amount of faith and understand that every assumption, process, practice and
behaviour, regardless of how deeply rooted in the business it is, will be
challenged. The old way will need to be uprooted and thrown away and Lean
developed and nurtured to take its place. Lean is not a tool, it is not a tool
kit it is an entire Leadership, management and production system. It has to be
the only system as it will not gel with anything else. You have to undertake
the effort wholeheartedly with open eyes and an open mind. Do that and the
sky’s the limit.
10. People reliant.
“Why not make the work easier and more interesting so that people do not have to sweat?The Toyota style is not to create results by working hard. It is a system that says there is no limit to people's creativity. People don't go to Toyota to 'work' they go there to 'think'”
NO
BLAME!
Lean
requires that everybody across the organisation is engaged, it requires that
everybody understands and demonstrates respect for people. There is an
expectation in Lean organisations that those that add value, understand their
processes best and Leaders are there to support the removal of anything that doesn’t
add value. When problems occur it is the value adding people that are expected
to resolve those issues with the support of the leaders. Value adding team
members are expected to improve their processes and identify and remove waste,
again with support. The first time you hang blame on a person as the result of
an issue or problem will be the last time they partake in the system. Lean
leaders focus on systems and processes and if there is a problem then it is
because the process is not fit for purpose or has malfunctioned and has let
down the team. The leader has to take ownership of this, thank people for
giving them the opportunity to improve and work with their people to rectify
the issue.
·
Management led improvement activities are part of TPS
and are known as Jishuken these activities are distinct from kaizen
improvement.
This week’s questions:
1. Which of the
above mentioned issues are you currently guilty of?
2. What can and
will you do towards changing this situation?
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