Sep 9 2015
Toyota’s Japanese documents and their English versions often mean different things. Recently, looking at the Japanese version of The Toyota Way 2001, I was surprised to find that what is translated into English as “Continuous Improvement” is “Chie to Kaizen” (知恵と改善), which means “Wisdom and Continuous Improvement.” In the English version, “Wisdom” was not only dropped from the main header, it appears nowhere.
Sep 7 2015
This is a translation of Bodo Wiegand’s latest newsletter, about Lean in Germany:
I visited a company earlier this week and, as always, first went through the production floor.
The Lean manager led me through the facility. On the first white board he told me proudly, what information is collected and discussed every day. It was professionally designed, clean and clear. For me personally, it was a bit too much information, and not well suited for communication with employees.
Sep 1 2015
Managers’ near universal reaction to the challenge of improvement is that their own operations are already run as effectively and efficiently as possible, given external constraints, including fickle customers, unreliable suppliers, local labor laws, worn-out equipment, a rickety transportation infrastructure, and the weather. The internal problems are so puny compared to the external ones that it would be futile to address them. Who cares about doubling operator productivity when labor costs are 5% of the cost of goods sold? Why should we reduce production lead times to one day when component purchasing lead times are four months?
Aug 25 2015
There is more to playing the piano than practicing scales, but you can’t get there unless you do practice scales. Likewise, there is more to Lean than tools, but you need the tools. They are not sufficient, but they are necessary. Unless you learn them, you are depriving yourself of the benefits of clever tricks, methods, and analytical tools developed over 65 years. Each one doesn’t necessarily take long to learn, but would to reinvent, and you don’t have that time.
Aug 19 2015
Jidoka (自働化) isn’t just “stop and fix” or “stop and call.” It is a complete approach to automation that includes building in the ability of a machine to stop when it malfunctions but also includes many other things. Sakichi Toyoda’s Type-G loom didn’t just stop when the yarn broke, it also had automatic shuttle change, which reduced the need for human intervention in its normal operations, and was a breakthrough that had eluded everybody else.
Sep 15 2015
About Strategy, Tactics, and Lean
Originally “the art of the general,” strategy is about which armies or fleets you deploy where and for what purpose. It goes hand in hand with tactics, which is the way each unit then engages the enemy. Always fond of military metaphors, business people have chosen to use the term”strategy” for their plans and decisions on products or services, markets, promotion methods, technology, organization, and financing. To Harvard Business School’s Michael Porter “the essence of [business] strategy is choosing what not to do.”
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By Michel Baudin • Management 3 • Tags: business strategy, Lean, Lean management, Lean manufacturing, Lean Product Development, Lean Startup, Strategy, Toyota, TPS