September 2005 | Gemba Academy

Gemba Keiei, Chapter 8: Limited Volume Production is to Produce at Low Cost

By Jon Miller - September 30th, 2005

The title for this chapter is awkward in English. It comes from the problem of trying to translate the nuances of Japanese words that have the same sounds but different meaning due to an intentional replacement of one of the kanji (Chi

Virtual JKE – Final Entry

By Jon Miller - September 29th, 2005

Kent Bradley VP, North America “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” — Confucius “Sometimes you don’t know what you’ve seen ’til you get back home.” –Luke Frida

Ford Adopts Toyota-style Supplier Strategy

By Jon Miller - September 29th, 2005

There’s good news today from the Ford Motor Company. The September 29, 2005 WSJ article “Ford Seeks Big Savings By Overhauling Supply System: No. 2 Auto Maker Will Offer Larger and Longer Contracts But Use Fewer Companies&#

Virtual JKE Day Five

By Jon Miller - September 28th, 2005

Kent Bradley VP, North America As someone who only recently joined the consulting world after 25 years directing manufacturing, assembly, and distribution operations, I can say with absolute conviction that I have never seen a lean ass

Virtual JKE Day Four

By Jon Miller - September 27th, 2005

Kent Bradley VP, North America It is Wednesday night in Tokyo, after another long day on the Gemba Research JKE tour. Today we visited Hokuetsu Industries, which owns about 10% of the global market for industrial air compressors and ha

Sitting Work vs. Standing Work in a Lean Manufacturing Workplace

By Jon Miller - September 27th, 2005

I recently spent 3 days standing on the shop floor while leading a training event for future kaizen facilitators. I spent probably 8.5 hours per day standing, 60 minutes sitting (lunch, breaks), and 30 minutes walking around the 100 sq

Virtual JKE Day Three

By Jon Miller - September 26th, 2005

Kent Bradley VP, North America Day three on the Gemba road was long, hot, and fascinating. We were on our way to catch the bullet train for Denso before 7:00. On the way, we took the usual opportunity to go over what we would be seeing

Virtual JKE Part Two

By Jon Miller - September 20th, 2005

Kent Bradley VP, North America Day 2, the first real day of our Gemba Research Japan Kaikaku Experience tour. “Going to the gemba” is the whole point of this tour – to be the best requires going to see the best. Today

Virtual JKE

By Jon Miller - September 14th, 2005

A key aspect of our work here at Gemba is the Japan Kaikaku Experience. We take business leaders to Japan to see the world’s best practitioners of lean. This week, Kent Bradley, on his second tour of Japan, will share his experie

Postal Service Provides Model for Lean Government

By Jon Miller - September 10th, 2005

It would be easy to point out how non-Lean the U.S. government has been at city, state and federal levels these last few weeks. We’ve seen examples of lack of decision making, poor logistics, lack of alignment of goals, poor comm

Month: September 2005