May 2006 | Page 2 of 3 | Gemba Academy

Gemba Keiei Chapter 21: Rationalization is Doing What is Rational

By Jon Miller - May 15th, 2006

The title of this chapter is somewhat awkward. By another translation you could read it as “Improvement means doing what is rational” or “Kaizen means following reason”. But here Taiichi Ohno is engaging in a bi

Five Practical Ways to Stay on the Sunny Side of Lean

By Jon Miller - May 12th, 2006

It’s not easy to read so much about the dark side of Lean. I’ve received e-mails this week from readers who are upset that I would post attacks on Lean manufacturing and kaizen. It’s no fun to learn terrible things about your fav

Interview with Darius Mehri, Author of “Notes from Toyota-land”

By Jon Miller - May 11th, 2006

Today we continue exploring the dark side of Lean as we interview Darius Mehri, author of Notes from Toyota-land. Darius is an American who spent three years working as an engineer in Japan at a Toyota group company. He changed the nam

Juxtaposition of an efficient assembly line and stressed workers

Lean Production Does Not Respect People

By Jon Miller - May 10th, 2006

Many of those exposing the dark side of Lean production take aim at “Lean production” as defined in the book The Machine that Changed the World. This book compares the Japanese and U.S. automotive industries and identifies best pra

Kanban cards in a flow with people represented on the cards

Human Kanban

By Jon Miller - May 9th, 2006

Kanban is a material and information flow management tool. They are typically cards attached to containers of parts. The cards contain information about the parts and these cards are reused, traveling with parts. Kanban are used to con

War, Oil and Lean Production

By Jon Miller - May 8th, 2006

Each day this week we will examine aspects of The Dark Side of Lean. Today’s theme is “War, Oil and Lean Production” – admittedly an extreme Left perspective based on Marxist thought and the examination of a murder-suicide at a

From the Mechanical Side to the Dark Side of Lean…

By Jon Miller - May 5th, 2006

This week started with an article about the top 5 reasons for using 3P. Requests from readers took us deeper into SMED and jidoka – all aspects of Lean manufacturing and machines. Without planning it the theme for the week was the �

The 5 Steps to Building Jidoka Equipment

By Jon Miller - May 4th, 2006

Delving deeper into themes related to Production Preparation Process (3P) today I’ll explain what is meant by the “5 Steps of Jidoka” mentioned number sixteen of the 16 Catch Phrases of 3P. Fist some background on jidoka. Jidoka

Gemba Keiei Chapter 20: What I Learned About Forging Changeover from Toyota do Brasil

By Jon Miller - May 3rd, 2006

Taiichi Ohno begins the chapter by saying “In order to achieve Just in Time you need to solve your changeover problems and reduce lot sizes. Forging processes are the most difficult.” This chapter should really be titled “Toyota

Designing Processes to Fit Lean Manufacturing with the 16 Catch Phrases of 3P

By Jon Miller - May 2nd, 2006

My apologies for introducing a new term with out explaining it yesterday. Thanks for asking Ben. The 16 Catch Phrases of 3P are used as guidelines for designing processes according to Lean manufacturing principles of JIT (Takt, Flow, P

Month: May 2006