Kaizen Archives | Page 11 of 12

How to Sustain Kaizen? Follow Up with the Tenacity of the Terminator

By Jon Miller - January 2nd, 2008

Yesterday Mike Wroblewski asked How do we Sustain Kaizen Results? on his blog Got Boondoggle? This is a great topic and one that fits in with the theme of sustainability that is on the minds of lean thinkers like Toyota President Watan

Lean Journey Advice from an Optimistic Hungarian Scientist

By Jon Miller - December 5th, 2007

I spent last week in Hungary on consulting assignment. Several times I heard from the locals, “We Hungarians are a pessimistic people” but they are making slow but steady progress with Lean nonetheless. I was also introduce

Four Things to Do Before Letting the Lean Consultants in the Door

By Jon Miller - November 15th, 2007

We are often asked, “What can we do in the mean time?” when shaking hands on an agreement to begin a Lean consultation with a new client. For most companies that are new to Lean, and even some that have been at it for a whi

What is the Standard?

By Jon Miller - November 6th, 2007

A problem was brought to my attention today. Some of our consultants are not submitting expense reports on time, causing us to be unable to bill clients on time. Simply put, some people are keeping other people from doing their job. Th

Why a Kaizen Newspaper is Called a Kaizen Newspaper

By Jon Miller - November 1st, 2007

The kaizen newspaper is tool used to perform visual management on the process of continuous improvement itself. Many people who have not been introduced to the kaizen newspaper through kaizen events or as part of a program of team-base

Seeing Problems for What they Are, Or Lean Insights from G.K. Chesterton

By Jon Miller - October 25th, 2007

G.K. Chesterton was an extremely clever early 20th century writer who used many twists of phrase to make his points. His style of thinking and the points he makes at times makes me wonder if members of the Toyoda family read and were i

Prioritizing the Elimination of the 7 Types of Waste

By Jon Miller - October 3rd, 2007

Tim Wood helps us remember the 7 types of waste, but he does not teach us about prioritizing the elimination of the 7 types of waste. “TIM WOOD” stands for Transportation, Inventory, Motion, Waiting, Overproduction, Over-pr

Ten Topics for Hansei After Kaizen Event

By Jon Miller - October 2nd, 2007

For better or worse, the 5-day kaizen event is a generally accepted and standard approach for rapid process improvement as part of a Lean implementation. There are both pros and cons to the 5-day kaizen event, of which more later. The

What Are You Building?

By Jon Miller - September 13th, 2007

For those of us who are in manufacturers, or in some way involved in making things or helping others make things, we think in terms of what we build, the materials, tools and processes we use. How would you answer if you were asked

Target, Actual, Please Explain

By Jon Miller - August 24th, 2007

I learned some important lessons today. One which I will share is to never compromise when it comes to placing visual status boards on the shop floor. Visual status boards promote problem solving and kaizen by exposing problems. There

45 Ways to Strengthen Kaizen Habits

By Jon Miller - August 16th, 2007

I have a suspicion that personal productivity bloggers are actually moonlighting Lean people. The 27 great tips to keep your life organized at Zen Habits contain advice familiar to us as one piece flow, bias for action, “zeroR

A Kaizen Team’s Secret Ingredient: Negative People

By Jon Miller - July 22nd, 2007

For many years Toyota people have said “No problem” is a problem (困らない事は困った事だ） so these negative people are a gift, are they not? In fact, you could say that a kaizen team’s secret ingredient i

How Many Ways Can You Do Kaizen at Your Company?

By Jon Miller - June 21st, 2007

The theme of kaizen and the human brain is one of our favorites here at Gemba, and this week’s post by Mike Lopez at the Lean blog takes on the important topics of psychology and Lean. Mike points out that the way in which you do

Want to Learn Kaizen? Forget About It

By Jon Miller - June 13th, 2007

Kaizen starts in the brain, so understanding the working of the brain is essential to doing kaizen better. A June 4, 2007 New Scientist article titled Forgetfulness is a tool of the brain suggests that if we want to learn kaizen, we al

The Top 10 Suggestion System Stumbles and How to Avoid Them

By Jon Miller - June 10th, 2007

Are you looking to implement an organizational suggestion system? Perhaps you already have one in place, but aren’t satisfied with the program? Read on to see our top 10 stumbles to avoid in your own suggestion system programs. T

Putting the Zen Back in Kaizen

By Jon Miller - June 8th, 2007

The “zen” in the word “kaizen” has nothing to do with Zen Buddhism. This is a mistake we often see in books or presentations. Kaizen means continuous improvement, or literally “to change and make good̶

Do Kaizen Like Toyota

By Jon Miller - May 20th, 2007

How do we do kaizen like Toyota? Just the fact that we’re hearing this question more often is a good sign that either a) there is a growing awareness about there being a right way to do kaizen, or b) Toyota’s PR machine is

Warusa Kagen is a Revolution of Awareness

By Jon Miller - May 2nd, 2007

There is a Japanese term that I like but is sadly not used as often as others in the Lean community, and may be indicative of a lack of focus in this key area of awareness. It is warusa kagen (悪さかげん) and means “conditio

How to Use a Kaizen Newspaper

By Jon Miller - April 26th, 2007

Chris asked: Are there rules for what goes on a kaizen newspaper so it does not become a massive action item list? A “massive action item list” should be cause for celebration. A full kaizen newspaper is a good thing. The f

How to Get What You Want in Four Easy Steps

By Jon Miller - April 5th, 2007

About 20 years ago in a catchy pop song Joe Jackson said “You can’t get what you want till you know what you want.” I didn’t think much about those words at the time, but these words seem to contain deeper wisdom as the years g

Top 5 Things I’ve Never Heard from a Kaizen Team Member

By Jon Miller - February 28th, 2007

#5. “I’m surprised at how little we got done in four and a half days.” #4. “I have no concerns about these results being sustained.” #3. “Everything went as planned.” #2. “There’s n

When is Point Kaizen OK?

By Jon Miller - December 19th, 2006

Point kaizen refers to small, isolated improvements that are easy to implement quickly. The impact of point kaizens are typically small but they can have a large impact. Point kaizen are in contrast to line kaizen, plane kaizen, cube k

Applying the 80-20 Rule to Kaizen

By Jon Miller - October 3rd, 2006

I’m fond of the 80-20 principle. Any time an understanding of statistics, laws of physics or human biology can make day to day decision making easier, it’s a welcome thing. The same is true in applying the 80-20 rule to kai

Ouch! Change Hurts

By Jon Miller - August 30th, 2006

There’s an interesting article titled The Neuroscience of Leadership in Strategy+Business magazine. Thanks to Kathleen Fasanella for spotting and writing about it on her Fashion Incubator blog. The article has a tempting tagline

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