Tips for Lean Managers Archives | Page 21 of 22

The Power of Mapping

By Jon Miller - March 14th, 2005

Iain Johnstone Operations Consultant During a recent trip to a client, myself and a team of 5 from various manufacturing departments began mapping the first three weeks of their build process. The product is very complex and labor inte

The Four Elements for Sustaining Kaizen

By Jon Miller - February 19th, 2005

One of the most frequent questions we encounter form our customers and prospects is the issue of how to sustain the gains made through kaizen and other continuous improvement efforts. In a recent discussion among our consultants, we ca

Value Stream Maps & Right Brain Thinking

By Jon Miller - February 6th, 2005

With the increasing commitment of major firms to TPS-based Lean initiatives, Value Stream Maps are increasingly becoming items seen in board rooms as well as kaizen team rooms. George David, Chairman and CEO of United Technologies is s

Genchi Gembutsu

By Jon Miller - January 11th, 2005

As we being a new year, there have been humbling reminders of one of the fundamentals of the Toyota way, namely Genchi Gembutsu. In short this means “go to the actual scene (genchi) and confirm the actual happenings or things (ge

TPM Metrics & Financial Impact

By Jon Miller - November 17th, 2004

What metrics are available when utilizing TPM to show the financial impact of your program? During a recent kaizen event, we reviewed the TPM program for one of our clients. The Operations Manager raised a good question regarding TPM m

Ownership Generates Success

By Jon Miller - November 12th, 2004

Bear McLaughlin, Operations Consultant October, 2004 During my journeys of training Office and Manufacturing Lean tools and techniques, I致e come across the same key in any business environment, OWNERSHIP, no ownership, means no succe

The Toyota Job Description: Follow Standards & Find Better Ways

By Jon Miller - October 19th, 2004

The Toyota managers who share their insights with us on our study missions to Japan tell us there are two things that are part of every Toyota employee’s job. They are: 1) Follow the standard 2) Find a better way Kaizen: The Powe

Selling Autonomous Maintenance to the Machine Operator

By Jon Miller - October 18th, 2004

A client of ours has recently begun implementing TPM (Total Productive Maintenance) as the natural next step in their Lean journey. Their goals were to lengthen mean time between failures (MTBF) as well as replace time spent on reactiv

Why Kaizen Teams Should Be Cross-Functional

By Jon Miller - October 1st, 2004

The rule of thumb to have a good mix of kaizen team members from different areas is: 1/3rd of the people from the area or process targeted for kaizen, 1/3rd of the people from upstream or downstream processes (customers and suppliers)

Kaizen: Start with Production or “The Office”?

By Jon Miller - September 24th, 2004

Most Lean transformations and kaizen programs start at the Gemba (workplace, actual place where value is created) which for manufacturers is the factory. A question Lean Champions often come across is “Why are we starting kaizen

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