"N" Terms from The Continuous Improvement Companion

• Nagara Nagara is a Japanese term meaning 'while doing something'. It simply means to do more than one thing at a time. For example, a two parts may be fitted together as they are clamped into a welding fixture. Or, a person may be able to assemble two parts whil...
• Names Remembering someone’s name tells them that you place value on them as an individual. It shows that you respect them enough to remember who they are. Unfortunately, many, if not most, people have an extremely hard time remembering names of people they see ...
• Negotiation Negotiation is simply the process of discussing something of mutual interest and agreeing to terms. Negotiations typically involve tradeoffs. One side gives something of value to the other site to get something of value in return. Negotiations may be c...
• Net Present Value Net Present Value (NPV) comes from the principle that money today is worth more than money tomorrow. Would you rather have $1,000 today or $1,000 in 5 years? That question is easy to answer. Most people would take the money immediately. What about...
• New Product Developement (NPD) NPD is perhaps the most critical of all business functions. Think of a business like a shark. It has to keep moving forward to stay alive. NPD is the process by which they keep moving forward. Customers get bored with the current product or need a produc...
• Night Shift A night shift is just what it sounds like. It is the second (or third) shift at a facility after the normal day shift ends. A night shift usually exists for one of two reasons. In production environments, a night shift adds capacity. This is very usefu...
• No-No’s of Lean Operations Continuous improvement is as much about not going backward as it is about making progress. Knowing what to avoid is as important as knowing what to do. While many of the items on this list of No-No's won’t derail your Lean efforts, they do act as speed bu...
• Noise (Sound) (+Lean PDF) Noise has a rather significant impact on operations. High levels of noise can cause permanent hearing loss. There are basically two things you can do to avoid the loss of that vital sense: eliminate the noise, or wear appropriate hearing protection. Ther...
• Noise to Constant Sheet The Noise to Constant Sheet is a tool for organizing and prioritizing effort in an improvement project. The first step to creating a consistent, correct output of a process is to reduce variation. This form list the noise in a process-the randomness or un...

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