A workaround is an unofficial or temporary fix for a problem. In effect, it is an admission that the issue cannot be immediately resolved, and a patchwork fix is put in place. Workarounds are not intended to be permanent fixes but have a tendency to be left in place longer Read more…
For many people, the term “Lean”, immediately brings to mind Lean manufacturing and images of the shop floor. While it is true that the origin of Lean certainly stems from these roots, continuous improvement principles have taken hold in the office, and are spreading at breakneck speed. The Lean office Read more…
Taiichi Ohno divided waste up into seven forms. Since then, there have been several other versions of the categories of waste (CLOSED MITT, for example). As a refresher…. The Categories of Waste Defects Overprocessing Transportation Motion Waiting Inventory Overproduction Why the Categories of Waste Don’t Matter Breaking waste into categories Read more…
The waste recording form is a simple tool for documenting waste during a process walk. The observer focuses on identifying the wasteful activities a person is performing and records them on the form. The form will usually contain a place to categorize the waste. Waste reduction is a large part Read more…
SMED means “single minute exchange of die”. It is one of the great enablers of Lean manufacturing for the simple reason that it reduces batch sizes. Simply put, when changeover takes a long time, a machine that makes many parts needs to run big batches all at once to be Read more…
Henry Ford (July 30, 1863 – April 7, 1947) is the founder of Ford Motor Company and the man most widely known as the inventor of the moving assembly line. While the first is true, the second common belief is a bit inaccurate. Ford actually popularized the moving assembly line; Read more…
Setup reduction is the act of lowering the time it takes to switch from one product to another. In a traditional manufacturer, the switching time (changeover) is long. As a result, if they do more than an occasional switch, they run out of production time. So, they produce long runs Read more…
The DMAIC cycle takes the DMAIC process one step further. It links the end of one project, the Control step, to the beginning of the next one (the Define step). The rationale behind linking DMAIC cycles together makes a lot of sense. When controls are applied to processes, deviations become Read more…
The define step of DMAIC is where the problem statement is created, the project is scoped, and the team is formed. The define step lays the foundation for the success of the project. A central part of the define step is to build a business case. That simply means gaining Read more…
The control step of the DMAIC process is where changes are locked in place. The control step requires a system to measure the performance of the new process to ensure it is performing as expected. The full DMAIC process is: Define Measure Analyze Improve Control Without the control step, there Read more…