The Kaizen Audit Form is one of the sustaining tools used to lock kaizen gains in place. It is very easy to backslide after a project when there is no process in place to keep people from reverting to old methods of work. Get Our Kaizen Audit Form for FREE The Kaizen Audit Form records the results of the 30, 60, and 90-day audits. The review team should consist of the original leadership of the Read more…
Interruptions plague workers, especially in the office. This simple log lets employees gain a better understanding of how much time they lose due to interruptions. It also helps them understand, and resolve, the root cause of the interruptions. Get Our Interruption Log for FREE
The FMEA Worksheet (Failure Mode and Effects Analysis) supports the process of managing the risk associated with product or process failures. Traditionally an engineering tool, the FMEA Worksheet is also useful when assessing the risk of a Lean project. Watch Our FMEA Video The basic steps to using the FMEA Worksheet are: Identify all failure modes. Consider the root causes. Assess the risk of the failure (severity, occurrences, and detection). Create an RPN (risk priority Read more…
The Countermeasure Sheet is a form used to track the actions necessary to get a KPI metric or other goal back on track. The basic steps to using the Countermeasure Sheet are: Fill out the header information. Create a problem statement. Do your homework and provide the background information. Do the gap analysis and identify the root causes. Identify actions to correct the root causes. Do your countermeasure accounting, and make sure the actions will Read more…
The 5 Whys form is a simple tool that helps improvement teams find the root cause of a problem. This simple form documents the problem solver’s progress. Velaction’s version of the 5 Whys template adds in a unique feature: the confirmation step. One of the drawbacks of the 5 Whys is its limited use of data. The confirmation step requires the problem solver or team to consider whether the presumed cause needs confirmation, and what Read more…
Unless specifically identified otherwise, the free forms listed on this site are free to registered users. 1. The forms available without registration may not be modified in any way. You are, however, free to post them online or redistribute them in any manner, as long as the original file is not altered in any way. This includes, but is not limited to, leaving all brand identifiers and links in their original condition. You may not receive Read more…
SI.com recently ran an article about the ‘interception ladder’. It looked back at playoff games since 1970, and found an interesting statistic. With each interception a team throws (accidentally throwing to the guys in the wrong jersey) the chance that the team won dropped. Now, this is a classic case of confusing correlation with causation. If this data truly was a cause and effect relationship, meaning interceptions caused losses, fixing the problem would be simple, Read more…
Inspection and quality go together, right? Wrong! Conventional wisdom holds that inspection and quality go together like those other famous partnerships in the title. After all, there are mountains of books on how to create sampling plans to check quality with inspections, and nobody blinks an eye when there is an end-of-line inspection station set up. The truth, though, is that we should be looking at the need for an inspection as a giant red Read more…
As I was packing to get ready for a training session, I came across a new dilemma. I recently switched back to using an electric razor. As I was contemplating where to pack it, it brought me back to a time, years ago, when I was a young lieutenant in the army. I had an electric razor packed up in my kit bag thrown on the floor of my tank. While we were off in Read more…
A kaizen charter is a form that lays out the scope and goals of a rapid improvement project. Get Our Kaizen Charter Form for FREE The kaizen charter is a living document that evolves throughout the planning process. It establishes the team, and scopes the project, setting the goals and boundaries.
I am an aspiring golfer who plays less than half a dozen rounds of golf a year. (My translation of aspiring means I have been golfing for a long time without any real improvement.) To gain some perspective about my skills, the average golf score in the US right now is around a hundred. My average is a little higher than that-I’d guess it is somewhere around 105 or so. There is one thing I Read more…
When planning a kaizen event, I use a trick to judge how well a leader knows his or her processes. I simply ask for a list of the cycle times. If the times all end in nice, neat numbers (:00, :15, :30, :45), I know they are just estimates, and there is almost a guarantee that a thorough time study has never been done. I had a thought that I don’t tend to hold people Read more…