Lean & Six Sigma

The bedrock to a successful Lean Implementation is alignment of the strategic aims of the business with both the processes and people that perform daily tasks.

These cannot be done in isolation, there has to be a systematic approach to implementing change for the whole to improve.

The Lean Strategy will be intrinsically linked to the overall business strategy and the 2 are woven together during the Hoshin Kanri / Policy deployment in the early stages.

‘Hoshin Kanri, also known as policy deployment, is a systematic process for tackling long-term strategic goals through day-to-day operations, built-in review processes, and training activities that support continuous improvement’

Once the policy has been agreed and communicated there is a well-trodden path to execution.

• Identify value streams and where value is created
• Build ‘standard work’ for all tasks
• Design the optimum production flows (specific to your product)
• Develop Pull production systems (streamline flow and minimise WIP)
• Employee led Continuous Improvement (CI)

On the face of it, strategic development, Hoshin Kanri, policy deployment are quite straight forward. Keeping the focus and detail as you try to write it all down and communicate the vision clearly requires a level of experience and ‘been there, done that’.

Chasm have and bought t-shirt.

There are a variety of tool we use to understand process flow(s) and depending on the complexity of the process, the needs of the customer, or the level of understanding required will use the relevant tool for the job.

Process Stapling: involves spending time in the workplace seeing how things are done. The most basic level of process understanding will (usually) involve the use of post it notes or actual copies of paperwork to model the flow.

Follow up activity will involve a critique of the process to determine what, if any, changes could be made to the process.

At it’s basic level there will be very little in terms if step timings or Value Added measurement, moreso an understanding that changes will make it better.

Process Mapping: a more detailed exercise that will be visually represented with a flow chart using start / stop, process steps and decision boxes. The process map will have significantly more detail in terms of value added activity, and process timings such that balanced decsions can be made on the impact of any changes.

As well as the initial ‘Brown Paper’ process maps, we will devlelop a ‘White Paper’ to-be process as a guide for the future. Actions and activity will be geared around the White Paper requirements.

Value Stream Mapping (VSM):

Blurb

more blurb