Gemba kaizen a commonsense approach to a continuous improvement strategy

SECOND EDITION GEMBA KAIZEN A COMMONSENSE APPROACH TO A CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT STRATEGY Masaaki Imai GEMBAKAIZEN•.

[Audio] Praise for Gemba Kaizen It's exciting to see an updated version of a classic book, Gemba Kaizen, which shares a wealth of new healthcare examples and case studies from around the world. A true sensei and master of kaizen, Mr. Imai shares sage and timeless advice on engaging all team members in process improvements and radical redesigns which are deeply meaningful to all stakeholders. The methods in this book will help you improve quality and safety, reduce waiting times, and improve the long-term financial position of your organization. Highly recommended! —Mark Graban, author of Lean Hospitals and co-author of Healthcare Kaizen Every business faces the iron triangle of quality, cost, and delivery. Conventional thinking claims you cannot have all three. Not only does Mr. Imai turn that thinking on its head, but he shows you in Gemba Kaizen exactly how to do it. —Matthew E. May, author of The Elegant Solution and The Laws of Subtraction Masaaki Imai has done it again. The second edition of his famous book Gemba Kaizen not only describes all the tools necessary for any type of business to implement a lean strategy but also includes a large number of excellent case studies. These show how kaizen can be used to improve hospitals, supermarkets, airport management, a bus line, and even software development. This is a must-read for the leadership of any business. My first exposure to lean [the term hadn't been invented yet, we called it Just-in-Time or the Toyota Production System] was at the beginning of 1982, during my first General Manager job at the General Electric Company. We created a simple kanban system between one of my plants and one of my suppliers. We dropped raw material inventory from 40 days to 3 days and got a lot of unexpected side benefits in the areas of productivity, quality, freed up space, 5S improvements, etc. Professor Schoenburger later did a story on this where he said that this was the first real lean activity at The General Electric Company. In late 1985 I joined the Danaher Company as one of two Group Executives. One of my company presidents, George Koenigsaecker, and I began introducing lean to Danaher in 1986. One of.

[Audio] the things that really helped us improve our knowledge of lean at the time was Masaaki Imai's first book, Kaizen. This was the most definitive work on the subject and was a great help. Imai helped us even more in early 1987 when he ran a seminar in the Hartford, CT area [just down the street from Jake Brake]. Imai used a Japanese consulting firm, Shingijutsu, to help run his seminar and be responsible for the hands-on factory kaizen part of the week. The three principals of Shingijutsu all had spent years working for Taiichi Ohno, the father of the Toyota production system. Koenigsaecker and I agreed that getting Shingijutsu to help us at Danaher would be a home run for us and George worked diligently the rest of the week convincing them. We became their first, and for four years, only American client and our lean knowledge increased dramatically. In 1991, I left Danaher to become CEO of The Wiremold Company, also in the area. I, of course, brought Shingijutsu along with me and by 1996 Masaaki Imai was back in my life as he included a chapter on Wiremold and what we had done in his new book, Gemba Kaizen. We have stayed in touch over the years and Imai has become a true leader in the lean movement throughout the world through his Kaizen institute. He clearly understands that lean is a strategy, not just "some manufacturing thing" and that it can apply to any business. He and I have discussed why is it so difficult for most business leaders to understand this and to embrace lean. Unfortunately there is no simple answer to this other than the fact that most people just don't like to change and implementing lean is massive change (everything has to change) if you are to be successful. This latest edition of Gemba Kaizen goes a long way to helping to solve this problem. First of all, it lays out the lean philosophy and tools in a very simple way so that executives should not only understand them but more importantly, not be afraid to try them. More importantly however, Imai makes the case that lean is a strategy and that it can be applied to any business. His case studies of non-manufacturing companies where lean has had a dramatic impact really help to make the point. Every leader of any type of organization should read this book and follow what it says. —Art Byrne, Operating Partner at J W Childs Associates, LP and author of The Lean Turnaround.

[Audio] Gemba Kaizen. Gemba Kaizen.

[Audio] About the Author More than any other business authority in the world, Masaaki Imai has championed the concept of kaizen over the past three decades in thought, word, and action. Mr. Imai is considered one of the leaders of the quality movement and a pioneer of modern business operational excellence. Mr. Imai is an international lecturer, consultant, and founder of the Kaizen Institute, a leading continuous improvement consultancy with offices worldwide. Mr. Imai's first book, Kaizen—translated into 14 languages—is the reference on the subject. picks up where Kaizen left off, introducing real-world application of continuous process improvement methods in production and service businesses. The second edition is fully revised with brand-new case studies, updated chapters, and current references. In 2010 Mr. Imai was honored for his lifetime of achievement with the first ever Fellowship of the Quality Council of India, the apex quality body of the government of India..

[Audio] Gemba Kaizen A Commonsense Approach to a Continuous Improvement Strategy Masaaki Imai Second Edition New York Chicago San Francisco Lisbon London Madrid Mexico City Milan New Delhi San Juan Seoul Singapore Sydney Toronto.

[Audio] Copyright © 2012, 1997 by the Kaizen Institute, Ltd. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the United States Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher. ISBN: 978-0-07-179036-9 MHID: 0-07-179036-5 The material in this eBook also appears in the print version of this title: ISBN: 978-0-07-179035-2, MHID: 0-07-179035-7. All trademarks are trademarks of their respective owners. Rather than put a trademark symbol after every occurrence of a trademarked name, we use names in an editorial fashion only, and to the benefi t of the trademark owner, with no intention of infringement of the trademark. Where such designations appear in this book, they have been printed with initial caps. McGraw-Hill eBooks are available at special quantity discounts to use as premiums and sales promotions, or for use in corporate training programs. To contact a representative please e-mail us at [email protected]. KAIZEN® and GEMBA KAIZEN® are trademarks of Kaizen Institute, Ltd. Information contained in this work has been obtained by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. ("McGraw-Hill") from sources believed to be reliable. However, neither McGraw-Hill nor its authors guarantee the accuracy or completeness of any information published herein, and neither McGraw-Hill nor its authors shall be responsible for any errors, omissions, or damages arising out of use of this information. This work is published with the understanding that McGraw-Hill and its authors are supplying information but are not attempting to render engineering or other professional services. If such services are required, the assistance of an appropriate professional should be sought. TERMS OF USE This is a copyrighted work and The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. ("McGraw-Hill") and its licensors reserve all rights in and to the work. Use of this work is subject to these terms. Except as permitted under the Copyright Act of 1976 and the right to store and retrieve one copy of the work, you may not decompile, disassemble, reverse engineer, reproduce, modify, create derivative works based upon, transmit, distribute, disseminate, sell, publish or sublicense the work or any part of it without McGraw-Hill's prior consent. You may use the work for your own noncommercial and personal use; any other use of the work is strictly prohibited. Your right to use the work may be terminated if you fail to comply with these terms. THE WORK IS PROVIDED "AS IS." McGRAW-HILL AND ITS LICENSORS MAKE NO GUARANTEES OR WARRANTIES AS TO THE ACCURACY, ADEQUACY OR COMPLETENESS OF OR RESULTS TO BE OBTAINED FROM USING THE WORK, INCLUDING ANY INFORMATION THAT CAN BE ACCESSED THROUGH THE WORK VIA HYPERLINK OR OTHERWISE, AND EXPRESSLY DISCLAIM ANY WARRANTY, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. McGraw-Hill and its licensors do not warrant or guarantee that the functions contained in the work will meet your requirements or that its operation will be uninterrupted or error free. Neither McGraw-Hill nor its licensors shall be liable to you or anyone else for any inaccuracy, error or omission, regardless of cause, in the work or for any damages.

[Audio] vii CONTENTS Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvii About Kaizen Institute. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xix CHAPTER 1 An Introduction to Kaizen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Major Kaizen Concepts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Kaizen and Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Process versus Result . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Following the PDCA/SDCA Cycles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Putting Quality First . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Speak with Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 The Next Process Is the Customer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Major Kaizen Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Total Quality Control/Total Quality Management. . 8 The Just- in-Time Production System . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 Total Productive Maintenance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 Policy Deployment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 The Suggestion System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Small -Group Activities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 The Ultimate Goal of Kaizen Strategy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 CHAPTER 2 Gemba Kaizen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Gemba and Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 The House of Gemba . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ..

[Audio] Find the Root Cause . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 Standardize to Prevent Recurrence . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 Application of the Golden Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33 CHAPTER 3 Quality, Cost, and Delivery at the Gemba. . . . . . . 37 Quality: More Than Just a Result . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 Quality Management at the Gemba . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 Cost Reduction at the Gemba . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 Improve Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 Improving Productivity to Lower Costs . . . . . . . . . . 45 Reduce Inventory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 Shorten the Production Line . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46 Reduce Machine Downtime . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46 Reduce Space . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47 Reduce Lead Time (Throughput Time) . . . . . . . . . 47 Role of the Gemba in Overall Cost Reduction . . . . 48 Delivery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48 Quality Improvement and Cost Reduction Are Compatible . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49 CHAPTER 4 Standards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51 Maintain and Improve Standards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51 Operational Standards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53 Key Features of Standards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 Toyoda.

[Audio] Seiton (Straighten) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72 Seiso (Scrub) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 Seiketsu (Systematize) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 Shitsuke (Standardize) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 Introducing 5S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76 CHAPTER 6 Muda . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 Muda of Overproduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80 Muda of Inventory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82 Muda of Defects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82 Muda of Motion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83 Muda of Processing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83 Muda of Waiting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84 Muda of Transport . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84 Muda of Time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87 Categorizing Muda in the Service Sector . . . . . . . . . . . . 87 Muda, Mura, Muri . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90 Mura (Variation) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90 Muri (Overburden) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90 Removing Muda from Public-Sector.

[Audio] Visual Management with 5S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109 Posting Standards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110 Setting Targets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111 CHAPTER 9 The Supervisors' Roles in the Gemba . . . . . . . . . . 113 Training Within Industries. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113 Managing Input (Manpower, Materials, and Machines) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117 A Day in the Life of a Supervisor at Toyota Motor Manufacturing Kentucky. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120 Morning Market (Asaichi) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126 Best- Line Quality- Assurance Certification . . . . . . . . . 130 Defining Challenges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132 Pseudo managerial Functions of Supervisors in the Gemba . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132 CHAPTER 10 Gemba Managers' Roles and Accountability . . . 135 Kaizen at Toyota Astra Motor Company Role Manuals at TAM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136 TAM Group Leaders' Responsibilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139 TAM Foremen's Responsibilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140 TAM Supervisors' Responsibilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140 Items That Need to Be Managed in the Gemba . . . . . . 141 Group Leaders' Daily Schedule of Activities: Examples from the TAM Manual . . . . . . . . . . . 142 Group Leaders' Activities: Production, Cost, and Quality Examples from the TAM Manual . . . . 143 Foremen's Activities: Cost -Reduction Examples from the TAM Manual . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145 Supervisors' Activities: Personnel and Training Examples from the TAM Manual . . . ..

[Audio] Formal Classroom Training . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150 Voluntary Activities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150 The Identification of Potential Problems . . . . . . . . . . . 150 Hiyari Reports . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150 Training in the Anticipation of Problems . . . . . . . 151 The Benefits of Kaizen at Toyota Astra Motor Company. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151 CHAPTER 11 From Just- In- Time to Total Flow Management . 153 Just-In-Time at Aisin Seiki's Anjo Plant . . . . . . . . . . . 154 Takt Time versus Cycle Time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156 Push Production versus Pull Production . . . . . . . . . . . 157 Establishing Production Flow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158 The Introduction of JIT at Aisin Seiki . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160 The First Step of Kaizen at Aisin Seiki . . . . . . . . . 161 The Second Step of Kaizen at Aisin Seiki . . . . . . . 162 Spreading the Benefits of JIT to Other Industries . . . 163 Total Flow Management. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164 TFM Transformation in Company A . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167 CHAPTER 12 Just -In -Time at Wiremold . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183 CHAPTER 13 The CEO's Role in Kaizen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195 CHAPTER 14 Going to the Gemba . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205 Gemba Kaizen and Overall Corporate Kaizen Two-Day Kaizen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207 Checklists as a Kaizen Tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210 Gemba Kaizen Workshops . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211 Case Studies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217 Lessons from a 20-Year Kaizen Journey . . . . ..

[Audio] Sonae MC: The Silent Revolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239 Surpassing Expectations through Kaizen at Embraco . . 249 Kaizen at Oporto Hospital Centre: Making Patient-Centric Care A Reality . . . . . . . . . . 261 Kaizen Enables Innovation and Customer Intimacy at Densho Engineering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269 Kaizen Enables Innovation and Customer Intimacy . . 273 Cutting Red Tape at a Public Utility: Enexis. . . . . . . . . 275 People Power: Participation Makes the Difference for Electrical Manufacturer in China . . . . . . . . . . . . 279 Rossimoda: Kaizen and Creative Product Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283 Finsa Uses Kaizen to Emerge Stronger from a Crisis . . 293 Innovating with Kaizen at Group Health . . . . . . . . . . . 301 Kaizen Helps Caetano Bus Deliver on Schedule. . . . . . 307 Kenyan Flour Producer Uses Kaizen to Increase Capacity, Improve Efficiency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313 Kaizen as the Foundation for Innovation at Medlog. . 317 Growing with Kaizen at Supremia. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 323 Exceeding Customer Expectations at Walt Disney World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329 Kaizen Experience at Alpargatas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 335 Transforming a Corporate Culture: Excel's Organization for Employee Empowerment . . . . . . 345 Quality in a Medical Context: Inoue Hospital . . . . . . 353 The Journey to Kaizen at Leyland Trucks . . . . . . . . . . 359 Tightening Logistics at Matarazzo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 369 Stamping Out Muda at Sunclipse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 373 Housekeeping, Self- Discipline, and Standards: Tokai Shin ei Electronics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 381 Solving Quality Problems in the Gemba: Safety at Tres Cruces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 389 Glossary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 397 Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ..

[Audio] xiii PREFACE My two books, Kaizen: The Key to Japan's Competitive Success (McGraw Hill, 1986) and Gemba Kaizen: A Commonsense, Low-Cost Approach to Management (McGraw-Hill, 1997) laid the foundation for exploration of kaizen as both a personal philosophy and business improvement system for people outside of Japan. Initially grasped as a set of methods such as total quality control, total productive maintenance, just- in- time management, quality circles, and suggestion systems, the West is ever closer to under standing kaizen for what it truly is: a strategy to win by developing people into problem solvers. The second edition of Gemba Kaizen reveals how kaizen has spread to every continent and culture, met with various unique challenges and demonstrated its success. Gemba means "actual place" or "workplace" in Japanese, and this book gives you a look into more than thirty actual places where kaizen was successfully made a part of the culture. The book explains how to use a commonsense, low -cost approach to managing the work place—the place where value is added—whether that place be the produc tion line, hospital, government department, shopping center, airport, or engineering firm. This is not a book of theory, but a book of action. Its ultimate message is that no matter how much knowledge the reader may gain, it is of no use if it is not put into practice daily. Gemba Kaizen provides not more theoreti cal knowledge, but a simple frame of reference to use in solv ing problems. To that purpose, it provides many checklists, examples, and case studies. The Commonsense, Low- Cost Approach to a Continuous Improvement Strategy Today's managers often try to apply sophisticated tools and technologies to deal with problems that can be solved with a commonsense, low- cost approach. They need to unlearn the habit of trying ever more sophisticated technologies to solve everyday problems. Furthermore, leaders must.

[Audio] xiv | Preface embrace kaizen and business excellence not as a tool or technique but as a never-finished pillar of their strategy. Putting common sense into practice is the subject of this book. It is for everybody: managers, engineers, supervisors, and rank and file employees. Along with putting common sense into practice, Gemba Kaizen deals with the roles of managers and the need to develop a learning organization. I believe that one of the roles of top management should be to challenge all managers to attain ever higher goals. In turn, first-line supervisors need to challenge workers to do a better job all the time. Unfortunately, many managers today have long ceased to play such a role. Another problem besetting most companies today is the tendency to place too much emphasis on teaching knowledge, while disregarding group learning of fundamental values derived from common sense, self- discipline, order, and econo my. Good management should strive to lead the company to learn these values while achieving "lean management." There are two approaches to problem solving. The first involves innovation—applying the latest high -cost technology, such as state- of- the art computers and other tools, and investing a great deal of money. The second uses commonsense tools, checklists, and techniques that do not cost much money. This approach is called kaizen. Kaizen involves everybody— starting with the CEO in the organization—planning and working together for success. This book will show how kaizen can achieve significant improve ment as an essential building block that prepares the company for truly rewarding accomplishments. Back to Basics: Housekeeping, Muda Elimination, and Standardization During the past 27 years since Kaizen was first published, many have looked for and asked "what is next?" but many times they are overlooking what is directly in front of them. We must go back to the basics and ask how well we have kept a steady, long-term focus on kaizen. Everyone in the company must work together to follow three ground rules for practicing kaizen in the gemba: ▲ Housekeeping ▲ Muda elimination.

[Audio] Preface | xv ▲ Standardization Housekeeping is an indispensable ingredient of good man agement. Through good housekeeping, employees acquire and practice self -discipline. Employees without self-discipline make it impossible to provide products or services of good quality to the customer. In Japanese, the word muda means waste. Any activity that does not add value is muda. People in the gemba either add value or do not add value. This is also true for other resources, such as machines and materials. Suppose a company's employees are adding nine parts muda for every one part value. Their productivity can be doubled by reducing muda to eight parts and increasing the added value to two parts. Muda elimination can be the most cost-effective way to improve productivity and reduce operating costs. Kaizen emphasizes the elimination of muda in the gemba rather than the increasing of investment in the hope of adding value. A simple example illustrates the cost benefits of kaizen. Suppose that operators assembling a household appliance are standing in front of their workstations to put certain parts into the main unit. The parts for assembly are kept in a large con tainer behind the operators. The action of turning around to pick up a part takes an operator five seconds, while actual assembly time is only two seconds. Now let's assume the parts are placed in front of the oper ator. The operator simply extends his or her arms forward to pick up a part—an action that takes only a second. The opera tors can use the time saved to concentrate on the (value- adding) assembly. A simple change in the location of the parts—eliminating the muda involved in the action of reach ing behind—has yielded a four -second time gain that trans lates into a three fold increase in productivity! Such small improvements in many processes gradually accumulate, leading to significant quality improvement, cost benefits, and productivity improvements. Applying such an approach throughout all management activities, especially at top management levels, gradually achieves a just -in time, lean management system by teaching people the skills to see their work in a new way and by teaching them the skills to change how they work. By contrast, management primarily focused on innovation and breakthroughs might be inclined to buy software, equipment or capabilities that would enable the organization to perform their work much faster. But this would not elimi nate the muda inherent in the current system. Furthermore,.

[Audio] investing in the new device or capability costs money, while eliminating muda costs nothing. We must innovate, but on a foundation of kaizen. The case study from Densho Engineering and others in this book reveal how this is done. The third ground rule of kaizen practices in the gemba is stan dardization. Standards may be defined as the best way to do the job. For products or services created as a result of a series of processes, a certain standard must be maintained at each process in order to assure quality. Maintaining standards is a way of assuring quality at each process and preventing the recurrence of errors. As a general rule of thumb, introducing good housekeep ing in the gemba reduces the failure rate by 50 percent, and stan dardization further reduces the failure rate by 50 percent of the new figure. Yet many managers elect to introduce statisti cal process control and control charts in the gemba without mak ing efforts to clean house, eliminate muda, or standardize. Supporting these rules of kaizen is the foundation of the house of gemba—namely, the use of such human-centered activ ities as learning together, teamwork, morale enhancement, self -discipline, quality circles, and suggestions. These are all methods not only for generating improve ments in safety, quality and cost, but positive means to kaizen and develop our people. Management (especially Western management) must regain the power of common sense and start applying it in the gemba. These low- cost practices will provide management with the opportunity for a future phase of rapid growth via innovation—something Western management excels at. When Western management combines kaizen with its innovative ingenuity, it will greatly improve its competitive strength. MASAAKI IMAI Tokyo xvi | Preface.

[Audio] ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The first edition of Gemba Kaizen was born out of 10 years of teaching kaizen, following the publication of my book Kaizen: The Key to Japan's Competitive Success in 1986. The second edition of Gemba Kaizen comes 15 years after the original publication, and much has changed in the world. I have been fortunate to see the transforming effect of kaizen on people and organizations worldwide over the past three decades. I wish to recognize and thank everyone who has taken up kaizen. The many cases and explanations of kaizen which are documented in this second edition are the fruits of the many workers, engineers, administrators, nurses, officials, managers and professionals who practice continuous improvement and were engaged in gemba kaizen at our clients' sites around the world. This book is truly a result of teamwork, collaboration and the kaizen spirit at work. I would like to thank those people who assisted in writing the cases in the first edition of this book. They include Kevin Meyer of Specialty Silicone, and Arthur Byrne of J.W. Childs, Inc., Iwao Sumoge of Densho Engineering, Joao-Paulo Oliveira of Bosch, Natacha Muro and Fernando Coletti of La Buenos Aires, Nestor Herrerra of Molinos Rio de la Plata, Gary Buchanan and Valerie Oberle of Disney University, Darla Hastings of Quality Inc., Shoji Shiratori of Aisin Seiki, and Yutaka Mori of Toyoda Automatic Loom Works as well as Yoshikazu Sano and Katsuo Inoue of Toyoda Machine Works. Besides those whose names appear in the book, I am particu larly indebted to Professor Zenjiro Sawada at Kurume University, who gave me the inspiration for the House of Gemba Management through his book Visual Control of Factory Management (published in English in 1991 from Nikkan Kogyo Shinbun); Ichiro Majima, Dean of Faculty of Business Administration of Miyazaki Sangyo Keiei University, who provid ed much valuable information in writing this book; Kaizen con sultants Kenji Takahashi, Yukio Kakiuchi, and many others who worked together with us in giving many gemba kaizen sessions at the clients' sites around the world. xvii.

[Audio] Once again I am deeply indebted to my colleagues at the Kaizen Institute since their work has made it possible to advance the ideas from my books into actual practice. I would like to thank those who led the efforts to document their experiences and the stories of our customers, including Antonio Costa, Daniel Simoes, Vinod Grover, Sebastian Reimer, Jayanth Murthy, Bruno Fabiano, David Lu, Mike Wroblewski, Julien Bratu, Jefferson Escobar, Aakash Borse, Chris Schrandt, John Verhees, Wijbrand Medendorp, Brad Schmidt, Ruy Cortez, Alexandra Caramalho, and Euclides Coimbra. I would like to thank Jon Miller for managing this book project. I must thank Jacob Stoller of StollerStrategies for bringing his editorial, journalistic, and creative skills, which were essential to the successful completion of this project. I wish to thank my wife Noriko for her patience and for accompanying me on my travels around the world; also to those who assisted in the making of this book, in particular Patty Wallenburg of TypeWriting for the compo si tion, and from McGraw-Hill, Pamela Pelton and David Fogarty for the production, and Judy Bass, who provided the spark for making the second edition of this book a reality. xviii | Acknowledgments.

[Audio] xix ABOUT KAIZEN INSTITUTE Founded by Masaaki Imai in 1985, Kaizen Institute is the pioneer and global leader in promoting the spirit and practice of kaizen. Its global team of professionals is dedicated to building a world where it is possible for every one, everywhere, every day is able to "kaizen it." Kaizen Institute guides organizations (public and private) to achieve higher levels of performance in the global marketplace—easier, faster, better, and with lower costs. Kaizen Institute experts challenge clients to help develop leaders capable of sustaining continuous improvement in all aspects of their enterprise, which ultimately leads into Kaizen Institute's vision of a worldwide community of practice in kaizen. Major services of Kaizen Institute, include, but are not limited to: ▲ Consulting and Implementation ▼ Partnering with clients for long-term kaizen implementation ▼ Operating system design and deployment ▼ Breakthrough projects and turnarounds ▲ Education, Training, and Events ▼ Business training, academic, and online training curriculum design ▼ Kaizen practitioner, coach, and manager level certification ▼ On/off-site training, workshops, seminars, corporate events, and leadership sessions ▲ Tours and Benchmarking ▼ "Kaikaku" benchmark to best-in-class organizations in Japan and around the world ▼ Building peer-to-peer learning and tour exchange network Visit www.kaizen.com to learn more about kaizen and the worldchanging purpose of Kaizen Institute..

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[Audio] Gemba Kaizen. Gemba Kaizen.

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[Audio] 1 CHAPTER ONE An Introduction to Kaizen Since 1986 when the book Kaizen: The Key to Japan's Competitive Success was published, the term kaizen has come to be accepted as one of the key concepts of management. In the first decade of the twenty-first century as the Toyota Motor Company surpassed General Motors to become the top automotive manufacturer in the world, awareness of the vital difference played by kaizen in Toyota's success also increased. Today, organizations worldwide from manufacturers, to hospitals, to banks, to software developers, to governments are making a difference by adopting kaizen philosophies, mind-sets, and methodologies. Even though the names of these strategies may change over the decades from continuous quality improvement and total quality management, to just-in-time and operational excellence, to six sigma and lean manufacturing, the most successful of these strategies are customer-focused, gemba-oriented, and kaizen-driven. The 1993 edition of the New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary recognized the word kaizen* as an English word. The dictionary defines kaizen as "continuous improvement of working practices, personal effi ciency, etc., as a business philosophy." Readers who are unfamiliar with kaizen may find it helpful to begin with a brief summary of the concepts of kaizen. For those who are already familiar with kaizen, this chapter may serve as a review. In Japanese, kaizen means "continuous improvement." The word implies improvement that involves everyone—both man agers and workers—and entails relatively little expense. The kaizen philosophy assumes that our way *Kaizen Institute AG has exclusive right to the use of kaizen®, as well as gemba kaizen®, as trademarks registered in major countries of the world..

[Audio] 2 | Chapter 1 An Introduction to Kaizen of life—be it our work ing life, our social life, or our home life—should focus on con stant improvement efforts. This concept is so natural and obvi ous to many Japanese that they don't even realize they possess it! In my opinion, kaizen has contributed greatly to Japan's competitive success. Although improvements under kaizen are small and incre mental, the kaizen process brings about dramatic results over time. The kaizen concept explains why companies cannot remain static for long in Japan. Western management, mean while, worships innovation: major changes in the wake of tech nological breakthroughs and the latest management concepts or production techniques. Innovation is dramatic, a real attention-getter. Kaizen, on the other hand, is often undramatic and subtle. But innovation is one- shot, and its results are often prob lematic, whereas the kaizen process, based on commonsense and low -cost approaches, ensures incremental progress that pays off in the long run. Kaizen is also a low- risk approach. Managers always can go back to the old way without incurring large costs. Most "uniquely Japanese" management practices, such as total quality control (TQC) or companywide quality control and quality circles, and our style of labor relations can be reduced to one word: kaizen. Using the term kaizen in place of such buzzwords as productivity, total quality control (TQC), zero defects (ZDs), just- in- time (JIT), and the suggestion system paints a clearer picture of what has been going on in Japanese industry. Kaizen is an umbrella concept for all these practices. However, I has ten to add that these practices are not necessarily confined to Japanese management but rather should be regarded as sound principles to be applied by managers everywhere. By following the right steps and applying the processes properly, any compa ny, no matter what its nationality, can benefit from kaizen. The widespread acceptance of kaizen into management thinking, including the successes of Kaizen Institute clients in more than 50 countries, bears this out. Major Kaizen Concepts Management must learn to implement certain basic concepts and systems in order to realize kaizen strategy: ▲ Kaizen and management ▲ Process versus result.

[Audio] Major Kaizen Concepts | 3 ▲ Following the plan- do-check-act (PDCA)/standardize-do-check-act (SDCA) cycles ▲ Putting quality first ▲ Speak with data. ▲ The next process is the customer. By way of introduction, top management must put forth a very careful and very clear policy statement. It then must establish an implementation schedule and demonstrate lead ership by practicing a kaizen procedure within its own ranks. Kaizen and Management In the context of kaizen, management has two major functions: mainten ance and improvement (see Figure 1.1). Maintenance refers to activities directed toward maintaining current techno logical, managerial, and operating standards and upholding such standards through training and discipline. Under its maintenance function, management performs its assigned tasks so that everybody can follow standard operating proce dures (SOPs). Improvement, meanwhile, refers to activities directed toward elevating current standards. The Japanese view of management thus boils down to one precept: Maintain and improve standards. As Figure 1. 2 shows, improvement can be classified as either kaizen or innovation. Kaizen signifies small improve ments as a result of ongoing efforts. Innovation involves a drastic improvement as a result of a large investment of resources in new technology or equipment. (Whenever money is a key fac tor, innovation is expensive.) Because of their fascination Figure 1.1 Japanese perceptions of job functions. Improvement Maintenance Top management Middle management Supervisors Workers.

[Audio] 4 | Chapter 1 An Introduction to Kaizen with innovation, Western managers tend to be impatient and over look the long -term benefits kaizen can bring to a company. Kaizen, on the other hand, emphasizes human efforts, morale, communication, training, teamwork, involvement, and self -dis cipline—a commonsense, low- cost approach to improvement. Process versus Result Kaizen fosters process- oriented thinking because processes must be improved for results to improve. Failure to achieve planned results indicates a failure in the process. Management must identify and correct such process- based errors. Kaizen focuses on human efforts—an orientation that contrasts sharply with the results- based thinking in the West. A process-oriented approach also should be applied in the intro duction of the various kaizen strategies: the plan- do-check-act (PDCA) cycle; the standardize-do-check-act (SDCA) cycle; quality, cost, and delivery (QCD); total quality manage ment (TQM); just-in-time (JIT); and total productive maintenance (TPM). Kaizen strategies have failed many companies simply because they ignored process. The most crucial element in the kaizen pro cess is the commitment and involvement of top man agement. It must be demonstrated immediately and consistent ly to ensure success in the kaizen process. Following the PDCA/SDCA Cycles The first step in the kaizen process establishes the plan- do- check-act (PDCA) cycle as a vehicle that ensures the continu ity of kaizen in pursuing a policy Figure 1.2 Improvement broken down into innovation and kaizen. Kaizen Maintenance Innovation Top management Middle management Supervisors Workers.

[Audio] of maintaining and improving standards. It is one of the most important concepts of the process (see Figure 1. 3). Plan refers to establishing a target for improvement (since kaizen is a way of life, there always should be a target for improvement in any area) and devising action plans to achieve that target. Do refers to implementing the plan. Check refers to determining whether the implementation remains on track and has brought about the planned improvement. Act refers to performing and standardizing the new procedures to prevent recurrence of the original problem or to set goals for the new improvements. The PDCA cycle revolves continuously; no sooner is an improvement made than the resulting status quo becomes the target for further improvement. PDCA means never being satisfied with the status quo. Because employees prefer the status quo and frequently do not have initiative to improve conditions, management must initiate PDCA by establishing continuously challenging goals. In the beginning, any new work process is unstable. Before one starts working on PDCA, any current process must be sta bilized in a process often referred to as the standardize- do- check- act (SDCA) cycle (see Figure 1. 4). Every time an abnormality occurs in the current process, the following questions must be asked: Did it happen because we did not have a standard? Major Kaizen Concepts | 5 Figure 1. 3 The plan- do- check- act (PDCA) cycle. Improvement A P C D Plan Do Act Check.

[Audio] Did it happen because the stan dard was not followed? Or did it happen because the standard was not adequate? Only after a standard has been established and followed, stabilizing the current process, should one move on to the PDCA cycle. Thus the SDCA cycle standardizes and stabilizes the current process es, whereas the PDCA cycle improves them. SDCA refers to maintenance, and PDCA refers to improvement; these become the two major responsibilities of management. Putting Quality First Of the primary goals of quality, cost, and delivery (QCD), quality always should have the highest priority. No matter how attrac tive the price and delivery terms offered to a customer, the company will not be able to compete if the product or service lacks quality. Practicing a quality -first credo requires manage ment commitment because managers often face the tempta tion to make compromises in meeting delivery requirements or cutting costs. In so doing, they risk sacrificing not only quality but also the life of the business. 6 | Chapter 1 An Introduction to Kaizen Figure 1 .4 The standardize- do- check- act (SDCA) cycle. Maintenance A S C D Standardize Do Act Check.

[Audio] Speak with Data Kaizen is a problem -solving process. In order for a problem to be correctly understood and solved, the problem must be recog nized and the relevant data gathered and analyzed. Trying to solve a problem without hard data is akin to resorting to hunch es and feelings—not a very scientific or objective approach. Collecting data on the current status helps you to understand where you are now focusing; this serves as a starting point for improvement. Collecting, verifying, and analyzing data for improvement is a theme that recurs throughout this book. The Next Process Is the Customer All work is a series of processes, and each process has its sup plier as well as its customer. A material or a piece of informa tion provided by process A (supplier) is worked on and improved in process B and then sent on to process C. The next process always should be regarded as a customer. The axiom "the next process is the customer" refers to two types of customers: internal (within the company) and external (out in the market). Most people working in an organization deal with internal customers. This realization should lead to a commitment never to pass on defective parts or inaccurate pieces of information to those in the next process. When everybody in the organiza tion practices this axiom, the external customer in the market receives a high -quality product or service as a result. A real quality- assurance system means that everybody in the organiza tion subscribes to and practices this axiom. Major Kaizen Systems The following are major systems that should be in place in order to successfully achieve a kaizen strategy: ▲ Total quality control (TQC)/total quality management (TQM) ▲ A just -in- time (JIT) production system (Toyota Production System) ▲ Total productive maintenance (TPM) ▲ Policy deployment ▲ A suggestion system ▲ Small -group activities Major Kaizen Systems | 7.

[Audio] Total Quality Control/Total Quality Management One of the principles of Japanese management has been total quality control (TQC), which, in its early development, empha sized control of the quality process. This has evolved into a sys tem encompassing all aspects of management and is now referred to as total quality management (TQM), a term used internationally. Regarding the TQC/TQM movement as a part of kaizen strategy gives us a clearer understanding of the Japanese approach. Japanese TQC/TQM should not be regarded strictly as a quality-control activity; TQC/TQM has been developed as a strategy to aid management in becoming more competitive and profitable by helping it to improve in all aspects of busi ness. In TQC/TQM, Q, meaning "quality," has priority, but there are other goals, too—namely, cost and delivery. The T in TQC/TQM signifies "total," meaning that it involves everybody in the organization, from top management through middle managers, supervisors, and shop-floor workers. It fur ther extends to suppliers, dealers, and wholesalers. The T also refers to top management's leadership and performance—so essential for successful implementation of TQC/TQM. The C refers to "control" or "process control." In TQC/TQM, key processes must be identified, controlled, and improved on continuously in order to improve results. Management's role in TQC/TQM is to set up a plan to check the process against the result in order to improve the process, not to criticize the process on the basis of the result. TQC/TQM in Japan encompasses such activities as policy deployment, building quality-assurance systems, standardization, training and education, cost management, and quality circles. The Just- in-Time Production System Originating at Toyota Motor Company under the leadership of Taiichi Ohno, the just- in- time (JIT) production system aims at eliminating non value- adding activities of all kinds and achiev ing a lean production system that is flexible enough to accommodate fluctuations in customer orders. This production system is supported by such concepts as takt time (the time it takes to produce one unit) versus cycle time, one -piece flow, pull pro duction, jidoka ("autonomation"), U-shaped cells, and setup reduction. 8 | Chapter 1 An Introduction to Kaizen.

[Audio] To realize the ideal JIT production system, a series of kaizen activities must be carried out continuously to elimi nate non-value- adding work in gemba. JIT dramatically reduces cost, delivers the product in time, and greatly enhances compa ny profits. Total Productive Maintenance An increasing number of manufacturing companies now prac tice total productive maintenance (TPM) within as well as outside of Japan. Whereas TQM emphasizes improving overall management performance and quality, TPM focuses on improving equipment quality. TPM seeks to maximize equip ment efficiency through a total system of preventive mainte nance spanning the lifetime of the equipment. Just as TQM involves everybody in the company, TPM involves every body at the plant. The five S of housekeeping (discussed in Chapter 5), another pivotal activity in gemba, may be regarded as a prelude to TPM. However, 5 S activi ties have registered remarkable achievements in many cases even when carried out separately from TPM. Policy Deployment Although kaizen strategy aims at making improvements, its impact may be limited if everybody is engaged in kaizen for kaizen's sake without any aim. Management should establish clear targets to guide everyone and make certain to provide leadership for all kaizen activities directed toward achieving the targets. Real kaizen strategy at work requires closely supervised implementation. This process is called Policy Deployment, or in Japanese, hoshin kanri. First, top management must devise a long- term strategy, broken down into medium- term and annual strategies. Top management must have a plan-to-deploy strategy, passing it down through subsequent levels of management until it reaches the shop floor. As the strategy cascades down to the lower echelons, the plan should include increasingly specific action plans and activities. For instance, a policy statement along the lines of "We must reduce our cost by 10 percent to stay competitive" may be translated on the shop floor to such activities as increasing productivity, reducing inventory and rejects, and improving line configurations. Major Kaizen Systems | 9.

[Audio] Kaizen without a target would resemble a trip without a destination. Kaizen is most effective when everybody works to achieve a target, and management should set that target. The Suggestion System The suggestion system functions as an integral part of individ ual-oriented kaizen and emphasizes the morale- boosting bene fits of positive employee participation. Japanese managers see its primary role as that of sparking employee interest in kaizen by encouraging them to provide many suggestions, no matter how small. Japanese employees are often encouraged to discuss their suggestions verbally with supervisors and put them into action right away, even before submitting suggestion forms. They do not expect to reap great economic benefits from each suggestion. Developing kaizen -minded and self-disciplined employees is the primary goal. This outlook contrasts sharply with that of Western management's emphasis on the economic benefits and financial incentives of suggestion systems. Small -Group Activities A kaizen strategy includes small -group activities—informal, voluntary, intracompany groups organized to carry out specific tasks in a workshop environment. The most popular type of small- group activity is quality circles. Designed to address not only quality issues but also such issues as cost, safety, and pro ductivity, quality circles may be regarded as group oriented kaizen activities. Quality circles have played an important part in improving product quality and productivity in Japan. However, their role often has been blown out of proportion by overseas observers, who believe that these groups are the mainstay of quality activities in Japan. Management plays a leading role in realizing quality—in ways that include building quality-assurance systems, providing employee training, estab lishing and deploying policies, and building cross -functional systems for QCD. Successful quality-circle activities indicate that management plays an invisible but vital role in supporting such activities. 10 | Chapter 1 An Introduction to Kaizen.

[Audio] The Ultimate Goal of Kaizen Strategy Since kaizen deals with improvement, we must know which aspects of business activities need to be improved most. And the answer to this question is quality, cost, and delivery (QCD). My previous book, Kaizen: The Key to Japan's Competitive Success, used the term quality, cost, and scheduling (QCS). Since that time, QCD has replaced QCS as the commonly accepted terminology. Quality refers not only to the quality of finished products or services but also to the quality of the processes that go into those products or services. Cost refers to the overall cost of designing, producing, selling, and servicing the product or ser vice. Delivery means delivering the requested volume on time. When the three conditions defined by the term QCD are met, customers are satisfied. QCD activities bridge such functional and departmental lines as research and development, engineering, production, sales, and after-sales service. Therefore, cross -functional col laborations are necessary, as are collabo rations with suppliers and dealers. It is top management's responsi bility to review the current position of the company's QCD in the market place and to establish priorities for its QCD improvement policy. Following the chapters of this book, I have assembled a number of cases that illustrate how various companies from both manufacturing and service sectors have implemented the concepts and systems of gemba kaizen. The Ultimate Goal of Kaizen Strategy | 11.

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[Audio] 13 CHAPTER TWO Gemba Kaizen Adoption of the word gemba has lagged behind adoption of the kaizen concept in the world. This is unfortunate but understandable; being present on the gemba can be a greater mind-set and behavior change than simply doing kaizen. The Cambridge Business English Dictionary is one of a few sources, as of November 2011, to give the definition of gemba as an English word: gemba /'gembə/ noun in Japanese business theory, the place where things happen in manufacturing, used to say that people whose job is to manufacture products are in a good place to make improvements in the manufacturing process This definition captures the spirit of gemba as it pertains to kaizen, but we must first understand gemba in its broader context beyond manufacturing. In Japanese, gemba means "real place"—the place where real action occurs. Japanese use the word gemba in their daily speech. Whenever an earthquake shakes Japan, the TV reporters at the scene refer to themselves as "reporting from the gemba." The gemba may be any workplace, crime scene, filming location, or even an archaeological excavation site. The gemba is where the action is and where the facts may be found. In business, the value -adding activities that satisfy the customer happen in the gemba. Within Japanese industry, the word gemba is almost as popular as kaizen. Joop Bokern, one of the first kaizen consul tants in Europe, had worked at Philips Electronics N.V. in Europe as production manager, as plant director, and finally as corporate quality manager. Bokern said that.

[Audio] 14 | Chapter 2 Gemba Kaizen whenever he visit ed a Japanese company, he had a rule of thumb to determine whether the company was a good one or not. If, in his conver sation with the Japanese manager, he heard the word kaizen within the first 5 minutes and the word gemba within the first 10 minutes, he concluded that it must be a good compa ny. Bokern's example shows that kaizen and gemba are sub jects close to managers' hearts and that they often make deci sions based on their understanding of their gemba. All businesses practice three major activities directly related to earning profit: developing, producing, and selling. Without these activities, a company cannot exist. Therefore, in a broad sense, gemba means the sites of these three major activities. In a narrower context, however, gemba means the place where the products or services are formed. This book will use the word in this narrower context because these sites have been one of the business arenas most neglected by management. Managers seem to overlook the workplace as a means to gen erate revenue, and they usually place far more emphasis on such sectors as financial management, marketing and sales, and product development. When manage ment focuses on the gemba, or work sites, they discover opportunities for making the company far more successful and profitable. In many service sectors, the gemba is where the customers come into contact with the services offered. In the hotel business, for instance, gemba is everywhere: in the lobby, the dining room, guest rooms, the reception desk, the check- in counters, and the concierge station. At banks, the tellers are working in the gemba, as are the loan officers receiving applicants. The same goes for employees working at desks in offices and for telephone opera tors sitting in front of switchboards. Thus gemba spans a multi tude of office and administrative functions. Most departments in these service companies have internal customers with whom they have inter departmental activity, which also represents the gemba. A telephone call to a general manager, production man ager, or quality manager at a Japanese plant is likely to get a response from the manager's assistant to the effect that "He is out at the gemba." Gemba and Management In or at the gemba, customer- satisfying value is added to the product or service that enables the company to survive and prosper. Figure 2. 1 places gemba at the top of the organization, showing its importance to the company..

[Audio] Gemba and Management | 15 The regular management lay ers—top management, middle management, engineering staff, and supervisors—exist to provide the necessary support to the work site. For that matter, gemba should be the site of all improve ments and the source of all information. Therefore, manage ment must maintain close contact with the realities of the gemba in order to solve whatever problems arise there. To put it differently, whatever assistance manage ment provides should start from the specific needs of the work site. When manage ment does not respect and appreciate the gemba, it tends to "dump" its instructions, designs, and other supporting services, instructions, designs, other supporting services—often in complete disregard of actual requirements. Management exists to help the gemba do a better job by reduc ing constraints as much as possible. In reality, however, I won der how many managers correctly understand their role. More often than not, managers regard the gemba as a failure source, where things always go wrong, and they neglect their responsi bility for those problems. In some Western companies where the influence of strong unions practically controls the gemba, management avoids involve ment in gemba affairs. Sometimes management even appears afraid of the plant and seems almost lost or helpless. Even in places where the union does not exercise a firm grip, gemba work is left to veteran supervisors who are allowed by manage ment to run the show as they please. In such cases, manage ment has lost control of the workplace. Figure 2.1 In this view of gemba -management relations, manage ment's role is to provide support to the gemba, which is seen as being at the top of management structure. Customer expectations Customer satisfaction Management of support Gemba.

[Audio] 16 | Chapter 2 Gemba Kaizen Subsequent chapters will discuss in depth what manage ment of the gemba really means. Supervisors should play a key role in gemba manage ment, and yet they often lack the basic training to manage or to do their most important job: main taining and improving the standards and achieving quality, cost, and delivery. Eric Machiels, who came to Japan from Europe as a young student to learn about Japanese management practices, was placed in a Japanese automotive assembly plant as an opera tor: Comparing his experience there with his previous experi ence in European gemba, Machiels observed much more intense communication between management and operators in Japan, resulting in a much more effective two- way informa tion flow between them. Workers had a much clearer under standing of management expectations and of their own responsibilities in the whole kaizen process. The resulting constructive tension on the work floor made the work much more challeng ing in terms of meeting management expecta tions and giving workers a higher sense of pride in their work. Maintaining gemba at the top of the management struc ture requires committed employees. Workers must be inspired to fulfill their roles, to feel proud of their jobs, and to appreci ate the contribution they make to their company and society. Instilling a sense of mission and pride is an integral part of management's responsibility for their gemba. This approach contrasts sharply with perceptions of gemba (Figure 2.2) that regard it as a place where things always go wrong, a source of failure and customer complaints. In Japan, production- related work is sometimes referred to as 3 K, signifying the Japanese words for "dangerous" (kiken), "dirty" (kitanai), and "difficult" (kitsui). Once upon a time, the gemba was a place that good managers avoided. Being assigned a position at or close to the gemba amounted to a career dead end. Today, in contrast, the presidents of some better- known Japanese companies have rich backgrounds in gemba areas. They possess a good understand ing of what goes on in the gemba and provide support accordingly. The two opposite views of the gemba—as sitting on top of the manage ment structure (inverted triangle) and as sitting at the bottom of the management structure (normal triangle)—are equally valid in terms of gemba -management relations. Gemba and management share an equally important place—the gemba by providing the product or service that satisfies the customer and management by setting strategy and deploying policy to.

[Audio] achieve that goal in the gemba. Thus the thrust for improvement should be both bottom- up and top-down. In Figure 2. 2, man agement stays on top of the organization. It takes the initiative in establishing policies, targets, and priorities and in allocating resources such as manpower and money. In this model, man agement must exercise leadership and determine the kind of kaizen most urgently needed. This process of achieving corpo rate objectives is called policy deployment. Because of their attachment to the gemba management relationship as shown in the regular triangle (Figure 2. 2), many managers tend to believe that their job is always to tell the gemba what to do. However, by looking at the inverted triangle (Figure 2 .1) showing gemba at the top, managers can see that they should listen to and learn from employees at the gemba in order to pro vide appropriate help. Gemba becomes the source for achiev ing commonsense, low- cost improvements. The respective roles of management and gemba in these two models never should be confused. Assistant Professor Takeshi Kawase of Keio University writes, in Solving Industrial Engineering Problems (published by Nikkan Kogyo Shinbun in Japanese, 1995): People within a company can be divided into two groups: those who earn money and those who don't. Only those frontline people who develop, produce, and sell products are earning money for the company. The ideal company would have only one person who does not earn money—the president—leaving the rest of the employees directly involved in revenue-generating activity. Gemba and Management | 17 Figure 2 .2 In this view of gemba -management relations, manage ment's role is to manage gemba by providing policies and resources. Customer expectations Customer satisfaction Management of control Gemba.

[Audio] The people who do not earn money are those who sit on top of the money earners—all employees with titles such as chief, head, or manager, including the president and all staff, and spanning areas that include personnel, finance, advertising, quality, and industrial engineering. No matter how hard these people may work, they do not directly earn money for the company. For this reason, they might be bet ter referred to as dependents. If money earners stop work for one second, the company's chances of making money will be lost by one second. The trouble is that non–money earners often think that they know better and are better qualified than money earn ers because they are better educated. They often make the job of the latter more difficult. Non–money earners may think, "Without us, they cannot survive," when they should be thinking, "What can we do to help them do their job bet ter without us?" If we say "the customer is king," we should say "the gemba is Buddha." Historically, the corporate staff played a leading role in regard to the gemba; the staff was accountable for achieving greater efficiency by providing guidance for gemba people to follow. The shortcoming of this system is the separation between those who pass down directives and those who carry them out. The new approach should be what we might call a gemba centered approach, where gemba is account able not only for production but also for quality and cost and personnel assist from the sidelines. The following are the conditions for successful implementation of a gemba- cen tered approach: ▲ Gemba management must accept accountability for achieving quality, cost, and delivery (QCD). ▲ Gemba must be allowed enough elbow room for kaizen. ▲ Management should provide the target for the gemba to achieve but should be accountable for the outcome. (Also, management should assist the gemba in achieving the target.) ▲ Needs of the gemba are more easily identified by the people working there. ▲ Somebody on the line is always thinking about all kinds of problems and solutions. ▲ Resistance to change is minimized. ▲ Continual adjustment becomes possible. ▲ Solutions grounded in reality can be obtained. 18 | Chapter 2 Gemba Kaizen.

[Audio] Standardization | 19 ▲ Solutions emphasize commonsense and low- cost approaches rather than expensive and method -oriented approaches. ▲ People begin to enjoy kaizen and are readily inspired. ▲ Kaizen awareness and work efficiency can be enhanced simultaneously. ▲ Workers can think about kaizen while working. ▲ It is not always necessary to gain upper management's approval to make changes. The benefits of a gemba -centered approach are many. The House of Gemba Two major activities take place in the gemba on a daily basis as regards resource management—namely, maintenance and kaizen. The former relates to following existing standards and maintaining the status quo, and the latter relates to improving such standards. Gemba managers engage in one or the other of these two functions, and quality, cost, and delivery (QCD) are the outcome. Figure 2 .3 shows a bird's- eye view of activities taking place in the gemba that achieve QCD. A com pany that produces quality products or services at a reasonable price and delivers them on time satisfies its customers, and they, in turn, remain loyal. (For a more detailed explanation of QCD, see Chapter 3.) Standardization In order to realize QCD, the company must manage various resources properly on a daily basis. These resources include personnel, information, equipment, and materials. Efficient daily management of resources requires standards. Every time problems or irregularities arise, the manager must investigate, identify the root cause, and revise the existing standards or implement new ones to prevent recurrence. Standards become an integral part of gemba kaizen and provide the basis for daily improvement. Properly applied, kaizen can improve quality, reduce cost considerably, and meet customers' delivery requirements with out any significant invest ment or introduction of new technol ogy. Three major kaizen activities— standardization, 5S (which cover various housekeeping tasks), and the.

[Audio] elimina tion of muda (waste)—contribute to successful QCD. These three activities are indispensable in building lean, efficient, and successful QCD. Standardization, muda elimination, and 5S are easy to understand and implement and do not require sophisticated knowledge or technology. Anybody—any manager, any supervisor, or any employee—can readily intro duce these commonsense, low- cost activities. The difficult part is building the self-discipline necessary to maintain them. Standardization in the gemba often means the translation of techno logical and engineering requirements specified by engi neers into workers' day- to -day operational standards. Such a translating process does not require technology or sophistica tion. It does require a clear plan from management deployed in logical phases. (For details of standards, refer to Chapter 4.) 20 | Chapter 2 Gemba Kaizen Figure 2. 3 House of gemba management. Profit management 5S (good housekeeping) Standardization Muda elimination Quality and safety management Cost management Logistics management Workers' operations Information Equipment Products and materials Teamwork visual management Self-discipline suggestions Morale enhancement QC circles.

[Audio] The Five S (5S) of Good Housekeeping The kaizen principle of 5S stands for five Japanese words that constitute good workplace organization. Today, practicing 5S has become almost a must for any company engaged in manufacturing. An observant gemba management expert can determine the cal iber of a company in five minutes by visiting the plant and tak ing a good look at what goes on there, especially in regard to muda elimination and 5S. A lack of 5S in the gemba should be considered a visual indicator of inefficiency, muda, insufficient self discipline, low morale, poor quality, high costs, and an inability to meet delivery terms. Suppliers not practicing 5S will not be taken seriously by prospective customers. These five points of housekeeping represent a starting point for any company that seeks to be recognized as a responsible manufacturer eligible for world- class status. (The implications of 5S will be explained in detail in Chapter 5.) Recently, before starting assembly operations in Europe, a Japanese automobile manufacturer sent purchasing managers to visit several prospective European suppliers. Eagerly antici pating new business, one of the suppliers prepared a detailed schedule for receiving the potential customers, starting with an hour- long presentation, complete with graphs and charts, on the company's efforts to improve quality. Next, the visitors would receive a tour of the gemba. On arrival, the purchasing managers were shown into the conference room. However, they insisted on being taken to the gemba right away, skipping the conference agenda. Once at the plant, they stayed only a few minutes before preparing to leave. Bewildered, the general manager of the plant implored, "Please tell us about your findings!" The purchasing group replied, "We saw a very low level of housekeeping and found the plant very disorderly. Even worse, we saw some workers smoking while working on the line. If management allows these things to happen in the gemba, it cannot be serious enough about making components vital for automotive safety, and we do not want to deal with management that is not serious enough." Muda Elimination Muda means "waste" in Japanese, but the implications of the word include anything or any activity that does not add value. At the gemba, only two Muda Elimination | 21.

[Audio] types of activities go on: value-adding or non-value-adding activities. A worker looking at an automatic machine while the machine processes a piece does not add any value. The machine does the only value- adding work, no matter how attentively and affectionately the worker may look at it. When a maintenance engineer walks a long distance with a tool in his hand, he is not adding any value. The value is added by using the tool to fix, maintain, or set up the machine. Customers do not pay for non- value- adding activities. Why, then, do so many people in the gemba engage in non -value- adding activities? A manager of one factory once checked how far a worker walked in the gemba in the course of a year and found that the worker walked a distance of 400 kilometers. Jogging for health should be done in the gym, not in the gemba! Ironically, some fac tories are equipped with gyms that have running tracks, but the workers spend more time jogging in the gemba during working hours than in the gym during off-hours. Once, when I was at Dallas–Fort Worth Airport in Texas, I needed to have my ticket endorsed in order to switch to another airline. After I had stood in line at the tick et counter for several minutes, my turn came, whereupon I was told that I had to go to another desk in another terminal to get the endorsement. I had to take a tram to the other ter minal because the terminals at Dallas–Fort Worth are so far apart (a big muda in kaizen terms!). At the counter there, I waited in line again for several minutes. When my turn came, the airline employee stamped my ticket with a bang and said, "Here you are, sir!" I asked myself, "Did I deserve to wait almost half an hour for this?" At what moment did I get my value? Bang! That was the moment of truth, as far as I was concerned. When a company in the service industry conducts its business inefficiently, the company is not only wasting its own resources but also stealing the valued cus tomer's time. Any work that takes place in the gemba is actually a series of processes. Assuming 100 processes from receipt of raw mate rials and components until final assembly and shipment, the value- adding time at each process is just like that bang! Just think about how little time it takes to press a sheet of metal, shape a piece of work on a lathe, process a sheet of paper, or give a signature for approval. These value -adding activities take only seconds. Even supposing that each process takes one minute, value -adding activity for 100 processes should take no more than a total of 100 minutes. Why is it, then, that in most companies, days or weeks pass from the time raw materials and parts are 22 | Chapter 2 Gemba Kaizen.

[Audio] brought in to when finished products emerge or for a document to go through the production process? There is far too much muda between the value-adding moments. We should seek to realize a series of processes in which we can concentrate on each value- adding process. We should seek to realize a series of processes in which we can concentrate on each value. There is far too much muda between the value -adding moments. We should seek to realize a series of processes in which we can concentrate on each value adding process—Bang! Bang! Bang!—and eliminate intervening downtime. (Chapter 6 offers a more detailed explana tion of muda.) Muda elimination and good housekeeping often go hand in hand. Facilities where muda has been eliminated are orderly and show a high level of 5S discipline. Good housekeeping indicates good employee morale and selfdiscipline. Any company can achieve a high level of self-discipline among employees temporarily. Sustaining that level, however, is a very challenging job. And the moment it disap pears, its absence shows up in the form of a disorderly gemba. Increased morale and self -discipline within the gemba require involvement, participation, and information sharing with employ ees. Certain activities expedite the process of kaizen and maintain its momen tum, eventually bringing change to the culture. These include teamwork, such as quality- circle and other small-group activities and employee suggestion schemes, in which workers remain continuously on the look out for potential kaizen targets. When gemba employees par ticipate in kaizen activities and notice the dramatic changes that have taken place as a result, they grow much more enthu siastic and self -disciplined. More positive communication on policy deployment at the gemba, as well as in a company's offices, worker participation in setting up goals for kaizen, and the use of various kinds of visual management also play a vital role in sustaining the momentum of kaizen in the gemba. (Chapter 7 addresses employ ee empowerment, involvement, and participation.) The Golden Rules of Gemba Management Most managers prefer their desk as their workplace and wish to distance themselves from the events taking place in the gemba. Most managers come into contact with reality only through their daily, weekly, or even monthly reports and meetings. The Golden Rules of Gemba Management | 23.

[Audio] Staying in close contact with and understanding the gemba are the first steps in managing a production site effectively. Hence the five golden rules of gemba management: 1. When a problem (abnormality) arises, go to the gemba first. 2. Check the gembutsu ("relevant objects"). 3. Take temporary countermeasures on the spot. 4. Find the root cause. 5. Standardize to prevent recurrence. Go to the Gemba First Management responsibilities include hiring and training work ers, setting the standards for their work, and designing the product and processes. Management sets the conditions in the gemba, and whatever happens there reflects on manage ment. Managers must know firsthand the conditions in the gemba—thus the axiom, "Go to the gemba first." As a matter of routine, managers and supervisors should immediately go to the site and stand in one spot attentively observing what goes on. After developing the habit of going to the gemba, a manager will develop the confidence to use the habit to solve specific problems. Kristianto Jahja, a kaizen consultant who worked for the joint venture in Indonesia between the Astra Group and Toyota Motor Company, recalls the first time he was sent to Toyota's plant in Japan for training. On the first day, a supervisor who was assigned as his mentor took him to a corner of the plant, drew a small circle on the floor with chalk, and told him to stay within the circle all morning and keep his eyes on what was happening. Thus Kristianto watched and watched. Half an hour and then an hour went by. As time passed, he became bored because he was simply watching routine and repetitive work. Eventually, he became angry and said to himself, "What is my supervisor trying to do? I'm supposed to learn something here, but he doesn't teach me anything. Does he want to show his power? What kind of training is this?" Before he became too frustrat ed, though, the supervisor came back and took him to the meeting room. There, Kristianto was asked to describe what he had observed. He was asked specific questions, such as, "What did you see there?" and "What did you think about that process?" Kristianto could not answer most of 24 | Chapter 2 Gemba Kaizen.

[Audio] the questions. He realized that he had missed many vital points in his observations. The supervisor patiently explained to Kristianto the points he had failed to answer, using drawings and sketches on a sheet of paper so that he could describe the processes more clearly and accurately. At this point, Kristianto understood his mentor's deep understanding of the process and realized his own ignorance. Slowly but steadily, it became clear to Kristianto: The gemba is the source of all information. Then his mentor said that to qual ify as a Toyota worker, one must love the gemba and that every Toyota employee believes that the gemba is the most important place in the company. Says Kristianto, "Definitely, this was the best training I ever had because it helped me to truly become a gemba man, and this gemba thinking has influenced me throughout my career. Even now, every time I see a problem, my mind immediately shouts out loud and clear: Go to the gemba first and have a look!" This is a common training method in Japanese gemba. Taiichi Ohno is credited with having developed the Toyota Production System. When Ohno noticed a supervisor out of touch with the realities of the gemba, he would take the supervi sor to the plant, draw a circle, and have the supervisor stand in it until he gained awareness. Ohno urged managers, too, to visit the gemba. He would say, "Go to the gemba every day. And when you go, don't wear out the soles of your shoes in vain. You should come back with at least one idea for kaizen." When he first began introducing just- in- time concepts at Toyota, Ohno encountered resistance from all quarters. One source of strong opposition was the company's financial peo ple, who only believed written financial reports and often did not support allocating resources to gemba -related kaizen because doing so did not always yield immediate bottom- line results. To soften this opposition, Ohno urged accountants to go to the plant. He told them to wear out two pairs of shoes per year just walking around the site observing how inventory, efficiency, quality, and so on were improved and how the improve ments contributed to cost reductions that ultimately produced higher profits. In his later years, Ohno made public speeches sharing his experiences. He is reported to have opened one such speech by asking, "Are there any financial people in the audience?" When several people raised their hands, The Golden Rules of Gemba Management | 25.

[Audio] he told them, "You are not going to understand what I am going to say. Even if you understand, you are not going to be able to implement it, since you live far away from the gemba. Knowing how busy you are, I believe your time will be better spent if you go back to your desk to work." He said this facetiously, knowing that the support of financial managers is crucial for gemba kaizen. Fuji Xerox President Akira Miyahara started his career at the Fuji Photo Film Company as a cost accountant. Knowing that the gemba was the source of the real data, he would go to the gemba to ascertain the information he needed. When he received the data about rejects for his financial report, he felt compelled to go to the gemba and observe the reason for the rejects because he believed that an accountant's job was not simply to deal with numbers but also to understand the process behind the numbers. Because Miyahara was seen in the gemba so often, the supervisor finally had to prepare a special desk for his use near the production line. Miyahara's attachment to the gemba remained with him even after he was transferred to Fuji Xerox Company and was pro moted to other manage ment positions. When he was general manager of the sales division, for instance, the gemba was where his sales and service people were—that is, at the cus tomers' sites. He accompanied service reps and visited cus tomers, which gave him a far better understanding of the customers' needs than did reading the reports. I once traveled to Central America and visited a branch of Yaohan, a Japanese supermarket chain headquartered in Hong Kong, whose stores span the globe. I asked the general manager, who had his office in the corner of a warehouse, how often he went to the gemba (at a supermarket, the gemba is the sales floor, warehouse, and checkout counter). The manager answered very apologetically, "You know, I have an assistant who is in charge of the gemba, so I don't go there as often as I should." When I pressed him to tell me exactly how often, he said, "Well, I must go there about thirty times a day." This manager felt apologetic about "only" going to the gemba 30 times a day! "As I walk through the gemba," he told me, "I not only look around me to see how many customers we have, whether mer chandise is properly displayed, which items are popular, and so on, but I also look up at the ceiling and down at the floor to see if there is any abnormality. Going 26 | Chapter 2 Gemba Kaizen.

[Audio] through the gemba and looking straight ahead is something any manager can do, you know?" One place that is definitely not the gemba is the manager's desk. When a manager makes a decision at her desk based on data, the manager is not in the gemba, and the source of the original information must be questioned carefully. An example will illustrate. Because of its volcanic terrain, Japan has many hot- spring resorts. A key attraction of the spas is the open- air bath (rotemburo), where guests can soak while enjoying a view of river or mountains. I recently spent several days at a large hot -spring hotel that had both an indoor and an outdoor bath. Most guests would bathe in the indoor bath first and then walk down the stairs to the rotemburo. I normally found about half the guests in each bath. One evening I found the indoor bath almost empty. When I went in, I found out why: The water was too hot. Consequently, there was a crowd in the rotemburo, where the temperature was fine. Clearly, something was wrong with the indoor bath. A housekeeper who was bringing in additional towels and clean ing the bath had apparently not noticed anything amiss. When I brought the problem to her attention, she quickly made a telephone call, and the temperature was restored to normal. Later, I discussed this incident with the hotel's general manager, a good friend of mine. He told me that the tempera ture of the indoor bath was set at 42.5 degrees Celsius and that of the outdoor bath at 43 degrees Celsius. The manager went on to explain, "We have a monitoring room whereby our engineer keeps close watch over the temperatures of the baths, along with room temperatures, fire alarms, and such. Whenever he sees an abnormality on the meters, he's supposed to take corrective action." To this, I responded, "Wrong! The person who watches the meters is only relying on secondary information. The informa tion on the baths is first collected by the thermometer sub merged in the tub and then transferred to the monitoring room by the electromechanical device, which moves the dial on the chart. Anything could go wrong in this process. The reality in the gemba is that at that time on that day, there were very few peo ple in the indoor bath, and if the housekeeper had been trained to be more attentive, she could have noticed the situation, stuck her hand in the water, and found that it was too hot. The Golden Rules of Gemba Management | 27.