LSS Yellow belt Session 2

After all these years, the society ended up with an oversupply of products that the customers undervalued because of maximizing the output without the consideration of the customers’ demands.

The principal purpose of lean is waste elimination in the value stream at the same time rendering customers the maximum value. In short, doing more with less.

A value stream refers to the set of activities that a company executes usually from ordering, designing, creation, and shipping the products and services.

It usually begins at the supplier’s supplier and ends at the customer’s customer.

Three components of a value stream:

  • Flow of materials 
  • Transformation
  • Flow of information 

Shifting to be a lean enterprise company requires a lot of changes such as in the worker’s attitudes. It is important to zoom out or view the flow of information throughout the entire company. 

Lean thinking process:

  • Go to gemba/ workplace and develop a value stream map
  • Analyzing all inventory notes to review the increase of costs and utilizing locked cash to a proper use
  • Analyzing the entire value stream 
  • Striving to move forward where value streams are based on customer demand
  • Extending the value stream towards the supplier

Common symbols in value stream mapping:

  • Load levelling (Heijunka box)
  • Push Arrow
  • Kaizen Idea
  • Go and see trigger

A value stream should contain at least:

  • Production control that is scheduled weekly
  • Weekly updates
  • Uptime

5S is a simple and practical workplace method that improves the company’s efficiency and operations management. 

A process is affected by its work area environment. 

Therefore, improvements can contribute to better process control. 

Distractions such as disorganized files and papers can lead to errors and delays, so it is important for a company to adopt the 5S method. 

The healthcare industry is one of the many industries that applies the use of lean methodologies. 

5S Sequence:

  • Sort – Unused or never used items must be thrown out
  • Set in order – Required items must be placed in marked locations
  • Shine – Cleaning of work area (mandatory and sometimes measured in particle count) and tools
  • Standardize – Developing checklists to ensure the work area is clean and orderly
  • Sustain – The most hard step and requires the support from the management

The 5S method may be improved to consider other factors such as employee and customer safety. 

A good example of a lean company will have a 5S checklist. Under every category in 5S, there will be certain items such as:

  • Sort(Organization) – Distinguished on what is needed and what is ot needed

Safety hazards (water, oil, chemical, machines) exist

Items are present in aisles, stairways, corners, and so on

  • Set in Order(Orderliness) – Correct places for items are not obvious

Items are not in their places

Items are not put away immediately after use

  • Shine(Cleanliness) – Other cleaning problems of any kind are present

 Cleaning materials are not easily accessible

 Lines, labels, signs, and so on are not clean or unbroken

  • Standardize(Adherence) – How many items can’t be located in 30 seconds?

Necessary information is not visible

All standards are not known or visible

  • Sustain(Self-discipline) – Stick to the rules

        How many workers have not had 5S training?

        Number of times job aids are not available or up-to-date

This is then rated as either Level 0 (with 3 or more problems), 1 (with 3 to 4 problems), 2 (with 2 problems), 3(with 1 problem), or 4(with no problems). 

A visual factory is a visual representation of all the materials and information in the value stream. 

Few examples are the status of every raw material usually indicated by signal lights (red, yellow, and green) on the machine. 

Inside a visual factory, anyone can walk on to the shop floor and state all the processes going on in the warehouse. 

Kaizen is Japanese term that means progressing through small, incremental steps, or “change for improvement”.

Kaikaku is another Japanese term that means breakthrough improvement. 

Many people are confused as kaikaku is sometimes referred to as a kaizen event or kaizen blitz. 

These events are mostly conducted by creating a team that reviews all chances for progress for three to five days. 

The pull system is an essential part of the Just-In-Time (JIT) concept and lean implementation.

Unfamiliar processes only occur when there is a pull from succeeding processes. This is signified as an empty bin or a kanban card. 

JIT is an inventory technique that implies that the delivery of a product is planned well. 

Companies that apply this technique will have their buffer stock reduced, so orders will only come in if it reaches the reorder level. 

Kanban pertains to a controlled system such as process outputs that is synchronized with the downstream processes.

It is executed with a kanban card that indicates the amount to be reloaded once the minimum level is satisfied. It may either be physical or digital information. 

It is important to remember that other factors of lean implementation be put into its proper place.

Poka-yoke is a Japanese method for error proofing. 

Standard work is an interaction tool that has three major components: time, inventory, and sequence.

The value of lean to the company pertains to customers’ perception of usefulness and importance of a certain product or service. 

As soon as the company understands the value, it is easy to determine a product’s target cost.

A process step is value-added if the product is finished right at the first try and the customer recognizes it. 

An excellent lean company eliminates non-value-added tasks. 

It enforces the “question everything” rule to determine the non-value tasks. 

Gray areas may occur where non-value-added tasks are not obvious such as inspecting and testing. 

Regulatory requirements may be necessary. 

One common mistake of a lean company is taking too much time waiting on the next step rather than focusing on reducing the amount of non-value-added tasks.

Categories of waste (muda):

  • Overproduction – excess work in progress because of external factors such as the just in case philosophy
  • Excess Motion – caused by poor workplace such as awkward positioning of components and tools
  • Waiting – can be resolved by planning a reduction of efforts and cross-training of personnel
  • Inventory – extra costs for storage, record keeping, etc. may incur if the company has an excess of inventory. 
  • The company must rather synchronize their inventory with actual customer demand.

Problems arising from poor inventory get solved if the company enforces protective inventory.

  • Excess movement of material – this happens because of poor plant layout . One way to limit material motion is through a C or U cell.

If high output is necessary, one person per machine may be the scheme. If low output is necessary, one person may move from machine to machine may be the scheme. 

  • Defect correction – typical causes are poor process capability, insufficient equipment checkups, and poor working instructions
  • Excess processing – hard to recognize. One common example is steel stamping that requires oil dipping in which in most cases, customers are not willing to pay as it does not enhance the product.
  • Lost creativity – the most unfortunate waste, as employees sometimes have ideas that would improve processes. The company must accept mistakes and treat these as learning experiences as a benefit of the lean thinking method.

There is no perfection in Lean. What exists is a continual learning process to achieve the ever abstract “perfection”.