The Benefits Of ‘Just-In-Time’

Just-in-time(JIT) manufacturing is a simple theory that stock that is housed within any company is waste and any over production of goods is also waste. Stock should be delivered and row material ‘just in time’. So there is no stock or row material being stored in any quantity, they are all simply brought in or created as required.

But what are the benefits of JIT within the manufacturing process apart from the cost reduction of accommodating stock and produced goods?

Over Production Ceases

Fundamental to the process of JIT manufacturing is that goods are not over produced. When they are over produced then they need to be transported to a storage facility and then stored until they are required.

Both these actions require staff time and effort. In addition, each time that goods are moved there is a chance that they will be damaged, so reducing the number of times that manufactured goods are transported/stored minimises the risk of damage.

Less transport also means less resources are used, which is very much in keeping with the Lean business philosophy of reducing waste and using resources sparingly.

Not having to store produced goods also means that there is less resources used to store them. When they are stored some degree of heating/lighting, security is required and again these take up resources.

Overproduction of goods can sometimes hide flaws within the production process, so reducing over production means that any flaws are immediately apparent, which in turn leads to quality improvement.

Flow Of Goods Improves

Because goods are not over produced and are produced in the right timescale, overall within the manufacturing process there is a better flow of goods, because there is no over production of any one item.

Workers Are Multi-Skilled

In order to meet the requirements of JIT manufacturing, workers have to be trained to be flexible and to be able to undertake duties that may be in areas other than their usual workstation. This means initially there are some training costs, but having a workforce that is so flexible and skilled that workers can be deployed to different work areas when required is highly desirable.

Labour Costs Are Reduced

Through production of goods only when required staff are not paid for non- production, thus saving the company costs. Usually staff will be deployed into other areas of work, so that they will still earn money, but the company saves because it is not paying workers to produce items that have no immediate use.

Positive Relationships With Suppliers

Suppliers will also benefit from JIT manufacturing because they too will be expected to supply using JIT principles. This means that they have to have a positive and inter-dependent relationship with the manufacturer, rather than the historic relationship where the customer had the power and the supplier was not an equal.

Motivated Workforce

The JIT manufacturing process is one that is highly focussed on targets, deadlines, quality and so on. Usually JIT is only one aspect of the Lean philosophy of ensuring that waste is eliminated in all its forms. Staff are therefore kept motivated by the goals, targets and even reward systems that may be in place to ensure that they continuously strive to effect improvement in all aspects of their work.

Lean is a culture that is very much focussed on quality and this culture can become a real driving force within the personnel of any company, which also spins off into JIT being viewed as a positive way of keeping the company financially viable and ahead of its competitors.


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Lean Six Sigma and Eliminate Waste

Lean Six Sigma is a tool that many business ownr turn to when they need the best tools for waste elimination and process improvement. Lean Six Sigma is a combination of Lean Methodology and the Six Sigma Methodology, which is designed to apply the tools of both practices into one formula for process improvement and waste elimination within a company or organization. Using the principles of lean, there are many different types of wastes that can be eliminated, depending upon the company and their specific needs for waste elimination. All you need is the proper Six Sigma Training and a little experience with Lean Enterprise to ensure that you're prepared for what you're getting into.

If you take the time to learn about the wastes that you have, you'll likely realize that you have more than you might have initially thought. By looking deeper than the surface and using the tools of Lean Six Sigma to identify all areas of waste, why they happen, and how to eliminate them, you will be much better able to make your business more efficient. For example, a doctor's office sending patients who have appointments for specific reasons to a triage room is an unnecessary step in the process of patient flow.

Using Lean Six Sigma, this process can be restructured so that the flow is more efficient and the triage isn't wasting their time or the time of the patients, making the business operate better for everyone that is involved. The great thing about this combination is that you have very basic principles of waste elimination from Lean Enterprise or manufacturing, and that is coupled with the statistical analysis that is offered by the Six Sigma Process. Together, these two tools create a dynamic solution to many process improvement and waste elimination projects in various industries.

Lean Six Sigma will eliminate wastes on many levels, and for many different reasons. If you have unnecessary waste in your processes, you can benefit from Lean Six Sigma projects just as well as anyone else. It doesn't matter how big your company is or how many projects you need to take on, because the methodology is very basic and able to be molded to just about any industry and situation that exists. Once you have eliminated the wastes within your industry you will be much more efficient, which will increase your customer satisfaction, profitability, and even your overall workplace atmosphere in some cases.

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ISO 9001 Vs Six Sigma

If you won't get into the history and background of each process management approach. You only have to search engine "Six Sigma" or "ISO 9001" to get your fair share of information. This article will go for the jugular on a topic that has been on my mind for some time. It has been touted in best-selling business books but that was 10 years ago.


Before I get off-topic, let's jump straight into a bullet list that lists the problems with Six Sigma:

1. 3M, GE, Home Depot, Ford and other major companies are pulling back on Six Sigma because research shows that customer satisfaction and employee morale has suffered

a. On the other hand, customer Satisfaction is a major theme of ISO 9001 as Customer Focus is one of the eight ISO 9001 management principles.

2. Over analyzing

a. On the other hand, ISO 9001 simply suggests that your business should take a Factual Approach to Decision Making. This means making informed decisions and ensuring data and information are sufficiently accurate and reliable and accessible to those who need it. ISO 9001 wants you to use the facts but to also balance it with experience and intuition.

3. Six Sigma and innovation do not co-exist in the same world

a. Another major theme of ISO 9001 is Continual Improvement. Unlike Six Sigma, ISO 9001 puts innovation squarely on the roadmap for organizational success.

4. It's all about numbers and not about customers

a. Again, ISO 9001 makes it abundantly clear throughout the standard that Customer Focus is a key element to business success.

5. Six Sigma = cost cutting. Surely, your business exists do to more than just cut costs?

a. ISO 9001 reminds us that in addition to cutting costs, we also have to focus on Mutually Beneficial Supplier Relationships, Leadership, Involvement of People and more.

6. Six Sigma = micromanaging

a. ISO 9001 is anything but micromanaging if it is well-implemented by an experienced consultant. The standard only required six documented procedures. A smooth-running ISO 9001 certified company is one that operates on its own positive, organic momentum.

7. It is elitist. Since when should a company only take direction from Black Belts? Whatever happened to everyone in a company acting as a process improver?

a. Not the case with ISO 9001. Only one central role of Management Representative needs to be assigned. As for the rest of the employees, everyone is encouraged to play their part.

8. It does not incorporate information technology - a huge force that can impact processes

a. There isn't anything specifically written into ISO 9001 speaking to Information Technology. However, several sections of the standard allow ample opportunity for IT to shine and play a central role.

9. It espouses incremental improvement, not radical breakthroughs

a. One of my personal favorite Management Principles of ISO 9001 is Continual Improvement.

10. Read any article about Six Sigma and you are bound to find a disclaimer section addressing concerns or issues with it.

a. ISO 9001 does not generate the same kind of backlash Six Sigma is getting

11. A Fortune 500 article stated that "of 58 large companies that have announced Six Sigma programs, 91% have trailed the S&P 500 since"

a. On the other hand, a Harvard Business School Working Paper by David I. Levine and Michael W. Toffel published on January 18, 2010 concludes that ISO 9001 delivers value, is not a fad, increases sales by roughly 10%, and more. The authors mention "...the strength and consistency of our findings leads us to shift our own priors in favor of the hypothesis that ISO 9001 adoption is more beneficial than we had anticipated."

12. It is based on arbitrary standards

a. 3.4 defects per million opportunities sounds great for some industries assuming their products are life-threatening or simply cannot endure any margin of error. But would you apply the same strict standard to your typical contact centre or service provider? Why does it need to be six standard deviations? This is not explained. Also, Six Sigma operates on the assumption that process data always conforms to a normal distribution model.


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How to Implement a Kanban in Lean Manufacturing

Lean manufacturing, well known among large corporations, in fact most companies all over the world have implemented some form of lean manufacturing. A big part of lean manufacturing is the Kaizen and Kanban methods. The Kanban means one thing that is visible, in Japanese and according to the best lean manufacturing system every product should be made as one until it reaches the customer but this is not very efficient in production methods. Still there are ways of implementing the system of "one" within the lean manufacturing system.

In a lean processes there are several teams formed for each department that involves the manufacturing of the part. These teams are formed to produce communication between the different departments. First you meet and get to know every person in your group and then you train those members in world class manufacturing and in other methods like Kanban and Kaizen. Kanban and Kaizen methods cannot be implemented without first implementing the basic system.

The process can be implemented into any department within a company, but first a complete analysis needs to be done to identify what areas need more efficiency including areas such as maintenance, sales, service, engineering production and even shipping. The key is to know the areas that need to be worked on and implement the plan, and this plan may be ever changing and ongoing.

A method within this system is the KanBan, which is Japanese, meaning something that is visible that helps in the transporting, moving or production of a product. This visible thing can be an electronic signal which signals the moving of a product from one station to another, a pallet on which product is put and then moved to another area, a bin with the same intentions, or anything similar.

The kanban method helps you manage inventory or processes; they allow you to know what is in stock and what has been shipped very easily, because each kanban has a certain number of products within. Even when you use an electronic signal you know how many of a product is shipping and how many are produced. As an example, lets assume the kanban is an electronic signal and you are producing refrigerators. If you implement a signal for 20 refrigerators going through the installation of thermal insulation, then you know that the next production area receives 20 refrigerators, etc.

As mentioned before the kanban method cannot be started and worked with efficiently until you really understand how it works. If you don't have the right organization and equipment the kanban system will not make much of a difference.

Lean manufacturing works as a whole, and certain methods like kanbans and kaizens work within the whole lean system. By the same token you cant have a lean system if you don't have kaizens or kanbans.


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Total Quality Management Philosophies

The basis for TQM is to prevent defect or trouble with the Quality from the beginning. Applying statistical techniques and management skills to examine, control and supervise factors that may affect on the appearance of defects during the whole process, in research phase, design phase and in other services relating to the development of Quality.

Applying TQM will not only improve the product quality or increase productivity but also enhance the effectiveness of the whole system due to the principle "always do correctly the correct works at the very beginning".

According to ISO 9000, Total Quality Management is a management philosophy that seeks to focus the functions of an organization into Quality, with the participation of every member in it, in order to reach a long-lasting success by satisfying all customer requirements and bring back benefit to the members of that organization and to the society.

Management system in TQM is a system established on basis of the following philosophies:

(1) Quality can't be assured and controlled if only the output of the process is controlled. It is the whole process involving every function, every operation that create quality.

(2) The responsibility towards Quality belongs to the highest level management of the organization. To have an appropriate and effective Quality Policy, the management board must deeply change their belief in approach to improve quality. They need to make commitment and agreement to Quality activities. This is very important step in the management of quality in any organization. If you want to improve the quality, first, you have to improve the administrative operations and other supporting functions.

(3) The quality of the product depends much on the quality of Human factor, the most important factor in making product quality. Training, education must be the strategic tasks to be firstly focused in the quality improvement programs.

(4) Quality must have the attention from all the members in the organization. Therefore, Quality control system must be built upon the mutual understanding, coherence and commitment to the main goal which is the quality of the work. This will help facilitate the movements of Quality groups in the organization, which will draw people into creativity and improvement of quality activities.

(5) Toward the prevention and protection from defect, error in the production process and other operations by making best use of statistical tools to find the main causes of defect and take duly corrective actions.

(6) To avoid economic costs, these principles must be absolutely and correctly followed right at the beginning.

TQM is related directly to every production and business processes to control and prevent defect causes during the process, with the procedure to implement as follows:

1. Select process of priority to analyze
2. Analyze the process
3. Examine the process
o Target norms/ control board
o Relations with customers/suppliers
o Service contract with customers/suppliers
4. Quality Improvement method in the process

Actually, TQM is the synchronous combination of Quality Control with Productivity control for the main goal as to achive the perfection of the product, as well as the perfection of the company itself.


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Quality Assurance Principles

Quality assurance (QA) cover all things in the organization like row material, product, maintenance so it has 5 principls:-

1 - Customer is God.

This philosophy must be applied in enterprises and done by all members' best. It means that all employees including sales and after-sales service staffs as well as suppliers and distributors have responsibility in quality assurance. Just when all members do it together, is the quality assurance successful. The whole companies, by means of quality teams, must cooperate together for the target of quality assurance.

2 - Approach customers and master their needs.

It is essential to clearly catch customers' needs and requests. Sometimes, customers just ambiguously raise their needs or just address their desire to get satisfaction of some products or services. Producers with their marketing departments should specifically get customers' needs and then concretize them in the features of products and services that they are going to supply. Today, it is not appropriate for producers to make products first and then do all the ways to satisfy customers.


3.- Continuous quality improvement by doing the Deming cycle (PDCA).

Customers' needs and expectations always change and tend to increase. Though enterprises have well-done philosophy "Customer is God", suitable market research methods and good quality product designs, QA implementation is not done thoroughly. Thus, enterprises have to do the continuous quality improvement in order to satisfy customers the most at all time. Enterprises can improve product quality in the increasingly good way by continuously applying the Deming cycle.

4.-Producers and distributors must have responsibility in quality assurance.

When an enterprise provides some products or services into the market, they have to take the responsibility to assure the quality of the products they make.

5.-Next process is the customer of the previous process.

In the range of factories and enterprises, we have to do the above philosophy thoroughly. Because when we accept that the next process is the customer of the previous process, the responsibility in QA must be done seriously. In the next process, when customers become suppliers for the following process, they also do their best to provide consumers with the best-quality products. Consequently, products will be made perfectly.

QA contains all things from production planning to product completion, maintenance, repairing and discard. Therefore, it is very necessary to obviously determine what should be done in each period in order to assure the product quality during the product life that includes ensuring that products have high efficiency and regularly checking what have been done.


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Benefits of Value Stream Mapping

Value Stream Mapping (VSM) is a proven tool. Well suited for a broad range of industries and processes, VSM is ideal for creating positive organizational changes and producing system-wide benefits in cost, quality, and flexibility. It helps eliminate waste.


But like any tool, VSM must be applied properly. That means avoiding the common errors that invalidate the mapping process. Below are tips on developing an accurate VSM. These tips will not only improve the accuracy of your map and facilitate the mapping process, they'll also help you reap its system-wide benefits.

But first, let's define a value stream. It includes all the activities required in bringing a product from "raw materials" into the customer's hands or in providing service to a target audience. Michael Porter, author of Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance, was among the first to talk about value chains and value streams. In his definition of a value stream, he includes primary activities, like inbound logistics, and support activities, like procurement. Porter relates these activities to gaining a competitive advantage.

One key to value stream mapping suggested by Porter's definition is to clearly define the product or service to map. In other words, make sure you have a value stream to map before engaging in the process, since the objective is to identify system-wide waste occurs and then remove it. Unfortunately, some apply VSM in situations where there's no product or control part, such as in product development processes. Make sure there's a repeatable action or control part to follow before creating a value stream map. Otherwise, you'll just be wasting time and resources.

Another key to developing a VAM is observing performance first hand. While many value streams are simple, many are also complex. In some cases, the production process or service delivery effort is long and tedious. It other cases it maybe set aside for a few days or a few weeks or the person developing the process needs to complete the map quickly. All of which makes developing a value stream map difficult.

In addition, much of what takes place in the day-to-day operations of a business-- phone calls, interruptions, reprioritizations of work--isn't stored on a computer or in someone's memory. So depending on engineering standards to fill in the information boxes and determine potential savings won't work, nor will trying to develop a map while sitting in your office. While the Map might be technically correct, you would be missing many of the activities actually happening on the floor.

Unfortunately, these activities affect production time and the product's value. Therefore, you must observe the product as it is being produced or the service as it is being delivered to determine which activities add value and which do not. While it's sometimes hard to do, it's critical to gathering accurate data for your VSM. Otherwise, you're creating a process map, not a value stream map.

Also, make sure you follow the product undergoing production or the service being delivered all the way. Sometimes an observer follows the worker through a long drawn out production process. When he or she stops dealing with the product, the observer, follows the worker instead of the control part. This can spell disaster.

Let's say, for example, the product is a patient in a doctor's office. When the doctor finishes his exam, the observer needs to follow the patient, not the nurse who's updating the patient's chart. If the observer follows the nurse, he or she is mapping the nurse's work, not the work being done on the control part, which stopped when the patient went home.

In addition, be aware of product families when developing a VSM. Most firms produce more than one product family. Sometimes, it gets complicated following a single product family because the observer did a poor job of identifying the key product family before hand. By not identifying the product family, the observer risks being distracted and following the wrong processing path.

Two common problem areas in value stream mapping are ignoring shared resources and double counting time. These pitfalls can invalidate the accuracy of a value stream map.

Most companies have shared resources. These resources--which may be people, assembly lines, or equipment--often support multiple product families. If the observer forgets to identify these shared resources when developing a value stream map, the map will be incorrect. Identify the shared resources in a value stream ahead of time. Forgetting to do so will produce incorrect estimates for things like cycle times. And that in turn will affect the map's end product.

Also, makes sure you understand exactly what goes in an information box and what is a processing step. Changeovers usually go in an information box, but what about travel time. The key is separating the actual work involved in completing the product or service from the things that cause inventory to build up. Long changeovers cause inventory to build, but what about long distance travelling? Both activities may need be eliminated because they both cause inventory to build.

These tips will help you develop accurate value stream maps. The maps will, in turn, help cut waste from your production processes or service deliver sequence, streamlining operations, cutting costs, and improving customer service. More importantly, they'll help you reap the system-wide benefits VSM provides, making your efforts both productive and profitable.



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