Well, with the right tools, and a better process, things get much easier. I am actually got a webinar recording posted on the same day that Tim McMahon and I presented it. Tim will be posting the slides up on SlideShare as well at some point in the near future. Read more…
Kitting is a method used to standardize production processes. Sets of parts are consolidated and delivered to a work area as a unit. The kit contains the precise number of parts or amount of material to produce a set number of products. The benefit is that there is less real Read more…
We had a last-minute change of plans in my family, so I ended up staying home rather than traveling over the holiday weekend. In this case, my loss was your gain as I spent a lot of time updating the information relating to 5S in The Continuous Improvement Companion. I Read more…
Up until now, the Gotta Go Lean blog has been published on a rather flexible schedule depending on the amount of time being spent producing new training materials and serving clients. Well, as our readership has grown, so too has the need to be more structured in how we publish. Read more…
Quite often, whether on the shop floor or in the office, a process grinds to a halt when frontline employees have to go seek manager approval for something. Whether it is for spending that exceeds a prescribed threshold, when two employees want to swap work stations to stay fresh, or Read more…
There are many reasons that Lean can fail to take hold in an organization. One complaint that I hear commonly is about the short term financial pressure on publicly traded companies. Lean requires a long term investment in people and processes. When a company is first trying to weave a Read more…
NPD is perhaps the most critical of all business functions. Think of a business like a shark. It has to keep moving forward to stay alive. NPD is the process by which they keep moving forward. Customers get bored with the current product or need a fresh product to solve Read more…
I was a bit humbled over the weekend. As a small business, Velaction outsources some of what we do, but for the things that change rapidly, we have developed internal capabilities. It lets us be more flexible, nimble, and cost-effective when we need to update something on our site, or Read more…
The concept of continuous improvement is that there is always an opportunity to get better. Sometimes, though, team members question how much better they can get. The truth is that Lean is not a magic drug that can cure everything about a company instantly. It takes work, and commitment, and Read more…
Developing a winning team is critical to the success of a Lean organization. That’s because a strong continuous improvement culture demands the involvement of people throughout the organization. And people won’t want to take on that responsibility if they do not feel prepared for the challenge. In our April, 2011 Read more…
In January, I posted an article about ways to start building a continuous improvement culture in your organization. Tim McMahon and I revisited the topic in March when we did a live Lean webinar chat on the subject. Tim added some of his perspective, and we talked for nearly an Read more…
Most people see the automotive industry as a great way to show how to apply Lean concepts to your organization, but your own car can also provide valuable insight into the application of Lean tools. In this video, Tim McMahon of A Lean Journey and I discuss how an item Read more…