Continuous Improvement or Kaizen
Continuous improvement or Kaizen is central to delivering Lean operations. The term originates from Maasaki Imai who wrote a book of the same name and made Kaizen popular in the West. According to Imai, Kaizen comprises several elements and is both a philosophy and a set of tools.
The Philosophy of Kaizen
Quality begins with the customer; but customers' views are continuously changing and their expectations rising. Therefore continuous improvement is required to maintain and improve customer service. Kaizen is dedicated to continuous improvement, in small increments, at all levels in the organisation and across all processes in the value stream… forever onwards in the pursuit of perfection!
Everyone has a role to play, from the boardroom to the shop floor:
- To achieve continuous improvement it is necessary that the culture of the organisation must change to embody the philosophy of Kaizen, driven from the boardroom down and right back up again. Only then can management allocate the resources, establish strategies, systems, procedures and organisational structures necessary for the tools of Kaizen to work.
- Middle managers are responsible for implementing Kaizen. They must monitor performance of the continuous improvement programme, and ensure that employees are educated in the use of the necessary tools.
- Supervisors are responsible for applying Kaizen. They must maintain the rate of incremental by encouraging suggestions, coaching operative, and improving communications.
- Operatives must make suggestions, learn new jobs, use the tools, and generally participate in continuous improvement activities individually and in teams without fear.
Flow versus Process Improvement
Kaizen can be further categorised in terms of flow and process improvement;
- Flow Kaizen is about value stream improvement, getting flow going, and should be a major concern of management. This is often but not exclusively where radical changes are found.
- Process Kaizen is about the elimination of lower level tangible waste, and is more often the responsibility of supervisors and operatives.
Remember, in the Kaizen philosophy every level in the organisation has a responsibility for both, flow and process improvement but the emphasis changes.
Guiding Principles of Continuous Improvement
Without active attention, the gains made through improvements in flow and process will deteriorate overtime, as customer needs and expectations change, resulting new wastes will appear. So Kaizen involves building on past gains by continuing experimentation and innovation every single day.
The guiding principles of Kaizen include:
- Questioning the rules – standards and targets are necessary but they are there to be beaten and must be beaten with time.
- Developing resourcefulness – it is a management priority to develop the resourcefulness and participation of everyone in the organisation.
- Try to get to the Root Cause – try not to solve problems superficially and this may often break down functional barriers.
- Eliminate the whole task – question whether a task is even necessary; in this respect Kaizen encourages radical thinking in the pursuit of flow.
- Reduce or change activities – be aware of opportunities to combine tasks or redistribute effort.
- Measure actual performance – performance measurement is important in understanding that the changes implemented have resulted in incremental improvement.
Lean is the pursuit of perfection; continuous improvement is one means of getting there.