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Kaizen (Japanese: 改善, "improvement") is a concept referring to business activities that continuously improve all functions and involve all employees from the CEO to the assembly line workers. Kaizen also applies to processes, such as purchasing and logistics, that cross organizational boundaries into the supply chain. [1]
A kaizen process. Some successful implementations use the approach known as kaizen (the translation of kai ('change') zen ('good') is 'improvement'). This method became famous from Imai's 1986 book Kaizen: The Key to Japan's Competitive Success. [7] Key features of kaizen include:
Kaizen costing is a cost reduction system used a product's design has been completed and it is in production. [1] Business professor Yasuhiro Monden [ 2 ] defines kaizen costing as The maintenance of present cost levels for products currently being manufactured via systematic efforts to achieve the desired cost level.
Masaaki Imai acknowledged that kaizen starts with the detection of needs and problem definition: "The starting point for improvement is to recognize the need. This comes from the recognition of a problem. If no problem is recognized, there is no recognition of the need for improvement. Complacency is the archenemy of KAIZEN™." [9]
Six Sigma was developed within Motorola to compete with the kaizen (or lean manufacturing) business model in Japan. [citation needed] In the 1990s, Allied Signal hired Larry Bossidy and introduced Six Sigma in heavy manufacturing. A few years later, General Electric's Jack Welch consulted Bossidy and implemented Six Sigma at the conglomerate.
Kaizen is based on the involvement of all employees, wherein singular changes typically do not improve major production metrics above a 20% threshold. A cross between Kaikaku and Kaizen is Kaizen Blitz (or Kaizen Events), which targets a radical improvement in a limited area, such as a production cell, typically during an intense week.
Example of a worksheet for structured problem solving and continuous improvement. A3 problem solving is a structured problem-solving and continuous-improvement approach, first employed at Toyota and typically used by lean manufacturing practitioners. [1]
Quality circles were at their most popular during the 1980s, but continue to exist in the form of Kaizen groups and similar worker participation schemes. [2] Typical topics for the attention of quality circles are improving occupational safety and health, improving product design, and improvement in the workplace and manufacturing processes.