KAIZEN

History
Kaizen came into existence after World War II when Toyota first
implemented quality circles in its production process.
Kaizen was first implemented in several Japanese businesses after
World War II, influenced in part by American business and quality
management teachers who visited the country.
It has since spread throughout the world and is now being
implemented in many other venues besides just business and
productivity.

Masaaki Imai is known as the developer of

Kaizen.
In 1986 Masaaki Imai introduced to the Western world the Japanese
term Kaizen and made it famous through his book, Kaizen:
The Key to Japan's Competitive Success.
 ('kai') KAI means 'change' or 'the action to correct'.
('zen') ZEN means 'good'

Kaizen: Change for Good

Kaizen is small incremental changes made for improving

productivity and minimizing waste.

Kaizen Focus
Make it better!
Make it faster!
Make it cheaper!
OBJECTIVE:
TO MAXIMISE OVERALL EFFECTIVENESS OF THE PLANT
AND PROCESS BY ELIMINATION OF ALL LOSSES AND TO
REDUCE COST OF PRODUCTION THROUGH SMALL GROUP
ACTIVITIES
Its all about making things: better, faster and/or cheaper.
Kaizen Thinking.
Leaders are most important for bringing change in an organization.
Environment makes people!
If environment changes, people change.
What is the Expected Change?

Change FROM TO
Customer orientation Company Driven Customer Driven
Operational Output Inspection Input Setting
Processes
People processes Individual Effort Team Effort
People skills By pass problem FindingSolution
Decisions Unilateral Consultative
/Empowered
Leadership Managing Leading
Management Style Delegation Empowerment
Management a different approach
Management has two major components:
1. Maintenance
2. Improvement
Under the maintenance function, the management must first
establish policies, rules, directives and standard operating
procedures (SOPs) and then work towards ensuring that everybody
follows SOP.
Under the improvement function, management works continuously
towards revising the current standards, once they have been
mastered, and establishing higher ones.
 Improvement can be broken down between innovation and Kaizen.
Innovation involves a drastic improvement in the existing process
and requires large investments. Kaizen signifies small
improvements as a result of coordinated continuous efforts by all
employees.
Kaizen (the translation of kai (change) zen (good) is
improvement). This method became famous by the book of
Masaaki Imai Kaizen: The Key to Japan's Competitive Success.

So what is Kaizen ?
Kaizen refers to philosophy or practices that focus upon continuous
improvement of processes in manufacturing, engineering,
supporting business processes, and management.
 By improving standardized activities and processes, kaizen aims to
eliminate waste as in lean manufacturing ( Toyota Production
System ).

Key Features of Kaizen

1.Improvements are based on many, small changes rather than the
radical changes that might arise from R & D .
2.As the ideas come from the workers themselves, they are less
likely to be radically different, and therefore easier to implement
3.Small improvements are less likely to require major capital
investment than major process changes
4.The ideas come from the talents of the existing workforce, as
opposed to using R&D, consultants or equipment any of which
could be very expensive
5.All employees should continually be seeking ways to improve their
own performance
 6.It helps encourage workers to take ownership for their work, and
can help reinforce team working, thereby improving worker
motivation

Kaizen is a daily process, the purpose of which goes beyond

simple productivity improvement.
It is also a process that, when done correctly, humanizes the
workplace, eliminates overly hard work ("muri"), and teaches
people how to perform experiments on their work using the
scientific method and how to learn to spot and eliminate waste in
business processes.

Kaizen at Toyota
Team
A team is a collection of people related to one another who share a
common objective and work in a collaboration with one another to
achieve a common target.

Team Leader is the Eyes & Ears of Team

Every team has a leader and members.

A team leader
First remove his Hat outside.
Has need for improvement
Sets targets for the team
Good communicator
Good coordinator
Works as a member
Resource person for the members
Understands teams strengths and weaknesses
Has counseling skills
How Small Group Activities will be success.
Standardize the work
Use modern tools and techniques.

Seven Steps of Kaizen

Step-0Select improvement topic

Step-1Understand the situation
Step-2Expose and eliminate abnormalities
Step-3Analyze causes
Step-4Plan Improvements
Step-5Implement Improvement
Step-6Check results
Step-7Consolidate gains