Let’s take a look at Kaizen’s core goal, plus some important facts about waste:
- To find and eliminate any and all waste from a process.
- Waste is anything that doesn’t add value.
- Muda is Japanese for waste
- Please note that “Muda” is required by law; such as financial statements, personal files, any documents used as paper trail for other reasons.
Types of Waste
- Overproduction: Among other reasons for this being the worst type of waste, tying up business capital is the main reason to avoid this.
- Waiting: When the manufacturing process is out of sync, machines and staff sit idle.
- Overprocessing: Any redundancy in efforts, rechecking, verifying, confirming. The checking should be done in the original processing, so when it leaves the process it is done.
- Motion: Unnecessary activity of staff while performing the processing. Arrange machines and supplies in an order that would eliminate any unnecessary movement.
- Transportation: Having to move from one location to another between processes.
- Defects: Everything from design flaws to data entry errors, invoice errors.
- Inventory: Unneeded piles of anything, even emails.
The Importance of a Kaizen Event
The Kaizen event works on many levels, from creating true teamwork to company loyalty. Since team members of all levels work together, there aren’t any subordinates, so everyone has their contribution to give.
A Kaizen event is an excellent way to make small quick changes that will make noticeable improvements immediately. Continuous improvements are key for a successful business, and Kaizen is a foolproof way of identifying and fixing continuously for a successful end result. As a business owner, you have to look at the whole picture and how little changes made over a period of time can save money in production costs. Less money spent is money in your pocket.
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