THE KAIZEN THEORYGroup 5- Linda, Elijah, Jelah, Nancy, & La’Gerald

KAIZEN Kai = Change Zen = Good

Kaizen means “good change”

KAIZEN Kaizen is making small incremental

changes to improve productivity and reduce wastes

The goal is to eliminate the Non-Value Added Activities (i.e. walking, transporting parts, generating useless reports)

MAIN PRINCIPLES OF KAIZEN Identify obstacles and threats at an early stage

and are solved then. Small issues that are overlooked can snowball into bigger problems.

Reduce waste through effective management. There are always more effective ways to do things Encourage employees to bring in ideas and suggestions

Must be done in a way where no one is blamed and that the best process is put in place.

HISTORY Toyota came up with the “Toyota Production

System” which strived for continuous improvement

In 1986, Masaaki Imai, the developer of Kaizen, wrote a book called “Kaizen: The Key to Japan’s Competitive Success”

Westerns read the book and “discovered” Kazien

BENEFITS OF KAIZEN Reduces waste

Improve space utilization and product quality

Higher employee moral and job satisfaction

Teaches to solve everyday problem

KAIZEN VS PROBLEM SOLVING TEAM

THE 5S’S Sorting

Keeping only essential tools and items

Simplifying Eliminate extra motion

Sweeping Cleaning work area

Standardizing Standardized work practices

Sustaining Maintaining standards

DOWNFALLS OF KAIZEN Resistance to change

Lack of proper procedures to implement new process

Too many suggestions can be confusing and a waste of time

Difficult to implement in large scale process, because it requires a lot of analyzing

REFERENCES Imai, Masaaki (1986). Kaizen: The Key to Japan's

Competitive Success Liker, Jeffrey; Meier, David (2006). The

Toyota Way Fieldbook. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Laraia, Anthony C.; Patricia E. Moody; Robert W. Hall (1999). The Kaizen Blitz: accelerating breakthroughs in productivity and performance. John Wiley and Sons. p. 26. ISBN 978-0-471-24648-0. Retrieved 6 February 2010.