Toyota Way Fieldbook : A Practical Guide for Implementing Toyota's 4Ps

2. Management is enlightened on the speed with which things can be accom-
   plished if a concerted effort is applied. Amazing things can be accomplished
   with proper focus and leverage of resources.


3. People learn a great deal. The intensity of the experience opens people up
   to learning in ways that are usually not possible in a traditional classroom
   approach.


4. Resources are usually made available, including management authority,
   cross-functional resources, and some money. So things can happen in the
   week that might otherwise take months of written requests, approvals,
   and cajoling people to help out.


5. Skeptics can be won over. In a classroom, the skeptics raise their hands
   and explain all the reasons lean will not work. Those same people in a work-
   shop are making it happen.


6. As we will discuss later in the chapter, the kaizen event is a great tool for
   implementing aspects of an overall value stream vision.
   The Tenneco example from Smithville, Tennessee, which we describe below,
   illustrates the positive and negative of kaizen events. In that case, radical kaizen
   events every other week dramatically turned around a plant. About 40 percent of
   the workforce were “kaizened out.” Within one year they worked through every
   area of the plant, moving hundreds of pieces of equipment, making new shipping

Chapter 19. Lean Implementation Strategies and Tactics 397

Characteristics

Focused process improvement

Specific improvement targets

Isolated process improvements

Toyota drives with hoshin kanri

Toyota uses variety of approaches

Some companies use kaizen events

Some companies use Six Sigma process

STRENGTHS

• High interest/support


• Resources usually available


• Bias for action


• Kaizen event approach can make radical
  changes quickly


• Opportunity to convince skeptics in
  kaizen events


• Six Sigma approach uses very rigorous
  statistical analysis


• Can support value stream approach

TRAPS

• Point kaizen with no overall vision/strategy


• No system to support lasting change


• Risk of back-sliding


• Lacks ownership if driven by staff
  function


• Kaizen event approach can become“the
  lean program”


• Six Sigma can lead to analysis paralysis


• Typically projects look for an immediate
  payback which means labor costs giving
  lean and Six Sigma the reputation as
  head-cutting programs.

Figure 19-1. Strengths and traps of kaizen project approach