Kaizen refers to ongoing improvement involving everyone in an organization. It emphasizes a culture of supporting quality improvement through problem solving over the use of specific tools. The philosophy and systems behind the Japanese quality movement center around Kaizen. Process-oriented thinking and continuous incremental improvement differ from Western result-oriented and innovation-focused management. Key aspects of Kaizen culture include adopting a customer-driven and collaborative approach to cross-functional problem solving.

1. Kaizen
今井正明

2. • Kaizen
– Ongoing improvement involves everyone
• Top management
• Managers
• Workers
– A culture of supporting quality improvement
• more important than the use of any specific tools

3. • Kaizen
– The unifying thread running through
• The philosophy
• The systems
• The problem-solving tools developed
of Japanese quality movement

4. Japanese ≠ Kaizen

6. • Japanese management
– Kaizen
– Process-oriented way
of thinking
• Western management
– Innovation
– Result-oriented
thinking

7. • Climate features innovation
– Rapid expending markets
• Increasing sales more important than reducing cost
– Consumers oriented more toward quantity
rather than quality
– Abundant and low-cost resources
– A belief that success with innovative product
will offset sluggish performance

8. • Climate favors Kaizen
– Sharp increase in the costs of material, energy,
and labor
– Overcapacity of production facilities
– Increasing competitions
– 資訊不對稱的消失
– Need to introduce new products more rapidly
– Need to lower the breakeven point

9. • Kaizen Culture
– A corporate culture in which everyone can
freely admit these problems
– A systematic and collaborative approach to
cross-functional problem-solving
• Internal, Next process is customer
• External, suppliers

10. • Kaizen Culture
– A customer-driven strategy for improvement
• Quality, cost, schedule, and delivery requirements
– Emphasis on process
• Result is not the only thing and everything
• Support and acknowledge people’s process-oriented
efforts for improvement

11. Kaizen and management
Innovation
Kaizen
Maintenance
Top
Mgnt
Middle
Mgnt
Supervisor Worker

12. • QC Circles
– Primarily focus on
• Cost, safety, and productivity
• Indirectly to product-quality improvement
– Account for only 10% - 30% of the overall
TQC efforts in Japanese companies
– Making improvements in the workplace

13. • TQC in Japan
– A movement center on the improvement of
managerial performance at all levels

14. TQC
• Quality assurance
• Cost reduction
• Meeting production
quotas
• Meeting delivery
schedules
• Safety
• New product
development
• Productivity
improvement
• Supplier management

15. • Process-Oriented management vs Result-
Oriented management
– Evaluation the performance of employee
• car sales in Taiwan
– 2006, 400,000 cars
– 2007, 200,000 cars? (optimistic estimates)
http://www.kuozui.com.tw
國瑞汽車

16. – Risks of result-oriented management
• Lacking long term strategy
• Missing new ideas and innovation

17. – Process-oriented management
• Evaluation of quality control circles
– Numbers of problems solved
» NOT the amount of money saved
– How the problems are approached
» Do they considered the company’s current situation
» Do they consider safety, quality, and cost
» Do they improve work standard
• Directed at people’s efforts
• Managers need to work with employees jointly

18. • Manager’s job
– Maintenance-related administration
• Checking the performance (result) of work
– Improvement-related management
• Checking the process that has led to a specific result

19. Key phrases of TQC
• Speak with data, 數據會說話
• Quality first, not profit first
• Quality at source, 源頭管理
• The next process is the customer
• Customer-oriented TQC
• TQC starts with training and ends with
training

20. • Speak with data
– Emphasize the use of data
However, aware of
• False data,
• Mistaken data,
• Immeasurable

21. • Quality First
– Customers are satisfied with the quality of
products or services
• Building quality into product
• Building quality into people
– Training is essential
» Help employee become KAIZEN-conscious

22. • Quality First
– Making the top quality products
– At the low cost
– In large quantity
– From the very beginning

23. • Quality at source
– Ask “why” 5 times
• The real cause of a machine stoppage
– Question 1: Why did the machine stop?
– Answer 1: Because the fuse blew due to an overload
– Question 2: Why was there an overload?
– Answer 2: Because the bearing lubrication was
inadequate.
– Question 3: Why was the lubrication inadequate?
– ……

24. • The next process is the customer
– Mass production age
• The person making the products neither knows nor
care who the customers are
– The design engineer’s customers
• The manufacturing people
• (End customers)

25. • Customer-oriented TQC,
– Not manufacturer-oriented TQC
– Build a system for designing, developing,
producing, and servicing products to satisfy
their customers
• 華航 – 退票作業
– 要求旅客繳回機票正本
– 不告訴旅客如何 follow up
– Cf. 以客為尊 ?

26. • TQC starts with training and ends with
training
– Building quality into people

27. • Cross-functional management to facilitate
Kaizen
– “Quality at source” means TQC should be
extended to include
• Vendors
• Suppliers
• subcontractors

28. • Follow the PDCA cycle
– Problem-solving
– Management
• Design – Plan: product design corresponds to the
planning phase of management
• Production – Do: making products as designed
• Sale – Check: customers satisfied?
• Research – Action: how to approach complaints

29. – Not PDCF
• Plan
• Do
• Check
• Fight/fire!
• No layoff policy
– Virginia Mason Medical Center,
Seattle, WA
– 改善造就『冗員』
• Redeploys employees
– Training
• Kaizen Promotion Office
– Toyota’s suppliers support center

30. • Use the QC story to persuade
– Case study of shortening telephone waiting
time
• kaizenStory.doc

31. • Standardize the results
– There can be no improvement where there are
no standards
– A way of spreading the benefits of
improvement throughout the organization

32. Cross-Functional Management
• Building a better system for
– Quality
– Cost
– Scheduling
• Resolving inter-unit conflict on
– Quality
– Cost
– Schedule

33. Quality
Cost
scheduling
Production
planning
Design
Production
preparation
Production
And
purchasing
Marketing
Top management
Strategy & planning
Administrativ
e

34. Involvement
100%
50%
0%
Marketing
Engineering
production
Idea
development
Design
development
Model
development
Trialrun
Ideal Product Development

35. • Cross Functional Management at Toyota
– Clarify its quality goals and deploy them to all
employees at every level
– Establish a system of close coordination among
different department
• toyotaXfun.doc