This week I realized the power of incremental improvement also applies to enrolling a Lean program, for instance implementing 6S. For over a year, there has been discussion between the different production teams concerning the perfect lay-out for all materials in the production hall. Consensus was never reached, which in practice means nothing was standardized and the 6S program got stuck.
Since four months, we organize a Lean day, when operators from each of the production teams come together for a whole day to speed up our Lean Implementation. In the first three months, we standardized only 2 or 3 items per day, for instance a shadow board or three locations for packaging materials, hence, small steps each month
In the 5th month, the small steps led to the operators noticing the changes and experiencing the positive side of a clean and organized workstation. Operators implement kaizens themselves to speed up the 6S implementation process by assigning fixed locations for other parts and products, one at a time. The kaizens lead to constructive discussions between the shifts and within months we will have a standardized la-out with consensus of all production teams!
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