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The FMEA Tool (Failure, Modes, Effects, Analysis) is a powerful tool available to a Lean Six Sigma practitioner. The tool is extensively used where a safety critical environment exists, such as the aerospace or automotive industry. The tool allows a team the ability to design quality and safety into processes or products on the front end of the environment, eliminating potential problems before they occur.

Real Kaizen thinking is based on making these little changes on a regular basis: always improving productivity, safety and effectiveness while reducing waste.  The western philosophy is often summarized as, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." However, the Kaizen philosophy is to "do it better, make it better, improve it even if it isn't broken, because if we don't, we can't compete with those who do."

Good team effort to come up with this one.

How many handoffs are there within each process? How visible are the key performance indicators - cost, quality, delivery, and safety - to each person working in the department? Does each process have a clear owner? How much and how often do people have to rework the information that they receive from their upstream colleagues? How often and how long do people (or customers) have to wait for information? How many different ways are there of doing a job (i.e., do you have standard work for each function)?

A good reminder that during our Gemba walks we need to notice safety issues.

5S is the systematic integration of all of the facets of manufacturing in the workplace in a manner that assures the best cost, optimum flow, perfact quality and absolute safety.  As this chart shows, straightening and sweeping is nothing more than a superficial, final step after the work place has been holistically designed and put in place.

What do you get when you combine free and Lean?  Well, the FreeLeanSite.com. Jay Watson is the Lean thinker behind this site. It grew from a passion of implementing Lean on the shop floor at companies like Motorola, Honeywell, and General Electric. He started the site to make "lean thinking" concepts of continuous improvement highly accessible for practitioners in North America. Our primary focus is on accelerating the developmental process, sustaining the effort, and most importantly - driving for results. The majority of the training modules are absolutely free to download and modify as needed. A management improvement process focused on elements of Safety, Quality, and Speed of Execution provides a framework for action. The site has four major sections to aid in finding the right resource: Jay also provides some advice on implementing Lean by defining a Lean Roadmap.The roadmap consists of the following three phases: PHASE 1 (GET READY): PLANNING FOR IMPROVEMENT PHASE II (GET SET): CONDUCTING A PILOT PROGRAM PHASE III (GO!): TEAM PROBLEM SOLVING/ SKILLS DEVELOPMENT I have been truly amazed by the sheer amount of Lean related material that Jay has compiled.  This is a great resource for learning on your own or sharing with your team.

"Don't be afraid to give up the good for the great." - John D. Rockefeller An essential element in Lean thinking is Kaizen.  Kaizen is the Japanese word for continuous improvement or change for the better.  As no process can ever be declared perfect, there is always room for improvement.  Kaizen involves building on gains by continuing experimentation and innovation. The cycle of kaizen activity can be defined as: Standardize process Measure the standardized process Analyze measurements against requirements Innovate to meet requirements and increase productivity Standardize the new, improved process Continue cycle infinitely Kaizen involves every employee - from upper management to operators. Everyone is encouraged to come up with small improvement suggestions on a regular basis. This is not a once a month or once a year activity. It is continuous. Kaizen is based on making little changes on a regular basis: always improving productivity, safety and effectiveness while reducing waste.  The western philosophy is often summarized as, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." However, the Kaizen philosophy is to "do it better, make it better, improve it even if it isn't broken, because if we don't, we can't compete with those who do."

"Don't be afraid to give up the good for the great." - John D. Rockefeller

Sample from Fault Tree Analysis eBook. Developing a Fault Tree in the manner shown in the previous pages is very useful in that everyone is forced to think through logical ways in which events may interact with one another in a complex manner to create an unacceptable incident. However, it can be seen that a tree could quickly become difficult to follow and understand as more events and gates are added. Inspection of Figures 11 and 12 does not give any immediate insights, apart from the hint that AND Gates should be inserted into the Safeguards section. Download the complete book at https://bin95.com/ebooks/fault-tree-analysis.htm