The essence of Lean
Thinking is the identification and elimination of waste in any and all
administrative and manufacturing processes in any production system.
Waste is any element or activity in the production system
that does not provide value to the customer. Value is
anything that the customer is willing to pay for. Customers
pay for the final product so they deserve price reductions achieved
through cost reductions gained from eliminating wastes in the order
fulfillment process. Waste elimination is an immediate, often simple,
strategy to impress customers, cut operating costs and improve profit
margins.
A jobshop, like any other
manufacturing facility, contains waste in its administrative and
manufacturing processes, and therefore has numerous opportunities to
eliminate those wastes. However, a jobshop is unlike the assembly
facility of an OEM like Toyota, Ford, Maytag, Alcoa, Boeing (or their
top-tier suppliers). Each jobshop requires an appropriate Lean
“Lean Toolkit”, and a flexible approach for application of those tools in
order to address specific opportunities with respect to its customer
base, organizational culture and leadership.
Jobshop Lean (JSLEAN)
provides concepts, tools and implementation strategies for the
deployment of Lean Thinking in jobshops, where many of the standard best
practices of Lean, as embodied in the Toyota Production System, do not
address the triple challenges of achieving flexibility, agility,
adaptability and reconfigur ability.
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