Circuits Assembly - November 2007 - (Page 57)

Establishing a Kaizen Culture On "Trystorming," and why "best" is not “better” for the long term. mall, steady, incremental. At face value, these adjectives may not appear best to stimulate, motivate and excite a workforce. But in the tradition of Lean manufacturing principles, these are the keys to creating a Kaizen culture. Kaizen is a Japanese term used to describe the process of gradual and orderly continuous improvement. At Solectron, it has become part of the very fabric of our company. To be clear, creating a Kaizen culture isn’t for the faint of heart. However, to effectively deploy Lean Six Sigma techniques across an organization and unleash the power of just-in-time manufacturing, that’s exactly what it takes: a cultural transformation. How does a company create the vision for a Kaizen culture and ensure long-term cohesiveness? In the 1990s, Solectron* won two Malcolm Baldridge Awards for quality. About four years ago, Solectron began its Lean journey to take its quality processes to a new performance level. From the start, Solectron senior management envisioned that there is never a “best” way of doing things. Instead, Solectron associates were empowered to always look for a “better” way. Companies must incorporate three fundamental practices to begin the process of creating a Kaizen culture: • Management and shop-floor synergy. The initiative must emanate from the CEO, who demonstrates the passion, willingness and stomach to make a cultural shift through his or her commitment to invest in people and processes. From the ground up, all employees need to embrace the vision and be dedicated to making continuous, incremental improvements. • Process and results. By creating a holistic process to a problem, employees are able to visually identify, analyze and assess whether a Kaizen event provided a better solution. If the intended objective was not met, employees must return to the original process, revisit opportunities and provide alternative solutions. • Trystorming. Solectron married brainstorming with action to see if an idea would work. We call this “trystorming,” and it gives everyone an opportunity to visually see the problem and try solutions. An early trystorming activity led to implementation of U-cell manufacturing lines for system configuration operations. This approach provides many benefits, not the least Lean Manufacturing S of which is greater flexibility to quickly configure lines based on production demand. Also, less floor space is needed to produce the same number of units. Kaizen in Action While one cannot measure the impact of culture in mathematical models, tools can be used that measure the progress of how adoption of processes affects Lean Six Sigma deployment throughout the organization. First, it is important for leadership to create a consistent approach to track and monitor Lean adoption, ensuring proper review of the initiatives at site, regional and global levels. For example, Solectron uses a Lean Maturity Tracker, which evaluates 17 elements of Lean deployment progress in the area of Lean leadership, Lean fundamentals, end-to-end pull and zero defects (Jidoka). All are underscored by production levelloading, or Heijunka, as the foundation. This type of tracker ensures organized practices around all Lean initiatives. As part of the Lean fundamentals and ensuring continuous improvement, we also established Kaizen workshops. These events normally begin about five to six weeks before any Kaizen event begins, which requires the project scope be outlined thoroughly and a cross-functional team formed to match project requirements. Next, the team creates a value stream map, which looks at the entire manufacturing line and tags each process within the line with either a green (value-add process), red (non value-add) or yellow (value-enabler, such as a regulatory requirement) dot. The red dots are seen as opportunities for improvement in a Kaizen event. Finally, the team goes to the shop floor directly to processes that are flagged red, so they can evaluate the situation based on facts. We call this the 3G (Genba, Genbutsu, Genjitsu) approach, which guides decision-making by always looking at the: • Genba (place or workspace). • Genbutsu (real thing or actual product). • Genjitsu (real data, specific problem). The team uses a methodology to generate as many possibilities for addressing the improvement opportunity. Each idea is assessed based on the agreed criteria. The idea that has the highest score is then put into action through trystorming. By putting the problem on the table in the exact Marty Neese is executive vice president, Operations and Siew Mui (S.M.) Kong is senior vice president, functional excellence at Flextronics (flextronics.com). circuitsassembly.com Circuits Assembly NOVEMBER 2007 57 http://flextronics.com http://circuitsassembly.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Circuits Assembly - November 2007

Circuits Assembly - November 2007 Contents Caveat Lector Industry News Market Watch Talking Heads Focus on Business Global Sourcing On the Forefront Screen Printing Better Manufacturing Pb-Free Manufacturing from a Tier III EMS Perspective ‘Living Documents, Subject to Change’ Creating Ideal Solder Joints An Alternative Drying Process for MSDs ‘Customer Satisfaction is More than a Score’ Optoelectronic Substrates: Will They Happen? Tech Tips Wave Soldering Process Doctor Test and Inspection Getting Lean Materials World Equipment Advances Product Spotlight Assembly Insider Technical Abstracts Ad Index

Circuits Assembly - November 2007

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