Lean Six Sigma Kaizen Blitz – Definitions and Generation of a Potential Projects List
Why start with definitions? For several reasons. Have you ever been to a plant that has been doing “Lean” for several years, but all you really see is a lot of 5S? Metrics, flow, standard work, Total Productive Maintenance, Setup Reduction, etc. are ALL missing, but the place sure looks organized! That is how they define LEAN. So definitions are important, because even on the event level, we want an all-encompassing transformation. We will be starting off each email with a short list that will be discussed in that section.
Kaizen: Depending on what publication you pick up, there are several variants of the definition of Kaizen. For our purposes, Kaizen is a team-based focus on continuous improvement.
Blitz: From the German military term Blitzkrieg, a lightning fast strike with power. One of the hardest things that new teams initially deal with is the speed of the change effort of a well-run Kaizen Blitz. So get ready for some fun!
Kaizen Blitz: A 3-7 day intensive team-based effort to achieve significant, systemic change to a system or sub-system. These events follow a formal, proven process to achieve these results.
Scope and Scale: These are project management terms, but are very key to our topic today. Many times we talk about choosing between going wide (scope) and shallow (scale) or narrow (scope again) and deep (scale). In choosing a project for the event, for example, is it more important to go wide, meaning cover a full department for example, but only handling something straightforward, like 5S, or do we need to fully establish as much Lean rigor as possible (going deep) but only in a section of the department? Scope deals with how large a portion of the organization will be affected by the change. Scale refers to the content of the event, or the number of tools that we will need to address.
Lean Methodology: It is assumed that you have a basic understanding of the Lean methodology. If you need a quick review, please search around SayEconomy for some more information.
Where Do We Start?
We first need a list of potential projects that we can use to select our initial events. How do we get that list?
- Value Stream Map (complete with prioritized project list)
- Lean Six Sigma Assessment
- Strategic Plan
- Operating Plan
- Marketing / Sales (Voice of the Customer)
- Internal / External Audit Findings
- Product Development Cycle
- Corrective Action / Preventive Action System
- And Many, Many More!
These are then filtered down to a list of priority projects with expected deliverables, resource requirements, etc. This framework will be used later in the project chartering phase of the Kaizen Blitz, and will also be the starting point as we consider the selection of initial projects to start the transformation effort.
Written by: Charen Smith
We also suggest this relevant article if you have time: Value Stream Mapping (VSM)
Some other similar articles
Tagged as business planning, management, PDCA, process optimization, quality management, strategic management, value stream mapping + Categorized as Business, Economy articles, Ladership & Management