B... Business Conditions

When we visit factories, especially when we're in a group, there's always someone who asks "but isn't that really Lean? They don't have any visuals" (or Kaizen, or Kanban... you choose!).

Apart from the fact that it's often difficult to see what's right in front of your nose[1], I've learnt that it's essential above all to understand the business conditions in order to be able to 'read' what we see in a factory. The example that stuck in my mind during my Japan Tour in Fukuoka, in the Lexus environment, was that it makes no sense to compare a Lexus factory with a Daihatsu factory, even though both are part of the Toyota sphere. Lexus produces top-of-the-range cars, designed for the American market, with strong competition from European manufacturers in the same market. The Daihatsu plant we visited produces entry-level vehicles, mainly for the domestic market and emerging countries. At Lexus, quality management is obsessive, to a degree that I have never seen elsewhere, and the Kaizen approach to product innovation is evident in both the parent plant and the subcontractors. At Daihatsu, all the energy is focused on controlling costs. The 2 factories are completely different.

Last month, I had the opportunity to make the same observation. Between two Toyota subcontractors who produce the same type of parts (stamped metal parts), the subcontractor who only works for Toyota and doesn't design the parts he makes, is doing a fantastic job of developing his flexibility, by constantly improving SMED, and his quality. The other subcontractor, which has several non-Toyota customers and engineers its own parts, has focused very strongly on product innovation, in order to win and keep customers in very different markets. The 2 plants have nothing in common either... although the same TPS principles apply.

The 'scaffolding[2]' of Lean technology is used to build the 'house' that needs to be designed in line with business conditions. There are standard Lean tools (no need to reinvent the kanban principle, it works very well and has done for decades), but there is no such thing as a 'standard' Lean factory. To look at and 'read' the Gemba, you need to understand the business first.

Cécile Roche

[1] Particularly Kaizen, which we Westerners look for in the form of major "projects" rather than where it really is, but I'll talk more about that in the letter K...

[2]  Thanks to Michael Ballé, I'm used to comparing the lean tools, kanban, heijunka boxes, etc... what one of my former bosses used to call "lean technology" to a scaffolding, which needs to be built quickly and without reinventing principles that have been known for a very long time, and which must be used to build the "house", i.e. the factory, the project, the service... which needs to be improved in the light of the business and customer challenges.