A Grass Roots Approach to Continuous Improvement

Far too often management professionals are caught by the temptation to stay the course, relying on the motto ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.’ But how often do we stand back and ask ourselves ‘it’s not broken, but is it working the way we want it to?’

In this era of competitive marketing, rising costs and changing consumer expectations, continuous improvement is a critical component in any food manufacturers tool kit. Improvement of processes and products seems like a relatively easy concept, and it can be, if you approach it correctly. One may even argue that to start out on an improvement journey, to fail, and to try again is the spirit of continuously improving.

"Remember, Kaizen is built for simplicity and team engagement. It’s not about getting to the end as quickly as possible, it’s a quest to continue chasing perfection; an ongoing journey."

I have participated in many continuous improvement initiatives during my career, from lean six sigma projects involving statistical analysis of data, prediction modelling of process outcomes, to cross functional projects across departments. In my opinion, none are as powerful or garner the same level of excitement and passion on the production floor as the kaizen event will.

The fundamental principle of Kaizen is that small, frequent improvement opportunities will create and maintain a positive continuous improvement culture in your processes. 

Start by going to the place where the work is being done and talk to the team members who are involved, after all, they are the experts. The people performing the work offer a wealth of knowledge in how the process operates, and more importantly to your kaizen goal, they also know those ‘little things’ that contribute to your quality defects, waste generation, downtime, causes for rework, and so on.

Imagine a production line, where the product is being packaged and travelling down a conveyor line to pass through x-ray detection units. You have a suspicion that there is a throughput issue and increased costs of packaging over the last quarter. Rally together the team members who work on the packaging line, as well as the members who operate the packaging equipment and detectors. This gives you one-step forward, one-step backward scope to best find the root cause and improvements.

After the team has watched the process and discussed it there appears to be a sporadic issue with the leading edge of the packages catching on the guiding rails of the conveyor belt. When this happens it causes broken seals and jam ups. The operators of the detectors, not knowing about the issue prior to their workstation say that the detectors regularly reject packages for curled seals and assumed this was caused by the packaging machine itself. Ah ha! This is the gold that you’re looking for. The opportunity to allow team members to address challenges together and identify impacts to subsequent process steps.

Another temptation is to eagerly fix the issue and move on without fully understanding or determining the scope and effect it has been having on the process. Without knowing the current state you can’t measure if your improvements have had a positive effect, or showcase the hard work of the kaizen team. Let’s go back to the production line. 

The team is excited that some opportunities have been identified, and they already have some quick fixes they can try. Now we enter data collection mode. You may have downtime recording in place to quantify the line stop time, defect data from quality control activities to show how often this occurs, or packaging control records to determine how many additional packages are used versus how many you expected to use. If you do not have this information at your disposal, then baseline measures can be started to build this case. This is where some may glaze over and think the process becomes too complicated. Don’t underestimate the power of a simple tally sheet, pictures or even videos to help build the baseline. These tools can be given to the process operators to start recording the instances during their shift, a tick mark for each time the packages get stuck for example. An observation and time study of how long it takes to clear the snag, re-packing the product and re-starting the line would be beneficial to quantify the lost time and costs.

Now that you have team engagement and an accurate picture of the current state, the fun can begin. Encourage the team to make simple, cost effective improvements first to prove their theories. A temporary repair to the line and monitoring over a specific time period can then be used to quantify the success of the improvement, as well as justify the approval to implement a permanent solution. Comparison graphs and charts are a powerful means to visually represent the efforts.

Lastly, don’t forget to showcase and celebrate the wins. This is the spark that will ignite the continuous improvement culture. Remember, Kaizen is built for simplicity and team engagement. It’s not about getting to the end as quickly as possible, it’s a quest to continue chasing perfection; an ongoing journey. Make it fun and inclusive and your continuous improvement culture will flourish.