Basic Concept of LEAN Methodology

By the Oxford dictionary when we use the term Lean as an adjective for a person or animal it means that person or animal is thin, especially healthy so; no extra fat in the body. In the same way LEAN methodology works in the industry, if any industry is practicing Lean principles it means the industry is continually improving its process by removing waste (MUDA) and non-value added activities (MURA & MURI).

The concept of lean is quite old it was started by Sakichi Toyoda (the founder of TOYODA Industries) in 1902 when he first created a concept of JIDOKA which advocates the principle of single man multiple machine and stop @ abnormality. Then in 1937 Kiichiro Toyoda son of Sakichi Toyoda started another company with the name of Toyota Motor Corporation, where he invented the concept of JIT (Just-In-Time). In 1950 an engineer named Taiichi Ohno from Toyoda industries was brought over to the automotive side and his work was to bring together the concept of JIDOKA & JIT.

The Lean Training program cover all the principles of lean methodology, basically lean can further drill down in two other concepts first is the TPS (Toyota Production System) and the second one is VSM (Value Stream Mapping). If one wants to implement lean in his industry than he should have to understand the concept of Toyota Production System (TPS) and Value Stream Mapping (VSM). The Toyota Production System (TPS) in itself is a very large topic which covers all the principles related to a good manufacturing practice (GMP) some of the principles of Toyota Production System are Just-in-time (JIT), JIDOKA, 5S, KAIZEN, KANBAN, Standardized work, Visual control & Mistake proofing. All these concepts help in tracing out and to reduce the waste in existing processes. Removal of waste makes a process lean and efficient in other words an improved and efficient process.

The second main concept of lean methodology is Value Stream Mapping (VSM) concepts of VSM was given by Shigeo Shingo & Taiichi Ohno, this concept work on removal of non value added activities from any existing process and help in re-design a new and improved process. In Value Stream Mapping first we understood the process flow and we record the time for each activity in that process. Then we draw the process diagram by using Value Stream Mapping icons once the Value Stream Mapping (VSM) diagram ready than we trace out the non-value added activities (on the basis of excess time, excess movement, excess motion, excess transportation & excess inventory) from that Value Stream Mapping (VSM) diagram and root out all non-value added activities by using Toyota Production System (TPS) techniques after removing the non-value added activities we re-design the new, improved & efficient process.

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