The "What's Holding Back Lean" article from Managing Automation magazine incorporates the results of a survey that the Lean Enterprise Institute (LEI) did on factors preventing lean implementation. It is discouraging that the top 4 obstacles are basically unchanged since last year. The top factors cited in the article are below with some quotes that stunned me.
Lack of Top-Management Commitment
"There's so much pressure for profits on a quarterly basis. CEOs keep looking for quick fixes, and lean isn't a quick fix." -- Pam Lopker, president of ERP software vendor QAD Inc.
"When leadership drives it, everyone aligns around lean." -- Bill Steenburgh, senior vice president of Xerox Services
A Short-sighted Focus on Cost Reduction
"Manufacturers in North America are looking to outsource to China to reduce labor costs. They haven't focused much on process improvement in recent years. We're letting our companies be run by finance too much. The CFO says: "I can cut that cost by outsourcing to China." That bypasses the discussion. That seems like less risk or less work than really looking at continuous process improvement. But they're missing out on significant long-term benefits." -- Pam Lopker
"Responding to profit imperatives, many companies are concentrating only on reducing costs rather than looking to lean as a source of greater efficiencies (and, therefore, profits)." -- Lauren Gibbons Paul, Contributing Editor Managing Automation
"They think their razor blade only costs a quarter of a cent because they got a million out of the machine that day, but that says nothing about whether it meets the customer or market's needs. Lean means using the equipment as sensibly as possible." -- Pam Lopker
Emphasis on Imagery Rather Than Real Work
U.S. managers keep themselves at arm's length from the production floor, ... "They go to the conference room and write on whiteboards for a while and then they go back to their desks and do e-mail. Japanese managers go to the point of value, the gemba. They constantly walk the factory floor." -- Jim Womack, founder and president of the Lean Enterprise Institute
"You can't truly understand a problem without going and seeing it for yourself, no matter what level you are ... so you can ask the right questions and drill down to the root cause." -- Parker Shannon, project manager for manufacturing at Toyota
Reluctance to Empower Workers
"[In the U.S.], the operator has no incentive to work with management. But he can probably tell you 15 ways to improve the process," -- Dennis Cocco, president and CEO of Activplant Corp
"We monitor the machines to understand where breakdowns occur. The goal is to reduce the breakdowns by changing our preventive maintenance and figuring out where we need to spend to increase the performance of that line. We use this data to empower the hourly folks who have the most knowledge so they can make better decisions." -- Greg Fell, IT manager, North American manufacturing, Ford motor Company
Wow! But you can see that progress is being made by some of the quotes. The answer to the survey question on levels of lean implementation reveals that only 4% have advanced lean implementation and another 29% have extensive implementation. This is discouraging for a philosophy that points an enterprise in the direction of their customers to be so sparsely implemented. Are you in the 33% improving profits by using lean?
Take a look at the article for the more detailed survey results from LEI, they are interesting.