Continuous Improvement

9 Key excerpts on "Continuous Improvement"

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  eBook - PDF

  Vanishing Boundaries

  How Integrating Manufacturing and Services Creates Customer Value, Second Edition

  • Richard E. Crandall, William R. Crandall(Authors)
  • 2013(Publication Date)
  • CRC Press

    (Publisher)

  Technology may be defined as the construction and use of machines, systems, or engineering. “Socio-technologists,” take a broader view and consider technology meaningful only when it becomes a social fact. 8 We therefore conclude that technology has a wide variety of meanings. In the following sections, we examine subsets of technology to show how technology relates to Continuous Improvement programs. To focus our discussion, we consider technology as consisting of two major categories—tangible products, or “hard” technologies and concepts, or “soft” technologies. The Role of Technology in Continuous Improvement ◾ 281 © 2010 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC The Role of Technology in Continuous Improvement Advances in technology are commonplace today, so we seldom stop to think about what impact technology has had and will have on our lives. Every economy in the industrialized world is experiencing the effect of this phenomenal explosion of technological advances. New technology offers new opportunities and new threats to both individuals and businesses. Those who seize the opportunities will move forward; those who fail will probably not be around to compete in the next decade. The primary use of technology in business and industry is to improve com-petitiveness. At the customer-facing side, it means recognizing the need for new or redesigned products and services. Internally, it includes increasing productivity, improving quality, and enhancing service delivery. We stated previously that tech-nology alone is not the key to productivity improvement. The key to redefining the tasks includes clarifying what needs to be done and eliminating what does not need to be done. This is a good beginning because many organizations apply advanced technology to tasks that do nothing to add value for the customer. When consider-ing the application of technology in operations, Rule 1 is to streamline the tasks before applying higher technology.

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  Total Organizational Excellence

  • John S Oakland(Author)
  • 2007(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  Chapter 13

  Continuousimprovement ___________________

  Key points

  Continuous Improvement involves planning and operating processes, providing inputs, evaluating outputs, examining performance, and modifying processes and their inputs to achieve better performance. This chapter explains the three basic principles of Continuous Improvements: focus on the customer, understand the process and involve the people.

  In Oakland's model for total quality management, the customer–supplier chains form the core which is surrounded by the hard management necessities of a good quality system, tools and teamwork. These need to work together to manage, measure and improve processes continually. Continuous Improvement methods may be used to ‘check’ progress, in terms of commitment, strategies, teamwork, problems and results, and development towards excellence.

  A structured approach to making improvements is provided by the drive model:

  •   define the problem,

  •   review the information,

  •   investigate the problem,

  •   verify the solution, and

  •   execute the change.

  People working in a process must know whether it is capable of meeting the requirements, know whether it is actually doing so at any time, and make corrections when it is not. Simple SPC techniques are used, not only as a tool kit, but as a strategy for reducing variability, part of the Continuous Improvement approach.

  The basic principles of Continuous Improvement

  Continuous Improvement is probably the most powerful concept to guide management. It is a term not well understood in many organizations, although that must begin to change if those organizations are to survive. The concept requires a systematic approach with the following components:

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  Managing Human Capital in Today's Globalization

  A Management Information System Perspective

  • Heru Susanto, Fang-Yie Leu, Chin Kang Chen, Fadzliwati Mohiddin, Heru Susanto, Fang-Yie Leu, Chin Kang Chen, Fadzliwati Mohiddin(Authors)
  • 2019(Publication Date)
  • Apple Academic Press

    (Publisher)

  CHAPTER 14

  Continuous Improvement PROGRAMS: THE DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY ERA OF HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

  ABSTRACT

  Organizations face new opportunities and challenges as the use of technology in organizations to increase their productivity through supporting an IT emerging technology in the era of digital ecosystem, when management information tool to support organizations called by management information system (MIS) is applied. Most organizations are fundamentally supported by MIS to be able to handle various information and business processes smoothly. Here, Continuous Improvement (CI) is a process that involves strategies and goals to improve operation and production processes efficiently and effectively that eventually satisfy customer needs. CI allows people to share their knowledge and experience of learning systematically. Some of the vital elements of CI are all of the people in the organization must be involved from planning until evaluation, it should be a step-by-step approach to achieve goals, and it should be a cycle where the process continues to maintain their quality and productivity. In other hand, Six Sigma also have the concept of focusing on customer satisfaction and eliminating waste to improve efficiency systematically but both practices have a different cycle to achieve their goals. Six Sigma consists of five-step process minimize defects; defining the target customers and their problems, measure its performance, analyze the causes of having performance failure, improve the poor performance, and in control to maintain good performance to have DMAIC as their consistent improvements.

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  Quality into the 21st Century

  Perspectives on Quality and Competitiveness for Sustained Performance

  • Gregory H. Watson, Tito Conti, Yoshio Kondo, Gregory H. Watson, Tito Conti, Yoshio Kondo(Authors)
  • 2003(Publication Date)
  • ASQ Quality Press

    (Publisher)

  PROBE AND LEARN AS AN ALTERNATIVE APPROACH There are, however, alternative ways of thinking about how to creatively build quality improvement through continuous innovation into the develop- ment process. The first step in such thinking is to understand that product From Continuous Improvement to Continuous Innovation 123 development in turbulent sectors, like high tech, is an emergent process in which the premium is on learning and rapid incorporation of that learning into subsequent, as well as previous, development processes. This severely limits the contribution of conventional planning, which is so much the hall- mark of the traditional approach to incorporating quality into the product development process. It also paradoxically encourages the successive gen- eration of error, early and often, as part of the learning process. Implicit in this description, as well, is that product development in a turbulent environment requires that we understand it as a nonlinear process, with both backward and forward movement occurring as the development team often revisits past decisions based on new information and changing circumstances. 30 These conceptions suggest that the task of infusing con- tinuous innovation into the processes of discontinuous change goes well beyond the traditional approach of quality experts, which is to figure out how to apply conventional quality improvement tools to rationalize and streamline the discontinuous change process. It requires understanding con- ceptually what we mean by continuous innovation and developing the tools to implement those new understandings. Under these rapidly changing circumstances with high levels of uncer- tainties and complex interaction effects, problems and error are inevitable. 31 This seems in contrast to conventional quality thinking, which stresses seek- ing the holy grail of prevention.

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  The Lean IT Expert

  Leading the Transformation to High Performance IT

  • Niels Loader(Author)
  • 2018(Publication Date)
  • Productivity Press

    (Publisher)

  Part V Continuous Improvement “ Lasting Improvement is achieved only when people work to higher standards. Maintenance and improvement have thus become inseparable.”  Masaaki Imai Passage contains an image

  25

  Improving   

  This is the most difficult phase to achieve and, more importantly, maintain. The reason is that teams and management will seek to reduce the amount of energy they need to expend. So far, the effort has been considerable, and leaders and teams work to embed habits. As habits set in, the way of working and the choices that are made are no longer or insufficiently challenged. The IT organization that is able to build the habit of challenging, learning and carrying out improvements on a long-term basis is the organization that has reached the Know Why stage and can claim that Lean has become its modus operandi. Both types of kaizen (daily and improvement) must be present in an IT organization for it to continuously improve. As one of the pillars of Lean and Lean IT, ensuring that an IT organization is competent at ensuring Continuous Improvement in line with the interest of the customer(s) is absolutely vital to the success of Lean within IT.

  In this part, we will look at the last piece of the Lean IT Expert puzzle: mastering Continuous Improvement and becoming a Lean IT kaizen lead. The Lean IT kaizen lead is someone who is involved with Lean improvement at any level of the IT organization, in any “ department”  or team.

  Lean is particularly known for its desire to improve using small steps. This is the preferred method because of the relative ease with which small improvements can be achieved. Small steps do not require much effort in managing organizational change. In fact, small changes often feel highly logical, even desirable, for those being asked to incorporate the change into their work. This does not mean that there cannot be situations within a Lean environment where larger changes are necessary. To this end, Lean recognizes three words used to define different types of improvement: kaizen, kaikaku and kakushin.

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  Manufacturing Execution Systems: An Operations Management Approach

  • Tom Seubert, Grant Vokey(Authors)
  • 2020(Publication Date)
  • International Society of Automation

    (Publisher)

  7 Continuous Improvement: Details and Benefits 7.1 Introduction to Continuous Improvement There are those who would use the often-stated cliché that Continuous Improvement (CI) is about the journey, not the destination, and to some extent, this is true. A line of thought that goes along with the journey concept is that the level of improvement obtained by each step must always be worth the expense to achieve that step. This is where Quality and Operations management frequently collide. Those who are Deming purists will state that the benefit will always outweigh the input because of nonmeasurable customer satisfaction characteristics. From an Operations management viewpoint, if you cannot measure it, how do you know you have improved it? The bottom line is that the cost of improvement for a product/process combination must be recoverable within the life of the product, or it will result in a net loss for the company. It can be argued that changes in product characteristics can improve the desirability of the product from the customer perspective, but these issues are under the control of Product Design and Marketing. Therefore, these aspects are outside the scope of this book. From a manufacturing perspective, the only aspects of improvement controlled by operations are the efficiency and the ease with which the product can be made. The ease of making the product is the primary driver for the initiatives of design for manufacturing (DFM) and is a collaboration between manufacturing and product engineering. There will be more on this later in the chapter. In the aspect of process efficiency, you must standardize, standardize, standardize. In the context of the value gained by any improvement, you must know your costs. In a cost/benefit analysis, as previously mentioned, if the cost of improvement is greater than the benefit, then the improvement should probably be avoided and a mitigation strategy should be used instead

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  The Lean Handbook

  A Guide to the Bronze Certification Body of Knowledge

  • Anthony Manos, Chad Vincent, Anthony Manos, Chad Vincent(Authors)
  • 2010(Publication Date)
  • ASQ Quality Press

    (Publisher)

  216 Module 2 Continuous Process Improvement 2.3.5.1 2.3.5.1. Concurrent Engineering The following is an extreme representation of traditional product development. The basic process is one of functional silos where each function operates fairly independently in getting through its tasks, throws the design over the wall to the next silo, and then moves on to the next project. This is thought to create a stream- line flow. However, without joint communication up front, much rework occurs in both product and process design and well into the late release of the design into production. You can see this manifested in transactional services with multiple Concept design Full-scale development Start of production Time Traditional engineering Concurrent engineering Number of design changes Figure 2.3.5-1 Product development life cycle showing concurrent engineering versus traditional engineering. Source: Adapted from Chapman, Bahill, and Wymore (1992). 20–24 months 14–17 months 1–3 months Job #1 +3 months US company Japanese company Design changes Figure 2.3.5-2 Fewer design changes and reduced product development time for the Japanese automobile. Source: Adapted from Hauser and Clausing (1988). 2.3 Continuous Process Improvement Techniques & Practices 217 2.3.5.1 screen queries to get to a decision point versus one screen with the decision data, or in manufacturing with archaic test equipment and processes due to receiving the “final final” requirements after the product is already released to manufacturing. Concurrent engineering utilizes an integrated design team composed of cus- tomers, suppliers, sales and marketing, product and service design, operations, and service and warranty throughout the product or service development cycle. A concurrent engineering team reviews requirements, matches process capability with design needs, and jointly manages each project through a series of design gates to ensure efficient and effective progress.

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  Your Customers' Perception of Quality

  What It Means to Your Bottom Line and How to Control It

  • Baboo Kureemun, Robert Fantina(Authors)
  • 2011(Publication Date)
  • Productivity Press

    (Publisher)

  The success of this modus operandi resides in the ability of the organization to assimilate a culture of Continuous Improvement that supports, deep down in its fabric, continued high customer percep-tion of quality. SIX-STEP Continuous Improvement APPROACH A constant cycle of Continuous Improvement typically consists of six steps: * 1. Embrace a vision of Continuous Improvement by understanding the high-level objectives. 2. Assess the current situation to obtain an accurate, unbiased snap-shot of where the organization is right now with respect to business, organization, people, process, and technology. Use this information to determine how customers perceive the quality of your product or service. 3. Understand and agree on the priorities for improvement (see Chapter 5, “A Framework to Derive the Right Investments”). The * George Spalding, Continual Service Improvement Book (ITIL) (Norwich, England: The Stationary Office, 2007). PAUSE AND REFLECT 6.1 How much does your company annually invest in Continuous Improvements that are meaningful to the customer? How much of these investments provide components that are reused? Managing a Journey of Continuous Improvement • 101 full vision may be years away, but this step provides specific goals and a manageable timeframe. 4. Work out the detailed game plan to achieve the next level of improvements (see Chapter 5, “A Framework to Derive the Right Investments”). 5. Verify that measurements and metrics are in place to ensure that milestones are achieved, process compliance is high, and business objectives and priorities are met by the round of improvements (see Chapter 7, “Metrics That Prove the Worth of the Initiatives”). 6. Ensure that the momentum for continuous quality improvement is maintained by assuring that the changes become embedded in the organization (see Chapter 8, “Delivering a Capability to Sustain a Customers’ Perception of Quality Function”).

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  Managing Operations

  • Bob Johnson, Alan Hart(Authors)
  • 2007(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  Total Quality Management, Butterworth-Heinemann, 1989)

  The need for innovation on an unprecedented scale is a given. The question is how. It seems that giving the market free rein, inside and outside the firm, is the best – perhaps the only – satisfactory answer.

  (Tom Peters, Liberation Management, Macmillan, 1992)

  Technology and economics is a potent blend. It is the premise to this book that from that blend all sorts of changes ensue.

  (Charles Handy, The Age of Unreason, Hutchinson, 1989)

  Processes are how the organization delivers outputs to the customer. The closer the fit between what the customer wants and what you deliver, the more successful you are likely to be in securing and retaining customers. But as we have seen, organizations are operating in an environment of constant change – in the marketplace, in their immediate environment, in technology, and, most importantly, in what their customers want and expect from them. It is not enough simply to keep an eye on existing processes and solve the occasional problem. The goal posts are moving; so it is a question of constantly readjusting your aim to stay on target. (Teresa Riley, Understanding Business Process Management, Pergamon, 1997)

  ‘I'm all in favour of that’, commented our marketing manager. ‘If Continuous Improvement means bringing our products closer to what the customer wants, that makes my job easier. The products will be easier to promote. Customers will be more satisfied. Yes, I like that.’

  The marketing manager is right, of course – but only up to a point. As you would expect from earlier contributions, he is missing important aspects of the total picture.

  As pointed out earlier, Continuous Improvement is essential to organizational survival. But it is not simply to do with achieving a better fit between customer needs and the product or service provided by the operation, important though this is. In addition, Continuous Improvement is a process intended to:

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