8 reasons behind failure of Lean Program

All strategies and activities have been perfectly designed. All resources have been budgeted and prepared. Meetings have been undertaken to determine the area of ​​improvement. Everyone is excited to start running the latest Lean Six Sigma project in the company.



The points out the eight major sins that generally occur in companies that run the Lean Six Sigma project.

What are the 8 reasons? Here they are:

Seeing Lean as a collection of projects

1. 
   
   Many companies are stuck with the assumption that Lean is just like doing business as usual, but with some additional Kaizen activities. If so, do not be surprised if the results of the improvement is not maximal and only temporary survive.

Thinking of "Buying" Lean

1. 
   
   Some companies have the wrong view of Lean as a commodity to buy. By spending millions of dollars, they think they can become a Lean company. In one of his articles, Waddell once discussed "... a company investing 400,000 dollars to introduce 90 Lean Manufacturing program points. "How can a company pay 400,000 dollars then turn into a Lean company? Technology and software are only a support in the business towards Lean enterprise. Man is the most important.

Look at Lean as a collection of tools

1. 
   
   This is the sin that most often makes the company fall. Many companies see Lean as a collection of tools, techniques, tricks in the factory that do not even change anything on the management side. It makes sense to say that what you get is what you manage. If you manage a business the same way, then you will get the same results. Change the management system and you will get different results. As simple as that.

Stuck in process improvement that (a) is in no way a process or (b) should be omitted instead of fixed

1. 
   
   For the first case (a), it is very common to find people define a set of activities in the middle of an end-to-end process and say that the "process" has been fixed. In fact, all they do is "move" waste to the beginning or end of the process. In the second case (b), it is very common to see people improve the material handling or quality inspection process, where they should eliminate it, or find ways to reduce the cost of handling paperwork or meeting rather than realizing that paperwork or meetings should be completely eliminated.

Choose the Lean method

1. 
   
   Very commonly, companies ignore the respect for employees because it is difficult to do, and start 5S because it is easiest to do. Lean is an integrated and comprehensive approach to running a business. You can not choose a little Lean concept that you like, and leave others because it's hard to do or understand.

Misunderstandings about Lean

1. 
   
   Believe it or not, Lean which means "lean" often leads to misunderstandings. Very often "improvement" is defined as improvement by reducing labor costs directly by reducing labor. This understanding is completely misguided and deviates from Lean's fundamental point. Note this: Lean is about waste elimination, and waste is all that does not add value to customers. Will reducing workforce add value to customers? Reducing cycle time is the main target, and few companies actually pursue this target.

Excessive reliance on Lean consultants and coordinators

1. 
   
   The fault is that companies are used to looking at Lean as a work that specialists can only do, instead of making lean thinking a fundamental part of everyone's work. In addition to Lean's consultant and coordinator, everyone works as usual, with no changes.

Top management ignorance

Although the company has announced their commitment to Lean, publish it extensively, and strategic Lean carefully, but how much time does top management use to learn Lean deeper? How much do they understand about the company's "strategy" itself?

Do not let you commit the 8 sins, because the company that failed to run Lean is generally trapped in it. Please add your own version in the comments field