What is the best way to record an improvement activity or Kaizen?

[Tapish]

We recently completed a Kaizen to improve cycle time by reducing waiting and walking. What is the best way to record this activity for reporting and future use.

 

[Bev D]

I have found a simple before and after flowchart with a summary of the changes and the cycle time improvement is best. Keep it simple.

 

[Golfman25]

Do you have a corrective/preventative action system in place? Maybe drop it in there and use the 8d type corrective action form.

Or use a continuous improvement log and/or form.

 

[Bev D]

Although you didn’t say what kind of Kaizen you performed I want to clarify for the general audience.
There are two kinds of “Kaizen”.
A true Kaizen (as performed in Toyota Production System) is a small quick improvement. 1-2 things are corrected and it takes only a few minutes. A true Kaizen is not recorded (except for an update to a standard work document)
A Kaizen ‘event’ or Kaizen Blitz is a long event that changes many things. An event can last days and involves large changes including moving equipment…this should be recorded in some fashion.

 

[Tapish]

Although you didn’t say what kind of Kaizen you performed I want to clarify for the general audience.
There are two kinds of “Kaizen”.
A true Kaizen (as performed in Toyota Production System) is a small quick improvement. 1-2 things are corrected and it takes only a few minutes. A true Kaizen is not recorded (except for an update to a standard work document)
A Kaizen ‘event’ or Kaizen Blitz is a long event that changes many things. An event can last days and involves large changes including moving equipment…this should be recorded in some fashion.

We did a second one which involved rearrangement of work flow and moving of equipments.

 

[Tapish]

Do you have a corrective/preventative action system in place? Maybe drop it in there and use the 8d type corrective action form.

Or use a continuous improvement log and/or form.

We do have 8D CAPA system. Maybe we would use this. Thank you.

 

[Steve Prevette]

Personally, I like the A3 report for reporting out an improvement effort. A3 report | Lean Six Sigma Group

 

[Miner]

We use a home-grown project tracking database that also documents the financial and other benefits (e.g., lead time, RTYL, etc.) of projects of various types. Finance vets all of the financial savings and pulls the savings monthly to use in the monthly financial reports.

 

[Victory]

We recently completed a Kaizen to improve cycle time by reducing waiting and walking. What is the best way to record this activity for reporting and future use.

Hi,
It depends on what your goal is for recording the improvement. Is this for sharing with others, compliance, financials or something else?

There are many forms of capturing or recording improvements, but it depends on why you want to do this.