What is Kaizen?

Kaizen is a daily process, the purpose of which goes beyond simple productivity improvement. It is also a process that, when done correctly, humanizes the workplace, eliminates overly hard work (muri), and teaches people how to perform experiments on their work using a '7 Steps Approach' and how to learn to spot and eliminate waste in business processes. In all, the process suggests a humanized approach to workers and to increasing productivity:  Successful implementation requires "the participation of workers in the improvement. People at all levels of an organization participate in kaizen. The format for kaizen can be individual, suggestion system, small group, or large group. At Toyota, it is usually a local improvement within a workstation or local area and involves a small group in improving their own work environment and productivity. This group is often guided through the kaizen process by a line supervisor; sometimes this is the line supervisor's key role. While kaizen (at Toyota) usually delivers small improvements, the culture of continual aligned small improvements and standardization yields large results in the form of compound productivity improvement.

Kaizen methodology includes making changes and monitoring results, then adjusting. Large-scale pre-planning and extensive project scheduling are replaced by smaller experiments, which can be rapidly adapted as new improvements are suggested.

In modern usage, a focused kaizen that is designed to address a particular issue over the course of a week is referred to as a "kaizen blitz" or "kaizen event".

TOP Q have managed Kaizen Blitzes for Ford, Jaguar, Kawasaki, Hitachi and Mitsubishi. The blitzes have ranged form reducing changeover time, to a reduction in paper usage. In all cases, the cost of staging the blitz has been far outweighed by the benefits generated.