How To Implement A Kanban?
One of the most popular implementations in companies all of the World is the implementation of Lean Manufacturing, and most of the corporate industry has implemented lean manufacturing methods. Lean processes include kaissen and Kanban methods. Even small organizations are implementing these new methods.
All large corporations have some sort of lean system in place but now even small businesses want to implement lean manufacturing into their business. The problem lies in that small business don’t have the funds to bring in a specialist to implement lean manufacturing, so what they have to do is attend a few seminars and then implement lean manufacturing into their business. And along with lean manufacturing, other methods including Kanban and Kaissen can also be included. But all methods rely on each other and cannot function without lean manufacturing as a whole being implemented.
Lean manufacturing is implemented by forming teams within each department and these team members are taught how the lean manufacturing system works and communication is developed between teams. The one person that is best trained in the lean manufacturing method is then in charge of training everyone else within the group.
What areas you decide to integrate the lean process into your business depends on the overall analisys you have made. This corporate analysis will determine which areas need to be worked on, including departments like production, maintenance, sales engineering, shipping and administrative. The whole company should be analyzed. But the important thing is to start. You will need to make changes along the way and the process will continually grow with the company.
A method used within the lean process is KanBan which in Japanese means a visible thing, and this visible thing helps streamline the production of a product and changes many products into one product. This visible thing can take on the form of an electronic signal. It can even be a bin, a pallet, etc. In an ideal lean system you would produce a product in a quantity of one and follow it all the way to delivery to the client. But a company cannot just produce one product so the kanban takes the place of “one” by being one sequence, one bin of a certain quantity, one pallet of a certain quantity.
The kanban method helps you manage inventory or processes; they allow you to know what is in stock and what has been shipped very easily, because each kanban has a certain number of products within. Even when you use an electronic signal you know how many of a product is shipping and how many are produced. As an example, lets assume the kanban is an electronic signal and you are producing refrigerators. If you implement a signal for 20 refrigerators going through the installation of thermal insulation, then you know that the next production area receives 20 refrigerators, etc.
The Kanban system does not really work on its own without the implementation of a whole lean production system. The whole organization needs to be in place, regarding every department and equipment for the Kanban to work.
The Lean Manufacturing Production System works on the whole corporation and within this process lie other smaller processes like Kanban. You cannot have one system without the other system, just as you cannot implement a lean manufacturing production system without methods like the Kanban and Kaisen methods.
Filed under: Management