Lean concepts example

Project 10, an example of Lean Engineering Education at De La Salle University, involved the application of lean concepts and tools to improve the production process of a soap manufacturing company. 

Lean Concepts Opportunities for Safety Professionals Applied lean concepts are to eliminate waste, improve efficiency, and lower production costs. Elements of waste that should be addressed in the lean process are the direct and ancillary costs of accidents. This chapter Discusses the origin of lean concepts and how broadly they are being applied Gives examples of lean applications in which hazards and risks were not addressed Comments on the opportunity for effective involvement in lean initiatives by safety professionals and Outlines a unique merging of lean and safety through design concepts. An Addendum offers A Simplified Initial Value Stream Map To Identify Waste (Muda) and Opportunities for Continuous Improvement (Kaizen). 

A brief overview of lean manufacturing concepts is presented. Comments are made on the challenge of concurrently addressing safety and lean and examples demonstrate situations where that has not occurred. A process model for safety and lean is included. A risk assessment framework is outlined that demonstrates how lean manufacturing concepts and safety can be implemented concurrently. 

The concept of trapping a contaminant in low concentration by adsorption with periodic regeneration of the adsorbent-catalyst has been applied commercially by Toyota for NOx-trap catalysts used in converting NOx in diesel or lean burn engine emissions, for example, for reduction of NOx in the presence of O2 [63]. The catalyst acts as absorbent of NOx (in the form of surface nitrate-like species) in the presence of O2 (lean conditions), but a periodic switch of the air to fuel ratio to rich conditions (deficit of O2 with respect to stoichiometry for the complete oxidation of CO and hydrocarbons present in the car emissions to CO2) leads to regeneration by reducing trapped NOx to N2. 

Out of neutral-. Whenever the team observes an individual working and one of their body parts gets out of the neutral position, it is an opportunity for improvement. Out of neutral examples I usually provide Include someone s arm above their shoulder. That means the shoulder is out of a neutral position. When someone has to reach for something and lean forward, his/her back goes out of neutral. If you have to twist to get something, your torso is out of neutral. These are simple examples that make the concept easy to understand and grasp. 

Standards are the baseline from which all continuous improvement activities can be measured. An example I often use is that of an order picker in a Toyota distribution center. I am not sure if the facts I use are correct, but that is inconsequential because what is important is the concept. Standard work for order pickers is 12 picks every 15 minutes. If in any 15-minute period they do not make their standard, they have to signal their supervisor. The supervisor immediately responds and approaches the order picker not to ask why he did not work to standard, but instead to ask what process problem, or problems, prevented him from making standard. Was the inventory count incorrect Was the inventory in the wrong location These and other questions will be asked until the problem is solved. This short, simple example demonstrates three distinct principles of lean respect for people, standard work, and a continuous improvement culture. Having defined standards that everyone understands enables the other two principles. Unlike this example, the actual workday of many supervisors is one spent firefighting rather than focusing on continual Improvement. Moving from one problem to the next fills their days because standards are unknown or not communicated. 

What this pharmaceutical company has done is an excellent example of how lean and safety can be addressed concurrently in the design process. The concept has... 

Readers benefit from the book s large number of practical examples about process improvement for lean and safety. It also contains many lean and safety forms that are helpful. Thus, this is as much a how-to book as it is a concept book. 

To help you better understand this core concept of Lean Safety, here is an example with which you can all identify. Just imagine yourself boarding one of Boeing s new Dreamliner airplanes. Shortly after taking off on this technological marvel of the 21st century, you will be confronted, or maybe rammed, with technology from 1955. 

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