The time observation form, also known as a process study form, is a basic and often-used tool for lean practitioners. Note that here we are talking about the application of the continuous time observation method and not the work sampling method.
The form, in combination with a stop watch, serves multiple purposes, including:
The VMA's were outrageous?!?
Well, if the media is to be believed, the news of the day was that it was an outrageous Video Music Award show.
Not true and true. Yes - the show was outrageous, no – it wasn’t news.
Let me explain. News is noteworthy, significant, and new. It changes your perspective, it is unusual.
Lean Enterprise Institute (LEI) will be hosting its first Fall 2013 session. The session, comprised of 13 workshops, will be held in Minneapolis from September 17th through 20th and will focus, "on such fundamental concepts as standardized work, leader standard work, kaizen (both daily improvement and team-based rapid improvement events), visual management and value-stream mapping in the context of organizational change and learning."
Lean practitioners must properly identify product families in order to value stream map a given family’s flow of material and information. That’s very important, but not always simple.
In order to illustrate how to identify product families and thus value streams, consider the following example. Three different patient groups go to a hospital. The treatment for patient groups 1 and 2 consists of three steps A, B, and C. However, the treatment for patient group 3 consists of only step D.
Work content (Wc) represents total operator cycle time or, if multiple operators, the sum of operator cycle times to perform a specific process(es) or sub-process(es). The scope of human work, including both value-added and non value–added activities, may encompass a complete value stream or only a portion of it. For example, the lean practitioner may speak of the work content to check-in and room a patient, assemble a sensor module or process a claim.
A complex man, born July 30, 1863, Henry Ford developed the automotive mass production assembly line. His relentless and systematic focus on efficiency and costs reduction resulted in many tec
When evaluating countermeasures, it is common to determine which countermeasure has the best average result. A lazy analyst may then conclude that the countermeasure with the overall best average is the preferred solution. On many occasions this intellectual sloth may result in the best choice, but there are some occasions where this type of thinking could result in disaster.
The wrongheaded thinking arises from not realizing that just because the average result is better; it doesn’t mean that the overall results are better.
Vilfredo Federico Damaso Pareto was born 165 years ago on July 15, 1848. As an economist Pareto established that 80% of the land in Italy was owned by 20% of the population.
Pitch is a representation of takt image - a visual and often audible management timeframe that lean practitioners use to pace and monitor value stream performance. It is typically driven by, and linked to, a value stream or line’s pacemaker process. Pitch performance is routinely tracked and reinforced with plan vs actual charts (a.k.a. production analysis boards), digital displays, lines that are “pulsed” or indexed every time interval, etc.
