Lean Manufacturing and JustInTime Philosophy Basic Idea Try

Lean Manufacturing and Just-In-Time Philosophy

Basic Idea • Try to eliminate the system operational inefficiencies and the resulting waste by • trying to produce the right items in the right quantities and quality at the right time through the right procedures. • In the emerging philosophy, inventories should be carefully controlled and they should not function as the mechanism for accommodating the system inefficiencies => Just-In-Time (JIT) • The aforementioned effort should an ongoing process towards continuous improvement rather than one-time/shot effort.

Enabling factors and practices of the lean manufacturing philosophy • Timely and reliable information flow across the entire supply chain through – stable, long-lasting and trustful relationships between the different parties in the supply chain – flexible / electronic ordering mechanisms: • Electronic Data Interchange (EDI), and • e-commerce practices – vendor owned and managed inventories

Enabling factors and practices of the lean manufacturing philosophy (cont. ) • Reliable and flexible production and transport systems – establishment of well-tuned processes with predictable and controllable performance => Statistical Process Control (SPC) – reduction of set-up times through the adoption of • flexible equipment • standardization of designs and production methods • externalization of set-up tasks – introduction of mistake-proofing techniques like • explicit checklists • integrated machine gages – real-time linkage of the transport carriers to the corporate headquarters / operational planning center through mobile telephony and global positioning systems

Enabling factors and practices of the lean manufacturing philosophy (cont. ) • Well-trained, responsive and responsible / empowered personnel – knowledge management – quality circles – employee ownership of the processes and their results – flattened (middle) management structures

Enabling factors and practices of the lean manufacturing philosophy (cont. ) • Reduce the variability in the system – input • quality of raw material • delivery times – operation • processing times • process capability • (smaller) lot sizes – output • production volume • production scope

Push versus Pull production control schemes • Push (MRP-type) control schemes: Predict the demand try to initiate and coordinate production in order to meet these predictions under the available production capacity. • Pull control schemes: Assuming a stable demand rate, establish the production capacity and the Work-In-Process (WIP) levels that will allow the system to meet demand as it occurs. – Generated demand consumes the existing WIP’s and authorizes new (replacing) production, through a cardbased mechanism known as KANBAN. – Appropriate mainly for repetitive manufacturing environments.