How to Creates a Culture of Continuous Improvement (KAIZEN) in an Organization?

What Are the Benefits of Kaizen?

Businesses continue to turn towards lean manufacturing tools to find ways to tighten their belts and remain competitive. Lean tools with low up-front costs are especially appealing. One such tool, Kaizen, focuses on continuous improvements and can be implemented on nearly any budget. Kaizen involves every employee in making small, daily changes. Using knowledge from every employee, Kaizen identifies problems at their source, solves them, and changes standards to ensure problems stay solved.

Improvements don’t stop once a solution is realized. Instead, each process is fine-tuned as employees continue to look for areas that can improve. The benefits of Kaizen span throughout the entire business.

How Can Kaizen Benefit Businesses?

Every employee, in every area, actively looks for things that can be improved. Over time, the small changes lead to major benefits in efficiency, safety, as well as employee and customer satisfaction. Kaizen can provide these benefits to nearly any industry, from manufacturing to healthcare.

Reducing Waste

Reducing waste is one of the key aspects of Kaizen and often the easiest to start with. Waste can take many forms, including time, resources, and revenue.

Simplifying Work Processes

Kaizen also benefits companies by eliminating overly difficult work. Making work easier helps to reduce potential mistakes and increase efficiency. 

A more efficient and easier process can be enjoyed by companies outside manufacturing as well. In an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) case study, Kaizen was used to improve the purchasing process. 

Using the right labels and signs can help Kaizen succeed by making workflow more efficient and increasing safety. Workers can more easily adapt to changes in workflow and avoid hazards when there is clear visual communication in the workplace.

Improving Safety

Using Kaizen to increase safety. In addition to reducing injuries and the related costs, a safer workplace makes employees feel more comfortable when working. An excellent example of Kaizen improving safety is in hospitals. Health care-associated infections (HAIs) are a significant risk in hospitals. In an effort to reduce the number of HAIs, a hospital asked its employees to focus on changes that would reduce infection rates. Several suggestions were brought forward and quickly implemented. 

Improving Employee and Customer Satisfaction

Businesses that practice Kaizen gain additional benefits, including employee and customer satisfaction. By involving employees in making changes, workers gain confidence and are happier. 

Problems are not just solved in-house. For example, if a customer needs a specific technology to solve its problems, the company will work with the customer to develop the new technology. The company and its customers solve problems together—resulting in many shared patents between the company and its customers. The open problem-solving practice has created a workplace culture where employees have pride in their work, and customers trust that their needs are always a priority.

Adopting Kaizen has many benefits that improve productively, safety, and the satisfaction of both employees and customers. Each of these, in turn, helps reduce costs and increase profit without large, capital-intensive improvement projects.

SOURCE: Graphic Products, https://www.graphicproducts.com/articles/kaizen-benefits/ 

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