Lean manufacturing

Emilio Ruiz Eguiluz Nájera A01011160 Manufacturing Strategies
Nestor Cifuentes Gutiérrez A01014302 Date due: 01/26/2011

Report 2

Lean Principles

Summary of the key concepts
Lean manufacturing implementation requires knowledge of the seven wastes (non value added activities like overproduction) which cause high costs of production that can be avoided. As well, lean requires manybuilding blocks (like Pull system, Kanban and Work Cells), which sometimes need to be considered to be followed in sequence as you could get negative results if implemented out of order.
Benefits of lean are mentioned, broken down into three categories: Operational, Administrative and Strategic improvements.
Many companies have tried to achieve lean without being able to get the mentionedbenefits or having difficult experiences with it.
Finally we have a comparison between old fashioned traditional manufacturing and the lean perspective of manufacturing, mostly between important concepts that differ between them. An example being People Utilization, while Traditional organizations want people to be busy at all times, Lean organizations people might not be busy at all as work isperformed based on customer demand.

Analytical Critic

I think that by this time we have heard a lot about lean manufacturing strategies but if it’s so good and there are so much books and manuals to achieve it, why is it that so many companies fail at it? There is a way to really know and apply the principles of lean, and it includes knowing the 8 wastes, what to do when you get positive resultsand how to get constant improvements, what benefits you can achieve.
But also you should consider the barriers for a successful implementation. If carried in a wrong sequence, the lean building blocks could produce negative results. Another example is not choosing the right project to apply lean principles, or failing to expand the lean implementation to the supply chain.
What did you learn?Lean is not only about strategies or applying new ways of doing things, it involves building blocks, avoiding or reducing wastes, having a successful follow up to the achieved results and looking forward to constant improvement.

Principles of Lean Thinking by Poppendieck

Summary of the key concepts
Japanese manufacturing companies demonstrated that "Just-in-Time" was a better paradigm. Thewidely adopted Japanese manufacturing concepts came to be known as 'lean production'. The origins of lean thinking become when Henry Ford standardized automobile parts and assembly techniques, so that low skilled workers and specialized machines could make cheap cars for the masses.
Basic Principles of Lean Development:
There are four basic principles of lean thinking which are most relevant tosoftware development:
* Add nothing but value.
* To develop breakthroughs with lean thinking, the first step is learning to see waste. Taiichi Ohno identified seven types of manufacturing waste: overproduction, inventory, extra processing steps, motion, defects, waiting, and transportation.
* Center on the people who add value.
* Center on the people who add values meansupgrading the skills through training and apprenticeships. It means forming teams that design their own processes and address complete problems.
* Flow value from demand.
* If you do nothing but add value, then you should add the value in as rapid a flow as possible.
* Optimize Across Organization.

Analytical Critic
Do it right the first time this was an excuse for the workerstake care of the process first do an analysis of it and then improve process. I agree that in mass production when task are structured and workers can't do anything fix a problem that is not assigned. Workers don't worry about that problems and process turn out to be inferior. To solve the problem take countless time. It's better to create teams that design their own process and solve their...