Danie Vermeulen from KAIZEN® Institute New Zealand joined fifteen other KAIZEN® Institute colleagues from Spain, Portugal, Germany, France, Italy, USA, Mexico, Romania, Czech Republic, Poland, India and Brazil to participate in an advanced TFM training course. The hands-on training was hosted by one of the laminated floor board plants of a well known forestry products company.  

The focus of the training was to apply key KAIZEN® Institute TFM tools and techniques in a real gemba (workplace). Within four and a half days the team of KI consultants and internal client team members achieved impressive outcomes. We’ve focused on the laminated press, splitting, profiling, packaging, storage, pick, pack, despatch and loading processes and completed:

• Value Stream Mapping – this helped us to map out the value-adding and non-value-adding process steps of the entire process for material flow as well as information flows. With this technique we also capture key data to quantify the value stream such as inventory holding, staff, cycle time, OEE, reject rate, etc. 
• Value Stream Design that included pull planning and supermarket (replenishment) that will result in a significant reduction in inventory holding (WIP as well as finished goods). This step included analysis and calculation of required supermarket sizing, as well as a redesign of the pick, pack and design process and layout to improve flow and reduce muda (7 types of waste)
• SMED (quick change-over) for one of the machines that identified opportunities to reduce change-over time from 1 hour to 30 minutes
• Cost –benefit  analysis
• Implementation planning
• We also played the beer game to demonstrate how a demand pull system can eliminate the supply chain bullwhip effect

This training workshop emphasised the power of “learning by doing” – we’ve achieved so much in such a short time!   

For more information – please contact me on dvermeulen@spam.kaizen.com