In essence, one has to make continuous improvements in the products produced at a particular firm to be successful. Apparently, an effective lean organization tends to use kaizen that allows a rather continuous improvement. Notably, through kaizen, people always look for a way of improving the overall process of production on a daily process. Currently, the salon is working on an appointment basis and one has to be very lucky to get an appointment. Additionally, one has to book online to get a consideration given the fact that there are only two appointments that are placed online in a day.
Furthermore, there has been a challenge particularly in the fulfillment process where it has taken longer than anticipated, therefore, causing dissatisfaction among the clients. To improve this kind of deficiency, there is a need for making multiple custom wig units by implementing kaizen improvement event. Some of the available kaizen events that are used for continuous improvement include Kaizen Blitz, Kaizen Burst, Focused Improvement Workshop, Continuous Improvement workshop, Accelerated improvement events, and rapid process improvement workshop (Buer, Strandhagen, & Chan, 2018). These tools are commonly used in implementing improvement in the production process in a company.
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Since the customer service is the one at stake, it would be viable to implement the Continuous Improvement (CI) Workshops. Essentially, this is a type of kaizen event that is applied through the workshop and often assists the clients especially in the delivery of an ongoing business improvement (Buer, Strandhagen, & Chan, 2018). Moreover, the technique is often applied to establish a rather small as well as medium size step improvements in the overall business performance. This selection is appropriate given the fact that it increases customer’s satisfaction as well as customer retention, a challenge that has been witnessed lately during the wig delivery in the company.
Kaizen Objective and Scope for Continuous Improvement (CI) Workshops
Once learning goals have been identified for the CI workshop, it is always important to select specific objectives to be attended to for an improved working process. The main attainable objectives and scope for the CI workshop is to identify the main reason why there are delays in terms of wig production and distribution, to identify ways in which to increase the number of appointments one can make either online or rather over the counter, to review customer’s feedbacks and identify ways in which to improve the overall services, and to identify inhibitors or other issues.
Kaizen Event Agenda
Project: Value Stream Mapping and Analysis
Champion:
Team:
Location:
Monday August 11, 2018
Event Time | Min | Discussion | Facilitator/Discussion Leader | Comments/ and or Tools |
| 8:00am | : 10 | Champion kicks-off: logistic, meeting rules, instructions | ||
| 8:10am | :05 | stream mapping for the wig production | ||
| 8:15am | :10 | Overview of the lean sigma/kaizen DEFINE - project contract | Applying VSM kaizen Frame the existing problem/opportunity | |
| 9:15am | :15 | Break | ||
| 9:30am | Review of the current process/process overview | Applying value stream mapping or kaizen flow | ||
| 10:00am | : 60 | Measure Turnaround feedbacks from clients Current state process flow | ||
| 11:00am | :60 | Lunch | ||
| 12:00pm | :15 | Analyze Overview of the downtime Brainstorming the session (identifying the cause of downtime of possible deliverables) | ||
| 1:00pm | :15 | Break | ||
| 1:15pm | :60 | Analyze Brainstorming (identifying the downtime of wigs deliverables) | ||
| 2:15pm | :15 | Break | ||
| 2:30pm | :30 | Analyze Brainstorming session | ||
| 3:00pm | :10 | Overview and wrap-up of the day | By one member |
Tuesday August 12, 2018
Event Time | Min | Discussion | Facilitator/Discussion Leader | Comments/ and or Tools |
| 8:00am | : 10 | Preview meeting objectives and agendas | ||
| 8:10am | :05 | stream mapping for the wig production | ||
| 8:15am | :60 | Analyze Select top causes & validate Wrap up analyze event of day one | Applying VSM kaizen Frame the existing problem/opportunity | |
| 9:15am | :60 | Improve Brainstorm solution | Develop alternatives, test, and implement the solution | |
| 9:30am | :10 | Break | ||
| 10:00am | : 60 | Improve Brainstorm solution and discuss | ||
| 11:00am | :60 | Lunch | ||
| 12:00pm | :15 | Improve Continue discussion and select solutions downtime | Applying VSM kaizen | |
| 1:00pm | :15 | Break | ||
| 1:15pm | :60 | Improve Continue discussion and select solutions Construct future state process flow | ||
| 2:15pm | :45 | Improve Designate action items to achieve future state | ||
| 2:30pm | :30 | Present to champion | Team | |
| 3:00pm | :10 | Objectives |
Primarily, the designed workshop is set to identify the root causes of downtime for the deliverables as well as the cause for customer’s dissatisfaction. This will allow the company to come up with solutions that will increase the appointments in the salon and the ordering of the wigs without delays. Notably, since the objectives were clear and dealt more with the services offered to the customers, two days was enough to discuss and brainstorm the issue and come up with a solution (Chan & Tay, 2018). The sequence of the topic session was arranged in such a manner that the staff was informed of the existing problem and why the workshop had been arranged. In this regard, the applicable tool was the value stream mapping (VSM) given the fact that it would assist in mapping the entire process from supplier to the customers by highlighting the overall flows of the product and services while identifying delays and the process that are considered to be non-value adding elements (Chadha, 2017). Noteworthy, the constructed kaizen agenda conformed to the objectives and the scope of the salon given the fact that it allowed the staff to identify lope holes that led to delays, the dissatisfaction of the customers, and provided a solution through brainstorming and discussions.
References
Buer, S. V., Strandhagen, J. O., & Chan, F. T. (2018). The link between Industry 4.0 and lean manufacturing: mapping current research and establishing a research agenda. International Journal of Production Research , 56 (8), 2924-2940.
Chadha, R. (2017). Value through continuous improvement. FAIMA business & management journal , 5 (1), 40.
Chan, C. O., & Tay, H. L. (2018). Combining lean tools application in kaizen: a field study on the printing industry. International journal of productivity and performance management , 67 (1), 45-65.
