Author: Eddie Van Eagle; Published Date: 27th September 2021
In early 2019, the company introduced Lean Six Sigma, a program to cultivate continuous improvement of processes, in the hope of promoting it as a culture within the organization.
With all the resources invested, today we see the fruit of our effort, commitment, and dedication through improved standards and output of the trainees. They can identify wastes in processes and physical movement They are able to implement PDCA (Plan, Do, Check and Act) in the most effective ways, constantly bringing new ideas of implementation that will improve efficiency in terms of task and resource management.
Trainees are more confident in executing tools learned in Lean such as 5S (Sort, Set In Order, Shine, Standardize and Sustain), visual control/management. This has greatly improved communication between teams and departments, allowing process flow to be more transparent, predictable, and manageable.
Taking the Planting Department as an example, the Lean program has raised the level of discipline, commitment, and attention to the effect of each process towards the entire process chain of tree planting. Improvements were significant through the PDCA process, which was used in selecting Kanban locations, methods of transporting seedlings, lining, and planting. As a result, planting throughput has increased several folds compared to the performance of the same team before the program.
The company’s management continues to render its support and commitment to this culture of continuous improvement by expanding the program to other departments. Employees are welcomed to speak up and contribute ideas on ways to improve the existing standard operating procedures. Through this approach, the company has been quick to adapt to the changes of limitation of operations brought by the Covid-19 pandemic.
With this, I truly believe that “Success or failure of the culture is depending on each individual member’s choices”. Lean Six Sigma is here to stay.