Kaizen Management:- A Japanese Concept

KAIZEN is defined as a gradual and unending improvement for better and achieving higher standards. It is a combination of two words KAI and ZEN. KAI means change and ZEN means for better and together it means change for better. It is a Japanese concept for the quality improvement process. As Japanese principle states that quality control starts with training and ends in training. It is also an everybody’s business from top level management to worker level in order to improve the cross functional management of different organizations.

KAIZEN improves the cross functional management by developing better and quality products which helps to increase the performance of business and also increases the revenue.A cross functional management team is a group of people with different functional expertise working towards a common goal. An enterprise is organized by vertical functions such as research and development, production, engineering, finance, sales and administrative services. These functional management not only have the responsibility of earning more profit but also improve their employees education level, customer satisfaction, quality assurance, cost control, delivery control and new product development.

The main goal of a company is to make profits but in order to earn more profit one company should use cross functional goals such as quality, cost and scheduling and without this goals the company cannot deliver quality products for consumers and they cannot earn more profit. Apparently, Toyota company was first in Japan which used the cross functional management. All the broad members of Toyota follows cross functional management in order to deliver quality products. Toyota has also developed the Toyota Production Systems (TPS) in order to eliminates wastes and also reduce overproductions. The main objective of Toyota is to follow KAIZEN in order to improve their business operations continuously and to improve it they follow certain principle such as:-

1.Long term Philosophy
2.Right Process will produce the Right Results
3.Use Pull system to avoid overproductions
4.Level out the work load
5.Build a culture of stopping to fix the problems, to get quality right the first time
6.Standardized tasks and processes are the foundation for continuous improvement and employee empowerment

7.Use visual control so no problems are hidden
8.Use only reliable, thoroughly tested technology that serves your people and process
9.Grow leaders who thoroughly understand the work, live the philosophy and teach it to others
10.Develop exceptional people and teams who follow your company’s philosophy
11.Respect your extended network of partners and suppliers by challenging them and helping them improve

12.Go and see for yourself to thoroughly understand the situation
13.Make decisions slowly by consensus, thoroughly considering all options implement decisions rapidly

14.Become a learning organization through relentless reflection and continuous improvement
The main aim of Toyota is improve their loyalty and build the culture of stopping to fix problems to get quality right the first time.

The essence of KAIZEN is simple and straightforward as it means improvement. Its follows unique Japanese practices that is used worldwide and they are customer orientations, total quality control, robotics, QC circles, suggestion systems, automations, discipline in the workshop total productive maintenance, Kamban, Quality improvement, Just-in time, Zero defects, small group activities, cooperative labour-management relations, productive improvement and new product development.

The message of KAIZEN strategy is that the change is not only for one day but it should be unending improvement as the old Japanese saying goes, “If a man has not been seen for these days, his friends should take a good look at him to see what change have befallen him”. This strategy management follows two major components i.e. maintenance and improvement.Maintenance refers to activities directed towards maintaining current technological, managerial and operating standards and improvement refers to those directed towards improving current standards. The top management establishes the policy for KAIZEN and cross functional goals and other level of management follows it in every organization.

KAIZEN follows 5S styles of management in order to reduce the work flow problems and improve the quality product. The main aim of 5S is to reduce the overproductions and maintain good inventory levels. 5S styles of management stand for:-

·Seiri (Sort):- to sort out unnecessary items
·Seiton (Set in orders):- to arrange and identity the different items in proper place
·Siso (Shine):- to clean the area
·Seiketsu (Standardize):- to create rules and standard operating procedure
·Shitsuke (sustain):- to maintain the system and continue to improve it.
This style of management is the foundation of all improvement and is the key component of establishing a visual workplace. A 5S program focuses on having visual order, organization, cleanliness and standardization.

KAIZEN and Innovation are two basic concepts of strategic developments in organizations. The first one is a Japanese style of management and latter one is a western style of management.The difference between KAIZEN and Innovation are as follows:-
KAIZEN and Innovation
1)Effect
KAIZEN- Long term and Long lasting but undramatic
Innovation- Short term but dramatic
2)Pace
KAIZEN- Small Steps
Innovation-Big steps
3) Time frame
KAIZEN- Continuous and incremental
Innovation-Discontinuous and non incremental
4)Change
KAIZEN-Gradual and Constant
Innovation-Abrupt and Volatile
5)Involvement
KAIZEN-Everybody
Innovation-Select few champions
6)Approach
KAIZEN-Collectivism, group efforts, system approach
Innovation-Rugged individualism, individual ideas and efforts
7) Mode
KAIZEN-Maintenance and Improvement
Innovation-Scarp and rebuild
8)Spark
KAIZEN-Conventional Know-how and state of the art
Innovation-Technological breakthroughs, new inventions, new theories
9)Practical requirements
KAIZEN-Requires little investment but great effort to maintain it
Innovation-Requires large investment but little efforts to maintain it
10)Effort orientation
KAIZEN-People Oriented
Innovation-Technology Oriented
11)Evaluation criteria
KAIZEN-Process and efforts for better results
Innovation-Results of profits
12)Advantage
KAIZEN-Work well in slow growth economy
Innovation-Better suited to fast growth economy
KAIZEN management place emphasis on problem solving. In order to solve the problems it focuses on seven statistical tools and these tools contains two approach and they are analytical approach and design approach. The first approach is used when data are available and the job is to analyze the date to solve a particular problem. Most problems that occur in production-related areas fall into this category. The seven statistical tools used for such analytical problem solving are:-

·Pareto Diagram:-used to classify problems according to cause and phenomenon
·Cause and effect diagrams:-to identify possible cause for a problem
·Histogram:- determine problems by checking all shape, value and nature
·Control Charts:- to evaluate process situations and trends with help of line graph
·Scatter Diagram:- illustrates the relationship between the corresponding date
·Graphs:-to identity the problems from graph
·Checksheets:-to tabulate the results through routine checking of the situations
The second approach is to find the way to develop new product development and to identify the customer requirements and then translate the engineering requirements to production requirements. The seven new tools are to help the quality improvement, cost reduction, new product development and policy deployment. The seven new tools of statistical tools are as follows:-

·Relations diagram:- it is the interrelated factors to clarify cause and effect relationship
·Affinity Diagram:- it is also a brainstorming method which is based on group work
·Tree diagram:- it is applied to show the interrelations among goals and measures
·Matrix Diagram:- it is used to know the quality requirements and production requirements
·Matrix Data analysis diagram:- it is based on data analysis and gives numerical results
·PDPC (Process Decision Program Chart):- it is a process chart used in research
·Arrow Diagram: - it is a network diagram and used in PERT (Program Evaluation and Review Technique) and CPM (Critical Path Methods).

KAIZEN helps to reduce cost and work load and basically it is long term needs. It follows the eight common principle of total quality management as it focus on quality goods. The main goal of this process is improvement and process for better results. In KAIZEN, quality comes first before profit as it opines that if quality is maintained properly then automatically profit will earned. Change is necessary and in order to make it change, one must follow KAIZEN process.