Lean Manufacturing. Six Sigma.

Lean manufacturing is Lean thinking. It helps manufacturers eliminate waste, save money and improve material flow. Together with Six Sigma program, lean manufacturing helps manufacturers make lasting, systematic improvements that removes waste and the source of the waste. Lean manufacturing is about developing an integrated understanding and setting the priorities in the manufacturing floor. Lean manufacturing helps to understand what is really happening on the factory floor. We often see production people watching machine running, sorting defects, waiting for the delivery, stocking inventory, wait for change-over or machine repair, looking for tools, counting parts, transferring parts over a long distance. How many of our daily floor activities are absolutely necessary for our production? How many of these activities are adding value to the product?

Lean Manufacturing was introduced by Taiichi Ohno after WWII. It is known as Toyota Production system. it works. Large and small manufacturing companies can greatly benefit from adapting lean manufacturing and lean thinking into their operations.

Lean manufacturing is about changing your manufacturing process to produce only what next process needs and when it is needed. The process generates a pull signal. It means, that you can start production of certain parts. Lean Manufacturing needs a supermarket of parts and supply. The supermarket is a dedicated storage place on your production floor, where parts are labeled and staged. The best practice for material ID is color coding of containers for visual identification of parts in process, finished goods and rejects.

Lean Manufacturing starts with the drawing of Value Stream Map. It is a tool to help you draw the current and future state of your manufacturing process, shorten lead time, eliminate overproduction, waiting time, improve quality.


World competition is growing. Market demand is changing rapidly. Lean manufacturing provides the opportunity to close the gap with the shop floor. Lean thinking can be applied to manufacturing process and office environment. The management and production force should work together to improve quality of the products and eliminate waste.
Use Six Sigma techniques to improve products quality, and determine root cause of the quality problems.