4 ms·
That's one of the main presuppositions in Lean Manufacturing that is so entrenched and so insidious. What's even more annoying is when managers who have worked
by prometheus76 4y ago
That's one of the main presuppositions in Lean Manufacturing that is so entrenched and so insidious. What's even more annoying is when managers who have worked in a Lean environment come over into our industry of steel fabrication (high-mix low-volume, where lean is low-mix high-volume), and they assume that 1) we're screwing up because nothing is consistent in our charts and graphs and 2) that if they just make us do Lean stuff, it will magically improve.
It leads to disaster every time.
- ngrilly 4y agoLean manufacturing is a lot about avoiding waste, but it doesn't necessarily mean removing all buffers and stocks, which is a type of waste, if this is causing a much worse type of waste, which is making the entire production line useless because it is missing input material. I really think "lean manufacturing" = 100% JIT is a misconception and an over-simplification.
- actionfromafar 4y agoAnd wasn't it notably Toyota, inventors of lean which had a decent stock of components? (Not huge perhaps, but better than a lot of competitors.)
- prometheus76 4y agoThe argument becomes how much buffer and stock do you need? How long can you fade a falloff in supply? One hour? One day? One week? What is "wasteful" vs. what is wise?
- ngrilly 4y agoExactly, which is a much more sane and useful discussions to have, and something any serious process engineer will do using for example a simulation.