Slot Machines and Kaizen

As we begin our lean journey at Walters & Wolf, one of the things we are doing is reaching out to companies that practice lean to see what they are doing and what things we might want to adopt or avoid at our company.  It was that practice that lead our Las Vegas office to contact one of the local slot machine companies.  This company in Las Vegas has been practicing lean for over 7 years.

Nick, our COO had attended a tour here several months ago along with the other people from our Las Vegas office.  On the tour they mentioned that they hold Kaizen events every quarter.  Nick then asked if it would be possible to observe one of the events.  We were told they would let us know.  As it turns out, we were not allowed to observe an event, we would need to participate in an event.  That first event a few months ago involved three of our employees. Nick, one of our Las Vegas employees and one of our Arizona employees.

Last week, I was invited to participate in one of the quarterly Kaizen events in Las Vegas.  It was so interesting working at another company for a whole week so I thought I would give a quick overview of what I learned.

First, the structure.  Scope sheets for different projects are created ahead of time.  Months before the event 3 scope sheets are selected.  The sheets show what the current state is, what problems they are having with this process, and what the goals of the improvement will be.  For our Kaizen, we arrived at their office at 8:00 on Monday.  The first day was just training.  An overview of most of the lean tools, some practice in how to calculate Takt time, how to measure cycle time, and several other great exercises to help you with things you will probably need to do in the coming days.  There were three teams that ranged from 7 to 9 people.  The teams were very cross functional and the people had either volunteered or had been picked for the group.  Some people that were selected were necessary for the group to achieve their goal.

My team arrived in the training room at 7:00 am on Tuesday.  We set out to document the current state and validate our scope sheet and that took most of the first day.  You find yourself going out to different departments and talking to lots of people and getting input on how things “really” work.  We then put that puzzle together and started to form a view of the problem we were tackling.  On the second day, you dig into the cause.  This was an amazing experience for me because I had read about a lot of these tools but had never practiced them.  The most interesting and powerful to me was the 5 why exercises where you use this tool to find the root cause of the problem.  In most cases, people have a very hard time defining a problem.  The problem is we have no standard process.  The problem is our cut sheet should have a bar code.  These are the kinds of things you write down at first and then the Sensei or one of the managers has to reel you back in to say “No, that’s not the problem”.  It really forces you to stop stating things as solutions and begin to really find the problem.  You then have to create a very logical list of questions that get you to the root cause.

After working out the current state, defining clearly the problem we are trying to solve, gathering data about the problem and examples of things contributing to them and then using the 5 why techniques to find the root causes to those issues, you now work on the countermeasures.  What will you put in place to solve these problems?  How will you know if they get solved?  What other ideas do you have if the first solution doesn’t work?  By the third day you should have a countermeasure in place and be able to observe if the change is successful.

Each afternoon there is a “report out”.  The team leader gives an overview of the day’s progress back to the leadership of the company.  This runs from 4:00 to 5:00 and allows the rest of the department heads and upper management to help guide the process.  “Did you think of how that would effect shipping?”  “Are you sure you looked deep enough into that issue?”  “Maybe tomorrow you should go to the line and verify that?”  This helps ensure the project is moving forward correctly and that all the departments have a say.  As outsiders, we were allowed to view this process.  Typically it is just the team leader and the management along with the Sensei.

On Friday morning we gave a presentation to the company on what we found.  We gave our results, read through several of the 5 why’s and read through our 30 day follow-up.  Everyone on the team presents part of the story from the week and the audience gets to hear what they found and what countermeasures were applied.

For me, the main takeaways were as follows:

• Man, I have a lot to learn.  If I’m going to lead lean in our company, I need to know these tools so well that I can teach others to use them properly.
• These events really help people inside the company learn more about how all their departments operate.  You are also interacting with lots of people in your company and getting to know them better.  They really help to build synergy inside the company.
• A structured event like this yields great results.  This company, as good as it is, still has lots of issues to work on.  But with every event (they don’t just do them at the quarters) they get a little closer to their goal.
• Inviting outside people to participate yields a different view.  In addition to Walters & Wolf, several vendors were present.  This allows an “outsider” perspective but it also gives the vendor a view of what is happening inside their customer’s company and how they might better serve them.
• Pay it forward.  We are so grateful for the help of companies like this that share their time and ideas with us.  We will definitely be paying that back as we start our events.
• Make more connections.  We actually met one of the vendor companies and invited them back to our Las Vegas office for a barbecue on Friday and then toured their facility in the afternoon.  Another good connection that we may be able to learn from or share with them what we are learning.