January 2008 Edition

quality

Toyota managers know the road to Lean is by way of motivation

 By Norman Bodek

This past September, I led a study mission to Japan, something I used to do on a regular basis. From study missions, miraculously, I found Dr. Shigeo Shingo, Taiichi Ohno, Dr. Ryuji Fukuda, Dr. Yoji Akao, and many more management geniuses. I could hardly absorb what they had to offer. But somehow I was able to recognize their genius and to produce their books in English.

From this latest trip, I came back with tons of new information. I am overwhelmed and trying to find a way to disseminate all the things I found. I am grateful that Kevin Meyer at superfactory.com asked me to write about my learning and experiences from the study mission. I found probably the best Toyota training course available in English, and I think I also found some of the real secrets that Toyota uses to motivate its employees – something definitely lacking with companies in the West.

Virtually every company that I know of is attempting to implement Lean in its organization, but hardly any company outside of Toyota can profess to be Lean. Why? Why aren't other companies able to implement Lean?

Toyota managers know how to motivate and inspire people. In the West, most managers install Lean tools such as Kaizen Blitz or 5S, et cetera, but they rarely inspire and motivate all workers to participate fully in the improvement process. From this past trip, I found over 100 small but very powerful methods that Toyota uses to motivate and inspire its people.

Let us take a few examples. One is called 3 Gen; Gen equals actual – actual site, actual item, and actual situation. Kiichiro Toyoda, former chairman of Toyota, was told by his plant manager of a problem that occurred on the plant floor. Instead of just relying on what the plant manager told him, Toyoda immediately went to the plant floor to see for himself. It is not that he lacked trust in the plant manager. No, Toyoda knew that "seeing is believing" and that the only way a person really learns is from experience. So Toyoda went to the actual site where the problem occurred, and looked at the exact item that caused the problem, and asked the worker to explain exactly how the situation occurred.

Toyoda learned from his own observation. How would similar situations like this be handled by a senior executive at your company?

On the same trip, while visiting a Toyota training center, I used the restroom. I flushed the bowl, but I needed to flush the bowl a second time. It did not work. I left the bathroom and told one of the managers that there was something wrong with the water in the building. Immediately, my wife, Noriko, went to a faucet and tried to turn on the water. It did not work. I was annoyed at her that she did not believe me. She had attacked my "ego."

Toyota goes beyond ego; in fact, it recognizes that ego can be one of the major obstacles to continuous improvement. Ohno would always insist that managers spend most of their time on the factory floor. He said, "Something was wrong if the manager didn't have to wash his hands three times a day."

I know of a president of a manufacturing company who gets highly frustrated with the lack of performance from his plant managers. He feels that the plant managers should be able to eliminate the defect problems. It occurred to me just recently that the president should be on the factory floor to demonstrate to his plant managers that the defect problems can be solved.

Often, we want others to do what we cannot do or are unwilling to do. Ohno was a very powerful manager in charge of all of the Toyota plants and about 300 suppliers. He would ask his managers to solve problems, give them a deadline as to when they should be solved, and always followed up to see that it was done. If Ohno could not do it, he always had Dr. Shingo, who could. If you read Dr. Shingo's books, you will see the hundreds if not thousands of problems that were presented to him and that were solved by simply using his own ingenuity or the talent of other people around him.

Another one of these powerful motivators: "Can't we make things even one yen cheaper? Squeeze your brain to make things cheaper than one yen; however, it doesn't mean to buy materials cheaper." A yen is less than one penny. Imagine, challenging all your workers to look for things that would save your company one penny. We just don't do that. In fact, most of us would never stoop or bend to pick up a penny. But Toyota wants to inspire everyone to be involved in continuous improvement, and it knows that most workers cannot reduce costs significantly but they can every day look for very small things that will inspire them. It is the collective effort that will save the company millions, if not billions, of dollars. I read somewhere that Toyota claims that 20 percent of its profits come from cost savings.

When people go to war, they are inspired to sacrifice even their lives. I know that religion also inspires people. But how often are people inspired when they go to work? I feel that inspiring people is management's most important job. For management is a process of getting work done through people.

Virtually every company that I know of is attempting to implement Lean in its organization, but hardly any company outside of Toyota can profess to be Lean. Why? Why aren't other companies able to implement Lean?

At least once or twice a month, I keynote a conference. I have a lot of fun. I often ask the audience, "What is your favorite day of the week?" Almost without exception the favorite day is Friday. But where do you spend most of your life? At work, of course. Then why isn't Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday your favorite day?

I believe our superiors have just not inspired and motivated us to want to come, joyously, to work.

Norman Bodek is president of PCS Inc. In 1979, after 18 years working with data-processing companies, he started Productivity Inc. - Press by publishing a newsletter called PRODUCTIVITY. Fascinated with the subject, he went to Japan to discover the processes that was making the Japanese world leaders in quality improvement and productivity growth. In the next 28 years, Bodek led 25 study missions to Japan and published more than 100 Japanese management books in English, "all without originally knowing a single person in Japan nor speaking their language." A recipient of the Shingo Prize for Manufacturing Excellence, Bodek recently worked with Gulfstream Corporation, where 1,000 people went from 16 implemented ideas in February 2005 to close to 21,000 in 2006 and saved the company more than $1 million. His e-mail is bodek@pcspress.com.

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