TXM Lean Methodology Video – Practical 5S
5S is probably the most well known Lean technique and is one of the essential foundations of a successful production system. This TXM Lean Methodology video explains how the TXM Practical 5S approach delivers sustainable results by placing accountability with your front line teams.
7 Flows to Consider When Designing Your Factory Layout
Whether you are moving into a new factory, changing the layout of your current facility to improve workflow or making room for a new piece of equipment, your team must consider the 7 flows during the factory layout design.
Lean Daily Leadership Process – Which Elements Do You Need?
TXMs Lean Daily Leadership Process brings together our practical approach to the Lean elements of visual management and standard work to provide our leaders with the daily management system to let them shine as leaders. We specialise in tailoring the TXM Lean Daily Leadership Process to suit your business. The three key elements that provide the foundation for the TXM Lean Daily Leadership Process are
making it visual, setting expectations through setting standards and encouraging teamwork through daily meetings.
TXM Lean Minute – Creating a Lean Quality Culture
As leaders we determine the culture of the organisations we lead.This is especially the case when it comes to quality. This Lean minute video explains with a simple example. If you want to create a Lean quality culture in your business then you need to send a consistent message that sending defective product to the customer is never acceptable.
TXM Lean Case Study – Managing Lean Office Processes with Colour Coding
We know how important visual management and colour coding are in our Lean Enterprise. Once implemented, it allows our team to easily identify what action to take next. Today we will step through a case study where a TXM Lean consultant implemented a simple colour coding system with huge success.
TXM Lean Methodology Video – Solving Problems Every Day
Solving problems using a structured process is oen of the key elements of a Lean Production System, but it is extremely hard to sustain in practice. With the Solving Problems Every Day Methodology TXM has developed a simple, pracitical and sustainable system to enable everyone in your business to be involved in improving and problem solving every day. Watch this Lean Methodology video to learn more.
TXM Lean Minute – What is Lean Manufacturing?
Lots of people talk about Lean Manufacturing and Lean Enterprise and Lean Manufacturing, but what is it really? At TXM we find this simple definition of Lean Manufacturing cuts through the jargon and goes to the heart of what Lean Manufacturing can deliver to your business.
TXM Lean Minute – The Lean Leadership Role for Senior Leaders
Increasingly lean leadership is being seen as the key to success for lean implementation in all kinds of businesses. So what are the key elements of Lean Leadership for senior leaders. In this Lean Minute video TXM Director, Ron Spiteri, explains some of the things Senior Leaders need to do every day drive their business to Lean success.
TXM Lean Minute – The “I to U” of Lean Plant Layout
There are lots of different ways you can layout your plant. Lean Plant Layouts can include I, L, O, S and U shapes. In this TXM Lean Minute, Anthony Clyne discusses how an S-shaped Lean Plant Layout works effectively for long products, such as Sykes rowing boats.
TXM Lean Minute – How to Level Lean Production to Takt Time
When you make a simple mass produced product, leveling lean production is relatively easy. However for customised products it can be challenging to level production to meet the rate of customer demand (takt time). This video provides some simple tips on how to do it.
TXM Lean Case Study – Ambitious Growth at CTCI Waterloo
THE CHALLENGE CTCI Waterloo, in Bathurst, NSW is a specialist in partitioning, particularly for wet areas such as bathroom lockers, showers and vanities. The company, now a subsidiary of Laminex, supplies Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne. The company manufacturers has regular product lines and a substantial amount of made to order contracts. When the company first …
TXM Lean Minute – How to Sustain Lean Manufacturing
The challenge many businesses face is how to sustain lean manufacturing. Initial improvements may be impressive, but they are not sustained and soon things go back to where they were or even worth. This video talks about how to sustain lean manufacturing year after year.
Top 3 Tips for Auditing your Audits
We know that audits are an important part of sustaining our Lean systems. But they are often the hardest part of implementing a new system and are easy to let slip, which results in systems that fade rather than embedded into our daily and weekly business processes. Here we will discuss the top three tips for auditing your audits and making sure your team is getting the best out of these unique opportunities to work on the business.
TXM Lean Minute – Why Your Business Needs Lean Visual Controls
Visual controls are simple visual cues or signals that tell us the current situation and enable us to make decisions based on facts. Visual Controls are everywhere in our everyday life – we need to make sure we use them in our workplace as well.
TXM Lean Case Study – Sykes Racing – Customised Lean Manufacturing
Sykes Racing Lean Case Study is one of the the most ambitious lean transformation TXM has ever been involved in. In this interview, Sykes Managing Director, Jeff Lawrence talks about how Lean transformed his business. Sykes is a great example of the use of lean for customised manufacturing.
“What gets measured, gets managed” is the adage by management expert Peter Drukker and you would be hard pressed to find a company today that doesn’t have some level of metrics. The challenge is to differentiate between every day “business” metrics and “lean metrics”. Let’s look at the key elements to getting good metrics in place and tools for sustaining their use.
TXM Lean Minute – Creating Lean Standardised Work for Customised Products
Lean standardised work is one of the foundation tools of Lean Thinking. However for custom products it can be difficult to apply. This video provides some simple tips on how to create lean standardised work for low volume custom products.
TXM Lean Minute – Why Lean Finance Makes Sense
Lean is a great way to engage your people and improve the culture of your business, but it also offers some hard nosed bottom line benefits as well. By increasing productivity and reducing working capital Lean can drive a step change improvement in your return on assets. This TXM Lean Finance video shows how.
TXM Lean Minute – Ask Why Five Times
To establish a culture of continuous improvement in your business Leaders need to role model problem solving by asking “why” five times. In this TXM Lean Minute, Anthony Clyne explains why its important to ask why five times to get to the root cause of problems.
The Top Lean Tools for Maintenance
As we implemented and refined our Lean Enterprise Production System the stability of the processes becomes extremely important. We need a good parts supply, reliable quality, dependable people, with the skills to complete the tasks needed, and of course, machines that we know will work when we need them to run. This week we will be looking at why maintenance is an essential part of any Lean Enterprise system and how to get started to include maintenance as a key part of our Lean Enterprise.
TXM Lean Minute – 5S Set In Order
5S Set in Order is the second “S” in popular workplace organisation method, 5S. In this TXM Lean Minute, Anthony Clyne explains what “Set in Order” means and gives you practical hints on how to “Set in Order” your workplace using the TXM Practical 5S approach.
TXM Lean Minute – Lean Plant Layout Design
Getting the plant layout right at the start can save you a lot of time and money in the life of your factory and will mean that you can make more product, more safely at lower cost and in less space. In this Lean Minute, TXM Consulting Director, Anthony Clyne explains the key points you need to consider when developing a new Lean plant layout using the TXM Lean Plant Layout Development Process.
TXM Lean Minute – Toyota Method of Respecting People
Respect for people is a core value at Toyota. In this TXM Lean Minute, Anthony Clyne provides some simple tips on how to use the Toyota Method to help you show “respect for people” in your workplace. At TXM we teach the skills of Lean Leadership by coaching leaders to demonstrate simple everyday behaviours such as these.
TXM Lean Case Study – MacNaught Lean Manufacturing Transformation
Read this case study to learn how MacNaught a manufacturer complex engineered lubrication products for global markets achieved a Lean Manufacturing Transformation. The Challenge “Initially, we looked to improving productivity,” said Macnaught CEO, Robert Hill. “With a small local market, a single export order can represent the equivalent of a month’s worth of local orders. What we …
TXM Lean Case Study – Ferguson Plarre Bakehouses Interview
Ferguson Plarre is a major industrial bakery supplying quality cakes and pastries fresh daily to a chain of over 50 retail stores. Ferguson Plarre is a great example of application of Lean Manufacturing in the Food Industry. In this video, TXM Managing Director, Tim McLean interviews Ferguson Plarre Director, Michael Plarre, about his Lean Journey and the benefits he and his business have gained, especially through their use of 5S and Leader Standard Work.
TXM Lean Case Study – Lean Manufacturing in the Beverage Industry – Juicy Isle
The Challenge Juicy Isle employee checking the bottling line for issues. Tasmanian juice company, Juicy Isle acquired two beverage companies, Hartz Mineral Water and Wellington Springs, expanding their production facilities from two juice lines to incorporate six water-based lines for consumer and industrial markets. With little automation to swap from one production run to the …
TXM Lean Case Study – Roband Food Service Equipment
TXM Lean Case Study – Roband Food Service Equipment In this Lean Plant Layout Case Study learn how a new Lean Layout designed with TXM lead to major improvements for food service equipment manufacturer, Roband. The Challenge Look in any food hall and you are likely to find a Roband toaster, sandwich grill or food display cabinet. …
Creating a Lean Human Resources Department
A key element for the lean way is Organisational and Human Resources factors inside our company. How a business is structured, how we train our people and how we work together will be a strong influence for the outcomes of implementing the actions for a lean enterprise.
TXM Lean Minute – Improve with Every 5S Audit
The biggest challenge with implementing 5S is how to sustain in. In this TXM Lean Minute, Anthony Clyne explains why every 5S audit should look for improvements.
Once the Lean direction and vision is set, the commitment has been communicated across the company and the deployment policy has been outlined across all level, we are now ready to put an actionable plan in place to implement lean across the organisation.
TXM Lean Minute – Red-Green Task Boards (Kamishibai)
In this Lean Minute, TXM Consulting Director Anthony Clyne explains how a Red-Green Task Board (also known as a Kamishibai Board) is a great visual tool to help make sure that the every day tasks in your workplace get done.
The Art of Policy Deployment (Hoshin Kanri)
Hoshin Kanri, or policy deployment, is one of the most important foundation elements for implementing the lean methodologies across a company. Today we will look at what the definition of Hoshin Kanri and provide a practical approach to getting you started. The aim of Hoshin Kanri, or policy deployment is to design company policies, organizational structure & business systems to autonomously sustain lean practices.
TXM Lean Minute – Kanban Posts
Our second “Lean Minute” about Kanban focuses on a common problem with every kanban system – making sure that Kanban materials and cards get delivered to the right location. In this short video Anthony Clyne will explain how a simple, colour coded kanban post works a bit like the flag in a golf green to …
TXM Lean Minute – Accumulation Kanban
TXM Lean Minute – Accumulation Kanban Our first “Lean Minute” videos focus on one of the most recognizable Lean techniques – Kanban. Kanban is such a simple and effective way to manage materials, however it is often wrongly perceived as difficult to implement. In this, the first of our series on Kanban, TXM Consulting Director, …
TXM Lean Case Study – Branach Manufacturing
Branach Manufacturing is perhaps the best Lean Transformation we have seen in a Small or Medium Sized Enterprise (SME). Branach have driven rapid growth through outstanding customer service and value delivered through a world class Lean production system. In this TXM video, TXM Managing Director, Tim McLean interviews Branach founder, Mike Walsh talks about their Lean journey and what it has meant for his business.
Why do So Few Small Companies Become Big Companies?
Why do So Few Small Companies Become Big Companies? Every big global company started out small. Hewlett Packard was originally two guys working in a garage. Hershey started out as one chocolate shop (and he even went bust a couple of times before he got it right!) and McDonalds started out with one restaurant. So …
The Need to Lead People through Change
People who resist change usually do so for a reason – lack of trust, frustration or a desire to have their input in to the change. If you take the time to listen to these individuals and incorporate their ideas, you will usually get a better outcome. You will also most likely retain these people and gain them as supporters rather than adversaries.
Documented Expectations to Sustain Lean
You and your company have been implementing Lean for the last 12 months and things are starting to look good. We have begun to define the new roles at each level in the organisation and how we want our new production system to be run and to sustain lean actions. Our challenge now is to sustain lean actions and continue to build on them.
I find it common for people to tell me that “Chinese quality” is bad. If I were to ask the same people about their perception of products such as the iPhone, the Airbus A320 or the Mercedes E-class, they would tell me that they are all high quality products. Yet they are all made in “poor quality” China. So what is going on here?
Implementing Lean is Hard; Sustaining Lean is Harder
As we look back over the last 12 months, can you seen where you’ve been? Continuous improvement and implementing Lean methodologies have been our focus. We’ve had workshops and done factory layouts, moved cells and stores around, cleaned up, implemented a kanban system, put in visual controls. We’ve had a good year; production numbers up, respectable profits in the current climate, quality not too bad. But what about our “Lean numbers”; how did we go there?