Why Lean Triumphs?

The article describes how Lean production management can be considered a high risk – high return venture

- Sanjeev Baitmangalkar

In a lesser-known part of the world, there was a machine tool factory that was truly remarkable. The workers not only performed the machining and assembly tasks, but also quality control, inventory management, pulling material from external vendors and internal suppliers, identifying and solving problems, thereby, improving productivity, quality and reducing cost through the elimination of wastes.

What was remarkable was, once the customer order came in and was recorded, based on the principle of First In First Out (FIFO) the workers controlled all activities until loading the machines on the trucks with little or no intervention from the supervision or management staff, like a ‘human automated factory in motion’! The teams were autonomous, did not require white-collar staff, and could react to shifts in production content. That is the gold standard today for manufacturing. It was this similarity to their system that caught the eyes of Toyota and paved the way for their India entry.

Operating principles