Kaizens

In mid 2002, Atlantic began studying the benefits of kaizens.

In addition to attending quality meetings and reading the classic, "Lean Thinking" by James Womack, three key managers participated in kaizens at a local manufacturer, American Saw.

Later, more than a dozen managers toured The Wiremold Company, a West Hartford Connecticut manufacturer, which has been running kaizens since 1991 and is considered a leader in the U.S.

The productivity improvements and efficiencies gained by American Saw and Wiremold provided the incentive for Atlantic to start its own program.

In the spring and fall of 2003, we hired a facilitator and ran two kaizens. Our goal is to run at least two each year.

Here are improvements we’ve gained from our kaizens:

This kaizen's goal was to improve internal turnaround time of electronic quoting. For the period shown (9/30 - 1/9/04, we achieved a 68% improvement (see the light blue and orange bars).

Changes made included streamlining the use of electronic mailboxes and creation of a new electronic messaging system to notify sales when purchasing transmits back a finished quote. To more quickly spot incoming faxed quotes, we also moved a fax machine to be in clear sight of our receptionist.

Note: the chart shows total turnaround time, including the external vendor portion, which the kaizen didn't cover. Since vendors take the most time, we consider it an ideal topic for a future kaizen.