Question

1. What is a Kaizen Burst? When are Kaizen bursts necessary in order to promote ongoing success?

2. What do you think are typical findings or results that promote the need for process redesigns?

3. How can organizations ensure that performance results are satisfying organizational goals and values?

Answer 1

Answer 1 : I am providing you the first answer here as follows :

“Burst” means to break open especially as an outcome of internal pressure.

“Kaizen” means a philosophy of continuous improvement.

So, Kaizen Burst eventually means a short duration event aimed at quick improvement. Here , events build the internal pressure leading to burst or improvement . I made it so easy . Yes it is.

Let us move further .

The duration of such events generally lasts from 3 days to one week as they are aimed at Rapid Improvement and not long term stuff.This is the reason “Kaizen Burst” is also called “Rapid Process Improvement”.The key is to focus on attaining major improvements in specific parts of an identified process by quick implementation.

Kaizen Burst events are suitable for both manufacturing and service industries.

Now, the point is when are such bursts necessary to promote ongoing success.

In my opinion , a burst is like a nitro boost added to an already accelerated car. I hope you can relate my example as nitro boosts suddenly add to the speed for a few seconds leading to increased average speed of the car.

Similarly , Kaizen bursts help successful organizations avoid lethargy , unnecessary delays in vital decisions by reducing the thinking time significantly and the entire focus is on acceleration and spurring growth resulting in overall increased profits and returns .

Kaizen bursts can be used for :

• Process redesign : Re - desigining the process optimally by eliminating unproductive steps
• Layout redesign - Useful in eliminating unnecessary to and fro movements to pick up materials and come to the machine
• Lean Office- Another technique to produce quality results with minimum resources.

And there are many such areas where kaizen events are useful.

It has become inevitable in today's era to have such sudden surges in productivity and profits and it can only be achieved by organizing events like “kaizen bursts” successfully.

The benefits are numerous and it only takes a week to beat the ever increasing competition today.

I believe that “Kaizen” is the need of the hour as it helps an organization improve continuously.

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