Kaizen Events at ControlTek Promote Cross-Discipline, Lean Manufacturing Initiatives

The road to Lean Manufacturing is long, but here at ControlTek, our employees are helping us pave the way every day.

What is Kaizen?

Kaizen manufacturing philosophy: Constant improvement through small, ongoing changes that help reduce waste and improve manufacturing productivity.

Kaizen events, on the other hand, involve cross-discipline teams of ControlTek employees focused on improving a particular area or process within the manufacturing plant.

These events involve all employees, from C-Level to the assembly line, in teams of five to eight employees working diligently in one week sprints to find ways to improve manufacturing productivity and help reduce operational waste.

Kaizen at ControlTek

Our most recent Kaizen event focused on identifying products that could be grouped together into a single production line. By grouping products with similar cable assembly, circuit assembly or other electronics manufacturing processes, ControlTek employees were able to create quick-turn, one-piece flow production, reducing WIP time and lead times to deliver finished electronics products to our customers faster.

Kaizen events continue throughout the year, and are just one small way ControlTek employees help us work towards Lean Manufacturing as an organization.

“ControlTek takes the Lean Manufacturing journey to heart as an organization,” says our VP of Marketing and HR, Stacey LaFrazia Smith. “Our culture is centered around a long-range view of our business, and Lean Manufacturing, continuous improvement of our processes, and staff training are all part of that. We believe in creating partnerships with our customers and with our employees, and to do that we need to make sure they’re well supported. ”

“The Kaizen events give all of our employees a chance to enact change within our company,” Stacey adds. “They also help create unity behind our efforts towards Lean Manufacturing as a manufacturing philosophy for ControlTek.”