Title: Applying lean thinking to improve the production process of a traditional medium-size British manufacturing company

Authors: Salman Sigari; Robin Clark

Addresses: School of Engineering Systems and Management, Aston University, Aston Triangle, Birmingham, B4 7ET, UK ' School of Engineering Systems and Management, Aston University, Aston Triangle, Birmingham, B4 7ET, UK

Abstract: A well-organised implementation of lean manufacturing strategy will lead to excellent operations system and continuous improvement through the removal of non-value-added activities. This case study uses value-stream-mapping to investigate non-value-added activities, simply show how lean manufacturing implementation can intelligibility result a framework of improvement. The implementation and improvements will be depicted in the area of lead time, cycle time and quality by applying lean concepts like circle-shape on production line, 5S and Kaizen team on the shop floor of a British medium-size company.

Keywords: lean manufacturing; value stream mapping; VSM; lead time; cycle time; Kaizen; continuous improvement; 5S; lean thinking; process improvement; UK manufacturing industry; United Kingdom; manufacturing strategy; non-value-added.

DOI: 10.1504/IJIOME.2013.054307

International Journal of Information and Operations Management Education, 2013 Vol.5 No.2, pp.154 - 169

Received: 13 Feb 2013
Accepted: 08 Apr 2013
Published online: 18 Jul 2014 *

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