The Toyota Production System (TPS)

The Toyota Production System (TPS) (トヨタ生産方式) is the philosophy organizing manufacturing and logistics at Toyota, including the interaction with suppliers and customers. TPS is known more generically as Lean manufacturing. It was largely created by three men: the founder of Toyota, Sakichi Toyoda, his son Kiichiro Toyoda, and the engineer Taiichi Ohno who drew heavily on the work of W. Edwards Demming and the writings of Henry Ford. At first these three came to the United States to see the assembly line and the mass production that had made Ford rich. While they were there they were unimpressed and just left the company and wandered the city. They ended up in a super market and this is where the idea first came from. These men observed the simple idea of an automatic drink resuplier, when the customer wants a drink they take one, and another replaces it. The main goal of the TPS is to eliminate waste (無駄, Muda). There are 7 kinds of waste targeted in the TPS.
Over-production
Motion (of operator or machine)
Waiting (of operator or machine)
Conveyance
Processing Itself
Inventory (raw material)
Correction (rework & scrap)
Toyota was able to greatly reduce leadtime and cost using the TPS, while improving quality at the same time. This enabled it to become one of the ten largest companies in the world. The TPS is a classic example of the Kaizen approach to productivity improvement. Due to this stellar success of the production philosophy many of these methods have been copied by other manufacturing companies.
Contents[hide]
1 Origins and Philosophies behind the Toyota Production System
2 Long-Term Philosophy
3 The Right Process Will Produce the Right Results
4 Add Value to the Organization by Developing Your People and Partners
5 Continuously Solving Root Problems Drives Organizational Learning
6 Commonly used terminology in TPS:
7 References
8 See also
9 External links
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[edit] Origins and Philosophies behind the Toyota Production System
Toyota has long been recognized as the automotive industry leader (as well as compared to all other businesses, in general) in manufacturing and production. This system, more than any other part of the company, is responsible for having made Toyota the company it is today.
It’s ironic that Toyota, who has constantly been taking away Ford and GM’s market share in the United States, got their inspiration for the production system in the United States. This occurred when a Delegation from Toyota visited the United States to study its commercial enterprises. Naturally, they first visited Ford automotive plants in Michigan, but, despite Ford being the auto industry leader at that time, found their methods to be unappealing. They were mainly appalled by the large amounts of inventory that were laying around and how the amount of work being done by the various departments within the factory were uneven on most days. However, the Toyota Delegation first got inspiration for their production system at an American Supermarket (a Piggly Wiggly, to be precise). They saw the virtue in the supermarket only reordering and restocking goods once they’d been bought by customers.
Toyota applied the lesson from Piggly Wiggly by reducing the amount of inventory they would hold only to a level that its employees would need for a small period of time, and then subsequently reorder. This is highly representative of a Just-in-Time (JIT) inventory system.
While low inventory levels certainly is a key component to the Toyota Production System, just as important is the philosophy behind its system to work intelligently and eliminate waste. In Jeffrey Liker’s the Toyota Way, these principles are outlined as follows: 1. Base your management decisions on a long-term philosophy, even at the expense of short-term goals 2. Create continuous process flow to bring problems to surface 3. Use “pull” systems to avoid overproduction 4. Level out the workload 5. Build a culture of stopping to fix problems, to get quality right the first time 6. Standardized tasks are the foundation for continuous improvement and employee empowerment 7. Use visual control so no problems are hidden 8. Use only reliable, thoroughly tested technology that serves your people and processes 9. Grow leaders who thoroughly understand the work, live the philosophy, and teach it to others 10. Develop exceptional people and teams who follow your company’s philosophy 11. Respect your extended network of partners and suppliers by challenging them and helping them improve 12. Go and see for yourself to thoroughly understand the situation (genchi genbutsu) 13. Make decisions slowly by consensus, thoroughly considering all options; implement decisions rapidly 14. Become a learning organization through relentless reflection and continuous improvement

[edit] Long-Term Philosophy
Base your management decisions on a long-term philosophy, even at the expense of short-term financial goals.

[edit] The Right Process Will Produce the Right Results
Create continuous process flow to bring problems to the surface
Use the "pull" system to avoid overproduction
Level out the workload (heijunka). (Work like the tortoise, not the hare.)
Build a culture of stopping to fix problems, to get quality right the first time
Standardized tasks are the foundation for continuous improvement and employee empowerment
Use visual control so no problems are hidden
Use only reliable, thoroughly tested technology that serves your people and processes.

[edit] Add Value to the Organization by Developing Your People and Partners
Grow leaders who thoroughly understand the work, live the philosophy, and teach it to others.
Develop exceptional people and teams who follow your company's philosophy
Respect your extended network of partners and suppliers by challenging them and helping them improve.

[edit] Continuously Solving Root Problems Drives Organizational Learning
Go and see for yourself to thoroughly understand the situation (Genchi Genbutsu
Make decisions slowly by consensus, thoroughly considering all options; implement decisions rapidly
Become a learning organizatoin through relentless reflectoin (hansei) and continuous improvement (Kaizen)

[edit] Commonly used terminology in TPS:
Just In Time (ジャストインタイム) (JIT)
Jidoka (自働化) (English: Autonomation - automation with human intelligence)
Heijunka (平準化) (English: Production Smoothing)
Kaizen (改善) (English: Continuous Improvement)
Poka-yoke (ポカヨケ) (English: fail-safing - to avoid (yokeru) inadvertent errors (poka))
Kanban (看板, also かんばん) (English: Sign, Index Card)
Andon (アンドン) (English: Signboard)
Muda (無駄, also ムダ) (English: Waste)
Genchi Genbutsu (現地現物) (English: Go and see for yourself)

[edit] References
Ohno, Taiichi (1995), Toyota Production System: Beyond Large-scale Production, Productivity Press Inc., ISBN 0-915299-14-3.
Yasuhiro Monden (1998), Toyota Production System, An Integrated Approach to Just-In-Time, Third edition, Spring, ISBN 0-412-83930-X.
Jeffrey Liker (2003), The Toyota Way: 14 Management Principles from the World's Greatest Manufacturer, First edition, McGraw-Hill, ISBN 0-07-139231-9.
Womack, James P. and Jones, Daniel T. (2003), Lean Thinking: Banish Waste and Create Wealth in Your Corporation, Revised and Updated, HarperBusiness, ISBN 0-7432-4927-5.
Womack, James P., Jones, Daniel T., and Roos, Daniel (1991), The Machine That Changed the World: The Story of Lean Production, HarperBusiness, 2003, ISBN 0-06-097417-6.
Shingo, Shigeo (1989) A Study of the Toyota Production System from an Industrial Engineering Viewpoint (Produce What Is Needed, When It's Needed), Productivity Press, ISBN 0-915299-17-8. (This refers to the English version; the Japanese version was published in 1981, but the ISBN is unknown)
Spear, Steven, and Bowen, H. Kent (September 1999), "Decoding the DNA of the Toyota Production System," Harvard Business Review
Emiliani, M.L., with Stec, D., Grasso, L. and Stodder, J. (2003), Better Thinking, Better Results: Using the Power of Lean as a Total Business Solution, The CLBM, Kensington, Conn., ISBN 0-9722591-0-4