Lean strategy has helped companies large and small throughout the world significantly improve their quality, costs and cycle time. The resulting economic benefits have been substantial. If speed, efficiency and customer value are among your critical concerns, you’ve got to join the forward-thinking companies who have applied lean principles to leverage their business operating strengths.

Lean methods accelerate product launches and improve business results by:

• enabling you to bring new products to the market faster
• developing new products with existing resources
• consistently completing new products on time
• eliminating development errors and rework

The time-tested approaches taught by MAGNET’s consultants in lean product development—from design concept through customer launch—will dramatically improve how you bring your new products to market and foster sustainability. These outcomes will be obtained by:

• identifying and eliminating unnecessary tasks, delays, errors and costs
• focusing on information flow and decision processes
• implementing and monitoring the new process that is put in place

A Lean Approach

Our consultants will begin by holding kaizen events at your facility. Kaizen (which means "change to become good") events typically last five days, and will include the key owners of the new process to be developed, including the project manager and representatives from design, manufacturing, quality, marketing and sales.

The participants form cross-functional teams and draft a charter outlining scope and deliverables. The team leader for the kaizen event drives members to achieve the deliverables, and also manages and monitors the project implementation and sustaining metrics.

The engine producing the event results is the 5-Step Lean Improvement Method.

Providing a proven structure, the 5-Step Method facilitates data decisions and ensures buy-in as the team:

• documents the current production flow process (value stream map), mapping information flow and collecting process data
• analyzes the value stream map using lean tools to identify wastes, useless activities, quality, quantity and people, including hand-offs, delays, rework, errors, etc.
• develops an improved product development process
• implements an action plan
• sustains improvement results by managing key metrics and scorecards

To find out how a MAGNET Lean Product Development project could benefit your company, contact MAGNET today!