Lean Tools in Project Management

The philosophy of Lean Thinking was originally applied in the automotive industry. Later it became clear that the philosophy was not only applicable in relation to the automotive industry, but it could also be used in other industries. This article covers the basic principles of Lean Thinking in relation to Project Management. The overall purpose is to give an overview of Lean Thinking. This will include a description of the background of Lean Thinking, a description of non-value activities together with tools and techniques applied in Lean Thinking. Additionally some examples will be given in how to approach Lean Tools in Project Management.

The main topics in this article are Lean Thinking and Project Management. The definitions of Lean Thinking and Project Management can be seen below:

Lean Thinking: Eliminate waste in order to maximize customer value with less resources..

Project Management: Plan, organize, motivate and control the resources to achieve a specific goal of a temporary project within the specific criteria.

The article is a combination of these two definitions and provides a clear picture of why these two topics are linked.

Background

Fig 1: Visualization of the five principles of Lean

Introduction to Lean

Lean Thinking is the philosophy from the Japanese automotive industry and was introduced in the very late 1930’s as the Toyota Production System (known as TPS). Lean is basically about creating value for the customer by eliminating waste. An organization which has fully adopted the philosophy understands which activities creates value for the customer and how much the customer is willing to pay for the product/service. The target in every lean project is to eliminate waste and reduce the variation in all of processes in the value chain. The lean philosophy, in form of TPS, caught attention from other automotive manufacturing companies when the small Japanese automotive company, Toyota, became one of the leading automotive manufacturing companies in the world. The TPS system was in the beginning dedicated to the manufacturing industry, but during the past years has the philosophy been established as an overall optimization philosophy for all kind of business’. The Lean philosophy consists of five principles; Specify value, Integrate the value stream, Create flow by eliminating waste, Establish pull and Seek perfection (see description below and figure 1.) .

Lean Principles

The Five Lean Principles .	Description
1. Specify Value	Specify Value is about understanding that only small amount of the time you spend in the company that adds value to the customer. This is mainly about eliminating all the non-value activities, known as waste, and furthermore identify what activities which make for the specific product or service.
2. Integrate the Value Stream	Value Stream Mapping is while all the activities of the product or service are identified from the very beginning of its lifecycle across all the processes. An overview of all the non-activities will be visualized in a Value Stream Mapping Model.
3. Create Flow by Eliminating Waste	Create Flow by Eliminating Waste ensures the flow of the product with only value added activities. While Lean Thinking is focusing by eliminating the waste, this principle can only be achieved if all the different waste has been eliminated.
4. Establish Pull	This is a part of the "Just In Time", which is important to know. Just-in-time (JIT) concept is from 1950s, and is part of the "Toyota Production System" (TPS). JIT originally had much focus on the times for their supply, production and customers. The materials for the production should be available "just in time", exactly when the need for them to be a "pull" system. Understanding what customer wants, when the customer wants it will secure a low inventory.
5. Seek Perfection	After achieving the first four principles continuous improvements must be a part of the philosophy. The aim must be zero waste although its difficult to archieve. To achieve the most "Lean" organization, involve every employee within your company which is a part of the value stream and implemented the mindset in all departments.

Implementation of the Lean Thinking principles in any organization should result in:

• - Quality Improvement
• - Elimination of Waste
• - Reduced Lead time
• - Reduced Total Cost

Applying Lean Thinking to Project Management is about eliminating waste in the project management process. To achieve the full value of Lean, Lean Tools are powerful and can be applied in Project Management. The next topic will cover the difference of wastes in Lean Thinking and Lean Project Management.

Elimination of Waste

Lean tools can easily be applied to Project Management with the purpose of eliminating waste (known as Muda in Japanese Terms). A description of the different types of Wastes are listed in the table below. Using Lean Thinking in Project Management is to reveal not only “production lines” can be “Lean”, but also Projects. The object of using Lean in Project Management is to reduce the cost of the project, complete the project on budget, complete the project within the estimated time and meet the success criteria of the project.

Description of Wastes:

Types of Wastes

Waste in Lean Thinking	Waste in Lean Project Management
- Transportation, every time when a product moves. Damaging of products, delays, etc.	- Status meetings, which are ineffective and too long to keep the participants interested.
- Inventory, raw material, work-in progress or finished goods, which is cost and does not create value to the customer.	- Too detailed plans. The schedule usually changes during a project period and it waste of time and a huge amount of rework.
- Waiting. If a process or product is not in progress.	- Collecting inoperable data, this will never be used.
- Over-processing. occurs when more work is done and its not required by the customer.	- Push sub project and meetings, which ties up the team members and only satisfying the stakeholder but increasing the duration of the project.
- Over-production. Producing more than the total demand of the product from the consumer.	- Documentation which is never used.
- Defects. Creates extra cost and extra labor from the producer.
- Motion. Equipment/people moving more than required.

The 7 different Wastes in Lean Thinking are related to the production. In Lean Project Management some similar types of waste can be found such as; Waiting, Over Processing and Defective Processes, but these are related to the planning and management of the Project.

As a Project Manager, it is crucial to classify all processes. When all processes have been classified, the Project Manager has to identify which processes creates value and which does not. Once all non-value activities have been identified, go to a detailed classification and use the table listed above. Find out what kind of waste is the biggest bottleneck and start a Project Plan which systematically eliminates the bottlenecks/wastes.

Lean Tools in Project Management

This section covers The Lean Tools that can be applied in Lean Project Management. These tools which are described below, helps to reduce the waste and the variation of the processes. Furthermore these tools can help to identify potential improvement of processes and assist to a better understanding of the products life cycle. Not every "Lean" tool is applicable in Project Management, but some tools can and those are listed below.

Value Stream Mapping

Fig 2: Detailed Map of Value Stream.

Visual Management in Project Management provides a lot of information quickly. Furthermore it's easier to remember information when it's presented visually. Value Stream Mapping (VSM) is a visual technique to map the current processes. VSM gives a current state view of the processes and gather information as; cycle times, inventory levels, down times, material flows and information flows. This technique can be used in different levels, such as the entire supply chain or a production area. The tool mapping all the non-valued activities as well as all the valued activities. The target is to achieve a future state sceneria by using other lean tools. Figure 2 shows a very detailed plan of a Value Stream. The Map informs many different common VSM symbols, which is used to portray material and information flow.

Kaizen

While Value Stream Mapping gives an overview of the current activities, Kaizen Events are useful for conducting the improvements of the activities. Kaizen events are generally a short-term projects, which takes place in a period of 3 - 5 days. The objective is to improve a minor process and the scope is small. Workers which are closets to the current process are key players in these projects. New strategies, techniques and equipment are not introduced in these events, those are introduced in Kaikaku Events, where the scope is larger and the more radically changes are made.

The Gemba Walk

Gemba Walk is a powerful tool, where the Lean Manager physically visits the production floor. The manager goes to the production and walks through the entire value stream. There are numerous of reasons why this is a great tools, for instance; The Lean Manager is not familiar with the process and have another view of the process. Furthermore, when the Lean Manager visits the production floor does it give a positive motivation impact on the employee and the worker feels valued because the manager puts this attention to the process. The Gemba Walk avoids the PowerPoint presentations and goes directly to the problems.

System Optimization

Fig 3: Example of Poka Yoke.

This mythology is a part of the Value Stream Mapping. Optimization is not only on a particular workstation of specific area, but considering the entire value stream, and identify what improvements will affects other workstation and which will not. The goal is to create improvements without affect any other areas and create a standardization of it.

Poka-Yoke

Poka-Yoke is a Japanese tool, which helps the workers to avoid mistakes. For instance, plugin a battery into headphones. The “Poka-Yoke” is that the headphones do not allow the process to begin after the mistakes has occurred. Therefore the consumer of the headphones cannot listen to music before the battery orientation is proper. An another example is shown in figure 3, where the image shows how its only possible to plugin the power outlet in one way. .

Summary

The explanation and the description of the applicable Lean Tools for Project Management listed above give an idea of how to approach these tools. These can be used as analytical methods, planning-, and problem-solving approaches.

Summarizing two of the factors in these Lean Tools, which can be applied in Project Management:

1. Lean Tools gives an understanding of the current processes and help to a better understanding of improvements. In order to understand this, it is required to make a current state of the processes.
2. Lean practices can be applied in any kind of business and projects. It's only depends on the workers and the project managers creativity.

Consequences

Advantages

Applying Lean Tools in Project Management provide competitive advantages. Space saved on warehousing, reducing cost, improving efficiency, time savings, faster responding to changes and elimination of waste are some of the major advantages by using the tools listed above. New production lines might be added while more space from the warehouse is available. In addition, the employees develop new skills and can respond quicker to changing demand from customers.

Limitations

• Inefficiency

Lean can be abused and overused. Lean can often become a goal itself, although the value of the improvement just moves the bottleneck to another process. Lean must be a trade of between the value of the improvements and the resources in the current situation. Some companies believe that Lean tools can be applied in their organization from the next day, but the companies forget to remember that Toyota has spent more than 50 years on achieving a “Lean” Production, and Toyota has still room for improvements. While running Lean Tools in organization, the project managers have to be patient with the improvement activities which are initiated.

• Problem Delivering the Right Product on the Right Time (Just In Time)

Fig 4: Visualization of the workload balance. Source: Author's creation.

"First stabilize then optimize" is a common proverb in Lean context. Unfortunately, some companies facing optimizing and then stabilizing, which is wrong and might have major impacts on delivery times etc. For instance, if a company has uncertain delivery of raw materials, and does not have raw materials for production, then it interrupting the production flow and delaying all other processes. Therefor being aggressive with "Just in Time" might leave bottlenecks in the overall Value Stream.

• Employees Frustration

Discouraging employees by using lean methods can be a problem. The managers squeezing the economy from the production and discourage the employees. Continue Improvements must be a part of the workflow, but not a strain on the workers and this can be challenging in a lean environment. In a lean environment the workload of the single worker must around 80 % every day. The last 20 % should be free for change or enhancement measures.

Additional Reading

• Books

- Lean Thinking. By James P. Womack and Daniel T. Jones. 2003. ISBN 978-0743249270 - One of the most famous books about Lean, especially the authors. Must read to get a detailed and overview of lean.

- Gemba Walk. By James P. Womack. ISBN 978-1934109151 - Great examples from Womack. Womack gives som great examples from the real life. Particularly when he steps into the first company, and explains how he did the "Gemba Walk" and how badly the company performed (Page 48-75). This book is available at The Technical University of Denmark's' library.

• Websites

- Elimination of Waste - Get a fast overview of Lean Thinking in Project Management.

- Lean Principles - If you are not into reading, then you can find some pretty good examples on YouTube. This video might give powerful understanding of Lean.