This became evident to the ZF Sales and Service Organization (ZF SSO) when it began a search for an improvement initiative. ZF SSO provides technical support and service for ZF products in North America including spare part sales, repair, remanufacturing and warranty administration.
A ZF SSO customer suggested the company investigate lean thinking as an improvement strategy, and trained the group on using a few lean tools. Although there was good acceptance of the lean initiative, “nothing sank in,” said Tim Corcoran, vice president of ZF SSO.
Lean Learning
To learn more about lean principles, Corcoran attended the Lean Learning Center's two-day Lean Leadership program. The program focuses on lean thinking and developing the skills necessary to design, manage and improve business at all levels.
“The Center’s approach,” said Corcoran, “helped us understand that lean tools are just the beginning. You also have to know how and why to use them. It became clear that lean transformation was going to be a top-down effort,” commented Corcoran.
As a follow-up to Corcoran's two day program, ZF sent management and supervisory members to the Center’s five-day Lean Experience class. Here the objective is for participants to internalize lean through personal experience and application.
“Our form of instruction is certainly not the norm. Lean concepts are taught through discussion and hands-on discovery, not lectures,” said Andy Carlino, Lean Learning Center partner.
The Lean Team
Although ZF had some success as employees deployed what they had learned at the Lean Experience, something was still missing. That something was an integrated approach and the leadership to direct it.
To meet these goals, ZF’s building management team became "the leadership team."
“Using a business excellence process to identify areas with the greatest opportunities,” said ZF’s first designated lean leader, Norbert Schmelz, “the team prioritized projects, identified goals and set up yearly implementation plans.”
This marked a major step forward in ZF’s ability to make progress. For example, after a waste walk (a lean tool), the leadership team came up with a plan to reorganize and optimize the building. Although the staff said it would take six or seven months to accomplish the reorganization, the leadership team pushed hard to get it done faster, and three months later both plant and warehouse were reconfigured to a lean layout.
It was the success of projects like this that helped impact and change the culture of the entire plant. Although lean principles were initiated from the leadership team, the acceptance by the entire plant to make a cultural shift to lean thinking was critical.
Integrating Lean
What started as an improvement initiative at ZF evolved into the Vernon Hills Business Management System, or VHBMS. VHBMS was established to define procedures and processes and to identify the relationship between them.
“Previously called the Quality System,” said Alex Kurzeder, IT/Business Process Manager at ZF, “VHBMS is the backbone of the way we operate our company and is a combination of our ISO/TS 16949, Lean and our ERP system."
“In the past those would have been three separate chimneys of activity," explained Corcoran, "which is why VHBMS is such a big change for us. It’s become a major part of our drive to continuous improvement. We could not have done this without lean thinking.”
Driven by customer requirements, VHBMS encompasses ZF’s quality operating system, quarterly strategic planning, business planning and goal-setting, as well as monthly business management review and team-building.
A key component of VHBMS is the Vernon Hills Operating Process, or VHOP, which details activities performed on a daily, weekly and monthly basis. Available to employees online in an easy-to-use spreadsheet format, each activity is color-coded and grouped by like needs.
“The rules of lean were used extensively in putting VHOP together,” said Corcoran. “By structuring our activities, clearly connecting customers and suppliers, understanding and simplifying flows, and improving upon them by experimenting at the lowest possible levels, we cut about 1000 different processes down to about 300.”
Real success … lasting change
By properly applying lean tools, ZF became a productive operation. The plant and warehouse were optimized, and the office was redone in a lean footprint using remanufactured furniture. The facility won ZF AG’s TQM award. And, the organization improved its Lean Assessment score by 40 percent.
“Learning and internalizing the principles of lean is what creates the shared thinking that is so critical to long-term success,” said Learning Center partner Jamie Flinchbaugh.
But ZF has also relied on its share of lean tools, such as scoreboards, waste walks, Five S, standardized work, process mapping, visual management, problem solving and kaizen events.
“We’ve come a long way in a relatively short amount of time,” Corcoran said. “Applying lean thinking has changed everything here at ZF SSO. We’re an organization with a shared vision, working within a structure of simple, yet optimized activities and processes. For us, lean is the only game in town.”
www.learnlearningcenter.com