Overview

Some common statements made by People who would benefit from this book:

"We are a job-shop, no two orders are the same."

"Lean works great for the automotive - high volume industries, but not for us. We have such low volumes and customer demand is unpredictable."

"We wear so many different hats in our company, we cannot see how Lean would help us."

"We separate ourselves from the market due to our customization by process and product, we can not 'see' how Lean can be applied here."

This book will convey the main Street Lean tools that comprise the Toyota Production System and apply them to the BackStreet environment of job shops and small-to-mid size companies. Our ultimate goal is to ensure the statements made would not be warranted given the detailed twists/adaptations of Lean that are contained in this workbook.

Society is becoming more dependent on the customization of products with an ever-increasing expectation for immediate delivery. Production is moving away from predictable demand, and operations must move quickly to develop new processes and ways of making product delivery more cost effective.

BackStreet Lean utilizes the Main Street Lean tools that comprise the Toyota Production System and adapts them to the BackStreet environment of job shops and small-to-mid size companies.

In contrast to concepts normally accepted and used on the Main Street of manufacturing, BackStreet Lean's concepts and tools...