Reduce waste. Speed up production. Increase profits

What makes a business successful? How do you increase revenue and reduce costs?
Above all, how do you identify and eliminate internal losses resulting from resources and activities that are redundant for the client? In most businesses, neither sales prices nor resource prices can be significantly influenced. So what else could be done? No more than what happens between the input and output of the company, i.e. the capacity and efficiency of internal processes. This is where the company creates added value. For decades, first the automotive industry, and then a number of other industries have been following the path of Lean in search of greater efficiency.
Lean is a philosophy of setting the work free of resources and activities which are redundant for the clients, since they do not create any value for them. Lean is a system of organizational and sociocultural tools, the knowledge of which facilitates and guarantees an effective business. Lean is a model for manufacturing in short series and broad portfolio, within tight timeframes, at low cost, and with quality in mind. Lean is a recipe for efficiency. Each company has a recipe of its own, but the goal is still the same – a highly efficient business!
The book “Lean in Action" is a guide to introducing the principles and tools of Lean. The book shares the knowledge and experience gathered from observations and analysis of the application of Lean in 140 industrial companies in Bulgaria. They have proven, and continue to prove, that Lean is not only universally applicable, but it also ensures positive results at all times. Acknowledged and comprehended first hand, practical experience is described and rationalized. The success achieved and lessons learned in hard times point out the right way, prevent mistakes, and reduce risks.
The book presents all the practically proven working tools of Lean, starting from searching for Muda and their analysis (losses from surpluses), 5S System in Workplace and Value Stream Mapping, going through Short Series Production, Single-Minute Exchange of Die, Total Productive Maintenance, On-Piece Flow & Continuous Flow & Leveling Flow, ultimately reaching the emanation of Lean – the ingeniously simple and effective system Production & Delivery Just in Time.
They are illustrated with useful examples of the application of the methods of Bottleneck Management, Queues Reduction, and Stocks Control when solving Lean cases.
Daily Management and the work of Kaizen teams are further discussed as means to maintain results achieved by other methods.
The synergy between Lean Production and Total Quality, Industrial Logistics, and Six Sigma is presented.
Working rules are provided for submission and selling ideas, seeking group consensus, preventing and overcoming resistance, and motivating to participate in improvements. Different models for managing Lean Transformation are compared.
The book is a practical guide for anyone interested in Lean Production, planning to carry out Lean Transformation for their business, or already on the way to achieve it.

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