Management:Toyota Production System

 Toyota Production System(TPS) is one of the most famous management systems in the world."JIT "(Just In Time) is definitely the most popular term that every businessman has heard about it.However,what does that mean?What other elements that contribute to Toyota's big success?The book-<<Toyota Production System>> can give you the answer and is written by Taiichi Ohno,the vice director of Toyota in 1973 and is considered as "the father of TPS"


  The foundation of TPS

Elimination of any waste is the fundamental brief of TPS. But,how to achieve that?There are two major components:(a) JIT  and  (b)  autonomation. With these two components,they can help the firm eradicate any waste in industries and thus,"Zero stockpile" can be reached.

  (a) JIT

Basically,this concept is quite simple:offer necessary and specific amount of materials to the next process within specific period of time.With this concept in mind,it can be separated  into two ways to do it: Standardized production and Board:

1.Standardized Production
let's look at an example:
A company need to manufacture 1000 products per month.
working hour of a person is 8 hour per day,
which means that he needs to produce 1 product within 12 minutes
and after 25 days,it finished.
But,of course,the crucial part is constant producing.

2.Board
actually,it is very similar to "Instruction Sheet'.Every production line has this kind of board that shows how much materials is needed,how much time is allowed,how many workers are needed etc.Managers and workers have to obey it completely.

  (b) Automomation

It is known that machines can provide us with huge convenience in many areas of life.Yet,from Taiichi Ohno's point of view,it is partially incorrect.It is inevitable that a machine will generate some 'by-products' or 'degraded products'.If we allow them to run continuously,waste will just accumulate. Autonomation(human+machine) can solve this problem.Each person manages more than 2 machines and once degraded products are formed,they can stop and fix them immediately.As a result,waste can be eliminated.

  7 Types of Waste

In my opinion,this is certainly the most important part of this book because you will find any waste in your company if you look at the following "Waste Check List":

1. Waste of over-production
2. Waste of idle workersb
3. Waste of delivery
4. Waste of process
5. Waste if stockpile
6. Waste of action
7. Waste of degraded product

This is definitely one of the best books about management since it is quite easy to read and it conveys powerful concepts.Also,we can see Taiichi Ohno's wisdom and ambition in this book

If you are interested in this book,just go to amazon.com or bookdepository.com for English Version and taobao.com for Chinese Version.