Point, Flow & System Improvement

By Pascal Dennis

Important that we understand the difference.

Leaders at all levels are responsible for leading improvement commensurate with their scope & span of control.

It makes little sense for a front line Team Leader to hunt the Great White Whale of System Kaizen.

Similarly, it's suboptimal for a Senior Vice-President to focus her attention on solely Point Kaizen - when she should be looking for Moby Dick.

(Caveat: she certainly needs to sponsor, motivate & check Point & Flow kaizen in her zone.)

So here are some working definitions of Point, Flow & System improvement.

Point Improvement

• improvement in a point in the value stream, e.g.
• Machine changeover,
• Material handling
• Quality - (e.g. damaged to packaging, contamination)
• Ergonomics
• Standardized work - lack of, wrong content/sequence/timing etc.

Flow Improvement

• improvement in several points in the value stream - that lead to an overall VS improvement (e.g. in Lead time, throughput, quality, inventory turns)
• Flow improvement comprises several point improvements
• A + B + C + D = overall VS improvement, where A, B, C & D might be
• Machine changeover,
• Material handling
• Quality - (e.g. damaged to packaging, contamination)
• Ergonomics
• Standardized work - lack of, wrong content/sequence/timing

System Improvement

• Entails continuing to ask Why until we uncover systemic causes to recurrent problems
• Usually entails macro systems around Man, Machine, Methods, Materials
• Can also entail core business processes - e.g. Budgeting, Forecasting, Info systems etc.

Happy fishing,

Pascal