Discover what Hoshin Kanri is and how it can benefit your organization.
Hoshin Kanri is a work method or system based on ensuring the whole company’s cooperation, to achieve the objectives of long-term strategic and short-term management plans. Hoshin can be translated from Japanese as “compass” and Kanri as “administration” or “control”.
Hoshin Kanri is designed to orient the organization in only one direction – achievement of objectives, with members taking the initiative.
The father of Hoshin Kanri is Professor Yoji Akao, who, in the late 1950s, introduced the quality function deployment (QFD) system within the total quality control (TQC) system.
Hoshin Kanri was very successful in Japanese companies, with perhaps its largest exponent being Toyota and, a few years later, the Western automobile industry. Although it was conceived specifically for quality functions, in response to customer demands and the need to reduce the design cycle, today it has been extended to director level and is a method of strategic planning based on Deming’s Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA).
The model includes seven steps:
Steps four to seven are cascaded down the organization, through all departments.
Five advantages of Hoshin Kanri, in case you are not convinced of its benefits:
In conclusion, it is a practical means of effectively resolving a company’s root problems, in a fast and controlled way.
In forums and schools and in American business talk, we are starting to hear about Hoshin Kanri and questions, such as, is it a new fashion? Are the classics back? We think, this time, it goes much further – the conversation is indicative of a paradigm shift in business management.
In the last 70 years, we have witnessed a profound change in management models, from management by control to management by objectives. That is, from order and command to planning and strategy. The problem is that strategy, in many companies (many of them large and well known) is a great and magnificent document that stays in the General Management drawer and does not move.
We are convinced that a change of paradigm in management models is needed, in view of the shortcomings of management by objectives and the crises into which we have been plunged. Current models are based on uncontrolled growth. The next challenge is global Lean management, which considers the processes, utilizes self-learning and values people.
Without a doubt, for what we provisionally call “management”, global Lean will exceed the model of direction by objectives, because, in addition to acknowledging that objectives matter, it also acknowledges the importance of the processes required to achieve them. Objectives and strategies are shared throughout the organization, through matrices of correlation. Cooperation is encouraged and know-how is harnessed and acquired in the processes.
The great challenge we face is how to apply Hoshin Kanri in Western companies. In Japan, the vision of quality and personal development is part of workers’ DNA. Workers are so involved with their companies that they see themselves as part of a family and feel pride in belonging. Western culture moves in other ways.
Hoshin Kanri is a method that puts people at the base of all process improvement, as how things are done is as important as what is done. Because it consists of a series of systems, forms and rules, every company can make it theirs.
For more information, visit our Consulting services web page or speak with your local SGS representative.
For further information, please contact:
Jason Hulbert
Associate Marketing Manager
Knowledge
Tel: +44 7912426878
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