Issue link: https://industrialengineer.epubxp.com/i/777540
40 ISE Magazine | www.iise.org/ISEmagazine Adding kaizen to your kanban potential delays in starting the next step, as the operator of that next step has no way of knowing the previous step was completed. The sixth iteration is an enhancement to traditional SIPOCs that is essential in setting the team up for success when the team members create the FMEA in the steps to come. The team reviews each of the inputs/ outputs and adds detailed specifications that must be met to ensure the material received by the operator is exactly what was expected. Put this information in the corresponding "input requirements" and "output requirements" boxes in the ESB. For example, if the input is water, clearly defined requirements could spec- ify a volume, temperature and/or purity. Specifying the volume of water can help reduce the likelihood of spills. Failure modes and effects analysis After the team members clearly defined the input and output requirements for each process step, they have a much bet- ter understanding of the current state of the plant. They also have all the infor- mation they need to analyze how the various steps could fail and the impact each potential failure could have on the overall process. FMEAs are traditionally complet- ed in a group setting with one person capturing the information on a laptop or whiteboard, while the other team members come up with each potential failure. This process is time-consuming, places stress on the scribe and leads to team member disconnect due to its slow speed. The failure box (Fbox) was developed as an alternate approach that allows the entire team to be engaged and speeds up the process by leveraging the clearly de- fined requirements captured in the ESB. This builds the FMEA directly on the previously created map using the fol- lowing steps. For each step on the map that was previously expended using an ESB, use an Fbox to capture the answer to the fol- lowing questions: • What could go wrong in this step? • What could prevent this step from being completed? • How could we fail to meet a require- ment? Each failure mode may result in one or more effects or consequences. An Fbox should be created for each conse- quence. For example, the failure mode "Part cut too short" has three potential effects or consequences: scrap, rework and line stoppage. Team members tape the Fboxes next to the corresponding ESB for each step on the map, as shown in Figure 2. Determine which effect to address first based on the risk priority number (RPN) calculated for each step using the formula: RPN = Frequency × Sever- ity × Detectability. Assign a numerical value as the answer to each question and place it in the corresponding location on the Fboxes. Leverage the Pareto principle to select the top 20 percent of the steps with the highest RPN that should resolve 80 per- cent of the issues. For each of the failure modes in the top 20 percent, write a problem state- ment. At this point you have identified op- portunities for improvement and have translated the most critical ones into potential project problem statements. Team members may be eager to start ex- ecuting these projects one after another based on the RPN ranking. We encourage you to adopt a mind- set of continuous improvement using a FIGURE 2 A box for everything, including failure Fboxes created for each consequence can help your improvement team decide which issue to tackle first.