KAIZEN IN AFRICA

AKAC 2019 Tunis

Tetsushi Sonobe1

1. Congratulations

◦ To nominees

You are one of the first to master Kaizen in Africa which is going to be the largest market in the world.

This is significant because Kaizen holds the key to well-being.

◦ To their nominators, trainers, supporters, & governments

◦ To JICA andNEPAD

2. How Kaizen brings economic success

Palgrave Macmillan Website. Open Access book, Applying the Kaizen in Africa: A New Avenue for Industrial Development, Kimiaki Jin, Keijiro Otsuka, and Tetsushi Sonobe (eds), 35,841 downloads

Kaizen delivers to businesses and non-profit organizations

(1) higher quality (2) higher productivity

(3) cost reduction (4) more reliable delivery

(5) higher safety (6) higher moral

(7) better environment

This afternoon, Kaizen Award Nominees’ presentation will provide good examples explaining how.

3

2-1. How Kaizen brings economic success in countries where unemployment rates are high among educated youth rather than unskilled factory workers?

◦ Kaizen provides managers and would-be managers know-how for identifying problems in workplace, detecting root causes, finding a solution, dividing the solution into doable steps, letting workers do these steps to make them a productive group of people.

◦By doing so, Kaizen creates jobs for both workers and managers.

4

2-2. How Kaizen brings economic success in countries where innovation is needed more than conventional labor-intensive manufacturing?

5

◦ Leading firms are great masters of Kaizen if they do not emphasize or if they call their methods differently.

◦ Firms are returning to Kaizen.

2-4. How Kaizen brings economic success in countries which need upgrading of products (higher value-added, quality) more than productivity and cost reduction?Kaizen includes

◦ Toyota Production System

◦ Total Productive Maintenance

◦ Total Quality Management

◦ General purpose tools including 7 QC tools, New 7QC tools, QC story, Why-why analysis, Muda elimination, Visualization, PDCA cycle

◦ 5S (Sort, Set in order, Shine, Standardize, Sustain)7

Thus, Kaizen is versatile. It works in both high-tech and low-tech,

both manufacturing and service, both brain-intensive and labor-

intensive industries.

In Africa, so far ….

Employ those who studied engineering more and give more tasks and

authority to them

8

3. Kaizen in Asia◦ American ideas, techniques, and practices for higher quality and

productivity came soon after World War II: Training within Industry (TWI),

Statistical Quality Control, and Preventive Maintenance

◦ Total Quality Control came soon from the US.

◦ Users in Japan made these ideas and practices human friendly by

emphasizing bottom-up

◦ As a result of this modification, Kaizen has these principles: Continuous

improvement, Participatory improvement, Incremental improvement,

and Low-budget improvement

◦ New tools, methods, and systems were also invented in Japan

◦ Now new inventions related to motivation are being made in Japan

9

Dissemination of Kaizen from Japan to Asia

It was a mission of JPC

JICA joined JPC. Other organizations, too.

Kaizen was spread through FDI of private firms

Without Kaizen, neither Singapore nor China would succeed in economic development

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

Detroit of Asia (automobile cluster in Thailand)

19

4. Africanization of Kaizen

◦ Absorb knowledge

◦ Customize practices

◦ Empower engineers

◦ Find a good way to motivate people

◦ Share knowledge and experiences within countries and beyond

◦ I understand that JICA is standardizing the concepts of Kaizen to some extent and laying the base for quality assurance of kaizen experts (trainers, consultant, etc.).

20