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About This Issue

David Walden

Page 2

Observations from the 1997-98 CQM Study Group

on Cycle Time Reduction
David Walden & Neil Rasmussen

Page 3

Key Findings on Cycle Time Reduction from the

Cincinnati Chapters Research Committee
Beth Robinson

Page 35

Leadership and Cycle Time Reduction:

Sustained Cycle Time Reduction Efforts
Require Top Management Leadership
Greg Fischer

Page 43

Kaizen at HillRom
Gary LeBlanc

Page 49

Planning Concurrency and Managing

Iteration in Projects
Stephen Denker, Donald Steward, & Tyson Browning

Page 55

T
A Written Example of A
CQM Journal Editorial Staff

Page 63

Cycle Time Reduction Special Issue

Volume 8, Number 2
Autumn 1999
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ISSN: 1072-5296

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Kaizen at Hill-Rom
by Gary LeBlanc

Gary LeBlanc received his formal

education in industrial engineering,
organizational leadership, and quality process improvement management. He has worked in the manufacturing industry for 21 years and
has held a variety of operational leadership positions.
Mr. LeBlanc is employed with
Hill-Rom Co., Inc., where he is the
Director of Quality Systems and
Regulatory Affairs, responsible for
the companys quality and regulatory
compliance systems at its facilities
worldwide. Prior to this position, Mr.
LeBlanc held the position of Director
of Continuous Improvement at HillRom, and was responsible for leading Hill-Roms implementation of
Lean Business Process, Kaizen, and
the Toyota Production System.
Prior to Hill-Rom, Mr. LeBlanc
worked for AMF Canada Ltd., where
he held the positions of industrial
engineer, materials manager and
plant manager.
Mr. LeBlanc has also been active
in a variety of industry, professional
and standards organizations, regionally, nationally and internationally.

Volume 8, Number 2

This paper is a transcription of a presentation by Gary LeBlanc at a February

1999 CQM Cincinnati Roundtable on Cycle Time Reduction.

History
Hill-Rom is one of two main businesses of Hillenbrand Industries. HillRom is a major supplier of hospital equipment, particularly hospital
beds and related equipment.
Hill-Rom started its cycle time reduction efforts in 1992 with the aid
of a consultant who helped us evaluate our core business processes.
Four core business processes were identified and cross-functional teams
were established to improve each process. The teams met every two
weeks to review cycle times and first-pass yields.
Thinking that the improved methods had been institutionalized, the
four core-process improvement teams were disbanded in 1993. However, by 1994 results had gotten worse. It appeared that the good results had been a consequence of measuring the processes and did not
represent fundamental changes.
At the end of 1994, Hill-Rom brought in another consultant, this time
from Japan, who taught us the Toyota Production System and Kaizen.
By 1995 we again dropped the consultant and again the results also
stopped. We had not internalized the process.
In 1996, Hillenbrand Industries CEO W. August (Gus) Hillenbrand
called an off-site meeting of key Hill-Rom managers. James Womack,
the leading U.S. proponent of lean production, spoke at the meeting.
However, there was little reaction to his talk among the managers, perhaps because they had already seen similar methods tried twice without long-term success. Then CEO Gus Hillenbrand spoke with such
emotion that his declamation has become known in Hill-Rom lore as
the significant emotional event. He made clear his own commitment
to permanent improvement saying, I will not allow any of you not to
do this again you will do it or you will be gone. In subsequent years,
some were indeed gone. For days afterward, this meeting and Gus
Hillenbrands conviction were the main subject of conversation in the
company. Today, what Gus Hillenbrand preached at that meeting has
become practice throughout Hill-Rom.

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Methods Used at Hill-Rom

There are five Hillenbrand Guiding Principles:
total customer satisfaction;
niche market leadership;
manage for cash flow;
manage for individual work; and
continuous improvement.
An important component of Hill-Roms continuous improvement activities is the method known as Kaizen.1 Hill-Rom uses Kaizen to eliminate waste. Waste can be found in a number of tangible areas, including:
defective products;
over production;
inventories;
motion;
processing;
transportation; and
waiting.

Kaizen is a Japanese term meaning continuous

improvement, or changing for the better. kai
means to change and zen means for the
good.

Waste also is found in the intangible area of untapped creativity.

If one thinks about the available effort one has in a company, the work
of the people in the company can be divided into value-added work
and non-value-added work. Hill-Rom defines valued-added work as
activity that transforms or shapes material or information to meet customer requirements, from the point of view of the customer. Everything else is non-value-added work. For a typical company, only 1% to
5% of its activity may be valued-added activity. At Hill-Rom, we have
estimated our value-added level to be about 3%.
Of course, a company can never get rid of all non-value-added work.
Some will always be necessary. For instance, a typical company may have
a ratio of value-added (VA) to non-value-added (NVA) work that looks
something like this:
VA

NVA

After the typical improvement, the ratio usually looks something like this:

VA

NVA

In other words, the typical improvement is a minor improvement. A

Kaizen waste reduction effort, such as Hill-Roms, is aimed at a major
improvement, for example:
VA NVA

At Hill-Rom, we also use Just-In-Time (JIT) production. The principles of JIT production are:
establish a takt time;
increase production flow; and
incorporate pull production.
Takt time is the rate of customer demand. The goal is to be right on
the takt time. A more rapid production rate than the takt time is waste
as is a slower production rate than the takt time.
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CG

CG

SG

SG

Figure 1 illustrates a Functional

(Departmental) Flow.

M
M

Key for Figures 1 and 2

CG
D
M
SG
T

T
M

T
M

Figure 2 illustrates a Process (Product) Flow.

D
CG

CG

Cylindrical Grinding
Drilling
Milling
Surface Grinding
Turning

SG

SG
D

In the typical production organization that has functional partitions,

products being manufactured flow back and forth among the functional
departments, as illustrated in Figure 1. Using the process flow technique, small stations that provide elements from different functions are
organized together in a production line specific to the product, as shown
in Figure 2. The process flow method also works in administrative (office) situations.
The pull production system makes extensive use of visual controls
on the shop floor to set the production flow. At Hill-Rom, we have found
that such visual controls can be more effective for controlling the production flow than the sophisticated computer systems we used for production planning. They were very difficult to keep up-to-date and correct.

RM

FG

Figure 3. In the typical manufacturing environment we produce in

batches. (Note: RM means raw
materials and FG means finished goods.)

A traditional production system produces batches of components at

each production station, as shown in Figure 3. Hill-Roms production
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Figure 4. In a one-piece flow production system we pull parts one

piece at a time.
RM

FG

system is based on the concept of one-piece flow, as shown in Figure 4.

Under this method, production is completed one piece at a time rather
than in the more traditional batches. This ensures that the product is
flowing at all times. One-piece flow reduces inventory, reduces cycle
times, and helps control quality. As soon as a problem is produced, it is
found!

Kaizen Events
We use Kaizen as our continuous improvement system our system of
changing for the better; and we often practice Kaizen in the form of one
week improvement events called Kaizen Events.
Before describing how Kaizen Events work, Ill list the reasons for
having Kaizen events:
they support our strategic objectives;
they have an action orientation;
they speed learning (rapid PDCA);
they accelerate improvement; and
they get results!
Kaizen Events are staffed with a cross-functional team of people who
are assigned to work for five days, Monday through Friday, typically
from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m, with authority to make changes. Our philosophy is
do it and learn and if it doesnt work then fix it.
The macro level Kaizen Event process goes as follows:
1. Select the process to be improved and the scope of the Kaizen Event.
These selections are filtered by senior management teams called
guidance teams so that Kaizen Events support Hoshin objectives.
Even with this filtering process, there are approximately 500 Kaizen
Events per year among our 10,000 employees at our 100+ locations.
2. Set the event objective. These are stretch objectives. The minimum
objective is for a 20% improvement and often a 50% improvement
results.
3. Select team members. Typically there are ten to twelve people on a
team. One-third of these are people from the process to be improved;
one-third are stakeholders in the process, such as managers, engineers
and accountants; and, one-third are people who know nothing about the
process and thus bring a fresh perspective. We welcome people from
outside Hill-Rom as part of this latter one-third of the team and often the
best ideas for improvement comes from these outsiders.2
4. Complete event pre-planning and preparation. The Kaizen Event time
allocation includes four weeks of preparation, one week for the event
itself, and four weeks for post-event work.
5. Conduct event. The one-week Kaizen Event is supported out of the
companys Kaizen Office, which employs 150 full-time people of the 10,000
total people in the company.
6. Complete event follow-up work. This includes making sure the
results of the one-week event are sustained, that the improved
process is performing as planning, and any other open homework.
Volume 8, Number 2

Cycle Time Reduction Special Issue

Editors note: Plastic Moldings CEO Thom

Gerdes noted that they sent people to participate
in Hill-Rom Kaizen Events in this outsiders
role, and that was partially how they learned to
do Kaizen Events themselves, which have been
of major importance to Plastic Moldings.

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Basic to Kaizen Events is having well-defined work processes. One
wants a repeatable, reliable process. Without a standard process, there
is nothing to improve.
The Kaizen Event itself has the following week-long schedule.
Day 1 Senior management kick-off
Training the team in Kaizen and lean production principles
(this happens with every team, regardless of past experience)
Initial brainstorming about possible improvements
Day 2 Understand the as-is process
Make first wave improvements
Assess impact on improvement targets
Day 3 Capture cycles of improvement
Continue improvement
Day 4 Stabilize new process
Day 5 Final presentation and celebration of results
The method of Kaizen Events is quick and crude, not slow and elegant.
Here is one example of the results from a 1998 Kaizen event for an
electronic head and footboard product for a bed:
Productivity (pieces)
Cycle time
Work in Progress (WIP)
inventory (pieces)
Floor space (sq. ft.)

Before
72
366 sec.
10
709

Goal
25%
25%

Result
141 (51% )
181 sec. (51% )
1 (90% )
165 (77% )

In this case, the Kaizen Event team developed the concept of onepiece-PC-board production using a 2-foot-by-2-foot wave-solder machine. The typical wave-soldering machine is optimized for volume
throughput and is thus big. Hill-Roms production philosophy leads to
a wave-solder machine dedicated to the particular product that needs
to be just fast enough, that is, slow. This is what one frequently sees in
Japan; lots of small machines, and lots of visual management.

Summary
Kaizen has become our standard for the way we think and the way we
get work done. We have developed the Kaizen Eye so we are constantly attacking and eliminating waste from our system. Its an exciting time to be at Hill-Rom.

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