The Sweet Smell of Lean Success

Takasago is not a household name, yet countless people in households around the world enjoy the company's technology and creativity everyday -- without even knowing it. One of the world's leading flavor and fragrance companies, Takasago has been combining art and science to enhance people's lifestyle and experience for over 80 years. Always at the forefront of meeting global challenges, it's not surprising that they are taking an industry lead in implementing lean practices.

Bill Bushman, VP of Operations, has been spearheading Takasago's lean initiative for over two years. In an enviable position, Bushman had the total support from Takasago USA President Sean Traynor. In fact, Traynor understood the lean process well, having worked for a Toyota supplier. He became a mentor of sorts, giving Bushman books to read and encouraging him to learn all that he could about lean manufacturing and lean thinking. It was this quest for more knowledge that led Bushman to the Lean Learning Center in Novi, Michigan.

Two years ago, he attended The Lean Experience, a five-day exploration and application of the philosophy, rules, concepts and tools of lean. "The Lean Experience was an excellent opportunity for Bill to see what lean would look like at Takasago," says Jamie Flinchbaugh, one of the co-founders of the Center. "More than a class about lean tools, it provided him an opportunity to learn about standardization principles, systematic waste elimination and systematic problem-solving.

"This really jump-started my lean thinking,"says Bushman. "Then I went back for the two-day Lean Leadership class to learn the skills necessary for implementing lean into the Takasago organization." To date, roughly fifteen people have attended classes at the Lean Learning Center.

Bushman is responsible for manufacturing in both the flavor and fragrance divisions in two New Jersey plants. A Japanese company, Takasago has been manufacturing in the U.S. for about fifteen years. While the flavor division hasn't yet reached its full potential here in the U.S., the fragrance division has done quite well and as a result had the resources to allocate to a lean transformation program. And, the changes have been amazing.

The practice of patience

But change didn't happen overnight at Takasago and Bushman admits that he became somewhat frustrated in the first six months following his return from the Lean Learning Center. "I was so eager for change to occur and though I kept training, talking and encouraging new ideas, I felt like we weren't getting very far." With encouragement from both the Lean Learning Center and his CEO, Bushman came to realize two important things. First of all, that lean transformation takes time and second -- one person can't change the world. After all the lean journey is all about changing a culture and doing so takes the development of lean thinkers throughout an organization.

What Bushman came to realize was that he had received training and was investing time in lean transformation, but he wasn't yet fully committed to the results it could achieve. Soon after, he began thinking of lean transformation like he does marathon running. You commit yourself to it, keep with it and do what it takes to succeed. So, instead of just talking to his staff about lean, he decided to get the staff involved. He began sending groups from both divisions to the Lean Experience class at the Lean Learning Center and when they came back they had he same passion for lean he had, they began, as he said to "light his fire", re-sparking his motivation and enthusiasm.

Kaizen and process mapping - a dynamic duo Takasago believes strongly in the power of kaizens as an agent for true change. As a result, the company has established a dedicated kaizen committee, overseen by employees who have gone through the Lean Learning Center's Kaizen Boot Camp. The goal is to hold a kaizen event every quarter in each plant with company leaders facilitating all of them, documenting action plans, and keeping the action plans going.

It's the fragrance division of Takasago that has really reaped the rewards of focused kaizen events and process mapping. This division has always been profitable, but over the last year, volume has increased by 30 percent and the number of orders is up 25 percent. Plus, just by rearranging the plant, organizing the workspace, the raw materials and the flow of information, Takasago has reduced their lead-times by fifty percent. And this has been over the last four months!

In its initial kaizen event, Takasago mapped out the entire manufacturing lead-time process -- from customer service to production planning to quality control. By dividing the whole process into a series of hand-offs, each juncture could be looked at more closely to identify obstacles and opportunities. They call it a deep dive - right down to the very nitty gritty details of one single process. When an obstacle was found during the kaizen, the group became hyper-focused, rooted out every issue they could and took action on it immediately. Minutes saved turned into hours saved which turned into days saved.

How beneficial have kaizens been for Takasago? For one thing, the company has reduced the time to process a large order - in the range of twenty tons - from four days to one day. And, it has reduced lead times in the fragrance division from four-plus weeks down to two weeks -- and this only took three months. While Bushman says he can't put a number on it, Takasago has dramatically increased plant capacity. Fragrance division kaizens have dominated Takasago's efforts but there is quite a Kaizen story on the flavor side as well.

In one event held last April, they focused on just one thing -- powder blending. This involves combining dry ingredients to create a flavor in a powder form. It's a fairly simple process, but the volumes are high and they were having difficulty keeping up with the workload. For one entire week, the team - including its Japanese counterparts - focused on lead-time issues in a single production zone of powder blending. This was the first time Takasago flew "solo" on a kaizen, running it themselves without the Lean Learning Center facilitating.

The team decided that the arrangement of some of the equipment made it difficult to manufacture. So, on its own, the group broke down the racking system and moved the equipment to another room. According to Bushman, this "take-the-bull-by-the horns" action was a great lesson for team members who had spoken up in the past with a good production idea that was rejected. After enough of this, people aren't inclined to offer suggestions or ask for permission to a corrective action if they assume the answer will be "no". So, the can-do spirit of the team taught everyone a lesson and the event achieved results! The output of that operation, by the way, has increased by almost sixty percent! It was a tremendous improvement and even better than that, the group was able to maximize efficiency without spending any additional money. This was a great starting point for the flavor division's lean transformation.

Lean -- a never-ending journey

Fundamental to Takasago's approach to lean transformation is that it is a journey that never ends - which is why Bushman and his crew call in the Lean Learning team for quarterly coaching. And, it's why Takasago has invested in the Center's training modules. Once a quarter, Bushman meets with a Lean Learning consultant who comes to a Takasago facility for a tour and to discuss the group's progress. The conversation runs the lean gamut as they talk about everything having to do with Takasago's lean training and lean learning - including any and all obstacles that may be standing in the way of either one. "What I really enjoy about these visits," says Bushman, "is that the Lean Learning people are good listeners with great advice, helping us peel back the onion, so to speak, to uncover true problem areas where improvement can make a big difference."

In addition to quarterly coaching, Takasago has also invested in the Center's training modules. With over 100 people in two different plants, sending everyone at Takasago for a week of training at the Lean Learning Center is not feasible, so Takasago relies on the modules to make sure everyone is in the lean learning loop. Familiar with the expression "going an inch deep and a mile wide"? Takasago has actually gone the other way - an inch wide and a mile deep. It has taken a few people, given them some good education at the Lean Learning Center to get the ball rolling, and now is giving everyone on the production floor a taste of the Lean Experience via the training modules. The Center has basically customized its Lean Experience class into four short, two-hour modules for Takasago. Flinchbaugh and Bill Bushman worked together for several months, tailoring the content to Takasago's needs. Three Takasago people conduct the training on-site, with around 20 people per class. Mandatory for all manufacturing people, the training has been very well received. The popular classes have also been attended by interested employees from quality control, production, planning and purchasing for whom training is voluntary. Future plans include the development of perhaps four to six more modules, customized with exercises or with real project assignments.

As Takasago continues to move down its lean path, Bushman and his team want to branch out further and have even more people dedicated to the continuous improvement effort -- out on the floor everyday testing new processes and new ways of doing things. The hope is to send even more people to the Lean Learning Center for formal training so that they, too, can make a difference on the floor. "People from the floor have a lot of influence over their own peers," says Bushman. "Getting production people trained and thinking a new way will encourage more people to start looking at their work in a different way."

Getting and staying on the same page

As Takasago moves forward, Bushman is quick to point out that momentum is really in the company's favor - like a snowball getting bigger and bigger as it's rolled along. He also notes that his own learning curve has taken him -- and other management personnel at Takasago -- from a 50,000-foot view of the operation to one that is focused on each day-to-day production floor issue such as customer orders, raw material delays and production equipment failures. Seeing things in a new way helps them understand better what people need in order to do their jobs better.

These days, everyone who touches a Takasago product is much more connected. From upper management to middle management to front-line supervisors to people on the floor - everyone is learning to focus on solutions with a shared set of rules and tools. "As Takasago pursues perfection, they are achieving excellent results," says Flinchbaugh at the Lean Learning Center. "The beauty of it all is that as long as their commitment to lean transformation keeps them on the same page, the final chapter to this success story will never be written."