Toyota Kata: Managing People for Improvement, Adaptiveness and Superior Results

Appendix 2 Process Analysis

The purpose of this appendix is to show you a procedure for analyzing the current condition of a production process. This is done to help obtain the facts and data you need in order to define an appropriate process target condition.

I have used this process analysis on a wide variety of production processes; some more automated and some less automated. In some cases adjustments will be necessary in order to fit the analysis to the characteristics of a particular type of process, but the basic concept as presented here is usually about the same.

The purpose of the process analysis is not to uncover problems or potential improvements, but to grasp the current process condition (Figure A2-1) and obtain the facts and data ...