CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT
What Is a Gemba Walk?
What Is a Gemba Walk?
“Gemba” is a Japanese term that means “the real place”. In Lean management, “Gemba” is where the real work happens, so you can observe and analyse it. The Gemba walk concept offers a real opportunity for managers to leave their daily routine, see where the real work is happening within the organisation, and build relationships with employees based on mutual trust.
There are 3 main components of this tool:
- Move and see: Management and leaders at all levels should participate in the Gemba walk, which involves a regular stroll around the shop floor and the discovery of wasteful activities.
- Find out why: By engaging employees in an active discussion, a Gemba walk explores the value stream in detail and identifies problematic components. An excellent leader is always eager to listen rather than to speak. Identifying problematic parts of the process may require the use of various techniques such as the 5 whys.
- Be respectful of others: It is critical to keep in mind that a Gemba walk is not the same as a boss walk. You don’t need to point fingers or blame people. The purpose of your visit isn’t to evaluate results. The goal is to collaborate with the team and find solutions together. Concentrate on finding the weak points of the process, not the people.
7 Steps to Follow When You Go to Gemba
Before you start your Gemba walk around the shop floor, make sure that you have an action plan. The plan will depend on what goal you want to achieve.
In some cases, it might be unstructured for example if you’re new in the organisation, and in other cases, your approach may be more structured as you may be familiar with the work process and employees. It is always a good idea to be prepared for the Gemba walk to maximise its efficiency.
Here are the steps to consider:
- Pick a topic or theme to focus on – choosing a topic or theme before going on a Gemba walk will help you stay on course as your efforts are directed towards that specific topic. Consider exploring themes like productivity, cost efficiency, safety, quality, and others. Once you have made you choice, you will need to make a checklist of question you are going to ask.
- Set up your team – teams being observed will have to be prepared for the Gemba walk. All the team members should have a clear understanding that the purpose of the Gemba walk – a common work process for continuous improvement. This takes pressure off employees and will be inclined to collaborate.
- Focus on the process – keep in mind that your focus should be on the process and not people. The main purpose of the Gemba walk is to understand and look for ways to improve processes.
- Follow the value chain – being where the value stream is will give you an opportunity to identify areas that need improvement – areas with high waste activities. Identifying these areas will help you eliminate those activities and improve overall performance.
- Write down what grabs your attention – keep a record of your observations and don’t be tempted to offer solutions during the walk. Giving suggestion immediately is a bad idea, leave the analytics for later as you will have a broad overview available to you. Furthermore, this offers room to use effective problem-solving tools as a pose to instant gut feeling.
- Invite a colleague – invite a colleague from a different department to join you, an extra pair of yes will offer a different viewpoint and may ask questions you may not ask.
- Follow-up – it is crucial to provide feedback to the team after your Gemba walk, even if there weren’t any major findings. Otherwise, the team will feel like the are being watched
In Summary
The Gemba walk can offer some significant advantages like:
- Clear communication of goals and tasks, therefore increasing employee engagement.
- Build stable relationships with your employees
- Identifying problems and how to solve them, which leads to achieving continuous improvement much faster.
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