Five Workshops on Lean Manufacturing Help Ontario Companies Compete

BROOKLINE, Mass., June 21 -- A new workshop on how to apply lean manufacturing principles to office and service processes is among five workshops being presented next month in the Toronto area by the nonprofit Lean Enterprise Institute.

The workshops will run July 19 - 21 at the BMO Financial Group, 3550 Pharmacy Ave., Scarborough, Ontario. The workshops are:

  -- Lean Logistics, July 19: Understand where and how to apply lean
     concepts to logistics, how to analyze costs and balance them among
     logistics functions, and how to truly eliminate unnecessary
     inventories rather than shifting them to other areas of the value
     stream.

  -- NEW! Business Process Value-Stream Mapping, July 20: Learn how to apply
     value-stream mapping, a fundamental lean manufacturing tool, to
     administrative, professional, and transactional activities. You'll
     learn how to identify existing waste in non-production value streams
     by drawing a current-state map and how to design a leaner, more
     efficient process by mapping the future state.

  -- Making Materials Flow, July 21: Sustain continuous flow production
     cells and lines with a dependable just-in-time material-handling
     system for purchased parts that uses timed delivery routes, pull
     signals, and a Plan for Every Part database.

  -- Creating Level Pull, July 21: This introduction to the basics of
     leveling and pull gives you the essential information you need to
     design and implement a basic end-to-end pull system with kanban and a
     leveled schedule at the pacemaker process.

  -- Change Agent Skills for Lean Implementation Leaders, July 21: Discover
     an analysis tool and communications format that use the plan-do-check-
     act (PDCA) cycle to build support for lean manufacturing initiatives
     by clearly demonstrating the benefits in human and organizational
     terms.

Workshops run from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. (EDT). For complete content descriptions and to register, go to the Training page of the LEI web site at: http://www.lean.org/Events/ or call (617) 713-2900.

Lean manufacturing cuts costs and inventories rapidly to free cash and resources, which is critical in a competitive world economy. Lean supports profitable growth by improving productivity and quality, reducing lead times, and freeing resources. For example, it frees office and plant space and increases capacity so companies can add product lines, in-source component production, and increase output of existing products. Companies implementing lean can take advantage of renewed economic growth by increasing sales while controlling costs.

Based in Brookline, MA, the Lean Enterprise Institute (LEI) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit training, publishing, and research center founded by James P. Womack PhD, in August 1997 to give people simple but powerful tools that enable them to apply a set of ideas known as lean manufacturing and lean thinking, based initially on the Toyota Production System. LEI disseminates this knowledge with the lean community through books and workbooks, public and on-site training, its web site, and global affiliates. For more information visit the LEI Media Center at http://www.lean.org/WhoWeAre/LEINews.cfm.