Toyota Production System (TPS), or Lean Management

"The key to the Toyota Way and what makes Toyota stand out is not any of the individual elements... But what is important is having all the elements together as a system. It must be practiced every day in a very consistent manner - not in spurts." (Fujio Cho, President of Toyota Motor Company)

The Goal is Achieving Synergy

We have worked with many manufacturing companies on shaping their culture and developing their systems during our more than 2 decades of existence. Our experiences have proved that a company's culture can only be transformed successfully on the long run if the so-called "hard" systems (being production processes, supporting or IT-systems) are aligned with the new, desired culture. The reverse is also true: the to-be systems or new structures can only become accepted and effectively used if the company's culture supports them, the two are in harmony. Thus strength of the system resides in the harmony of its components.

In the last decade ther have been major changes in market processes. As a consequence, customers' expectations significantly grew concerning quality, cost, time of delivery and flexibility. Thus we meet an increasing demand of manufacturing companies and also service providers to align their organizational cultures with the efficiency improvement, process improvement, or BPR-processes taking place - all in order to achieve measurable and long-lasting results.

Lean Management and Concordia

We first met lean management (also called Toyota production system or TPS) when we supported its introduction through organizational development methods at Alcoa Köfém Présmű Kft. between 2000 and  2003. It was nearly unbelievable to see the results. Already in the first 9 months of introduction:

• the reduction of work-in-process inventory was 56%,
• the reduction in finished-goods inventory was 44%.

Productivity grew, hundreds of employee ideas were born, a new generation of leaders was bred in only a couple of years - basically in moments compared to standard change processes.

Alcoa was one of the first companies in introducing lean, and according to a study of Harward Business Review, one of the few who could also adapt lean philosophy and cultural approach besides the adaptation of lean tools.

The philosophy of lean management is in accordance with Concordia's values: its most important principles include respect for people and the belief that all employees, working at any hierarchical level of the organization can add value to the copmany through their development ideas. Since we consider lean management outstanding regarding its concept, results and values, we have decided to support its introduction prominently.

Why Choose Concordia?

Lean management has become one of the most sought systems of manufacturing companies; professionals of more and more companies all over the world study how to successfully implement it and sustain the results achieved by its application on the long run. Since the implementaton of new systems and a production philosophy is necessarily accompanied by the transformation  of culture, important synergies may occur if the implementation is supported from the professional and also the organization development side. At Concordia, that is what we can help our clients in.

For the successful implementation of lean management we combine the methods of our experienced lean professionals and OD-consultants, thus achieving synergy and creating the possibility for permanently  successful lean implementation.

Among our consultants you can find a lean professional who has also assisted the process of lean implementation  on the company side as production manager, lean manufacturing manager, and many of our colleagues have supported the implementation of lean culture at companies, through organizational development methodology, change management programs, personal middle- and executive consultation/coaching, skills development programs, workshops, kaizen events, and the facilitation of change management teams.

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