The importance of improvement ideas from employees

Employees who work directly on production lines also have their own perspective on how they can make their work easier, working daily with those manufacturing processes, accumulating experience, noticing those details or those small problems that, perhaps, those responsible for the processes (engineers, supervisors, managers) do not see.

The industrial environment is increasingly competitive, customers demand cost reductions year after year, companies have limited resources, so permanent adaptation is needed to remain profitable. The often underestimated resource that can contribute to improvement is the company's own workforce, the employee who works daily at that job. The Kaizen concept, the Japanese philosophy of continuous improvement, is the solution to integrate all employees in this aspect as well.

Essentially, Kaizen means “change for the better”, promotes continuous improvement through small but constant steps, does not necessarily “require” innovations or major ideas and does not rely on the occasional “brainstorming”. Applying Kaizen principles involves creating an organized framework through which all employees are encouraged to observe, think, identify and propose solutions. Of course, management has an essential role in creating this system and not only to listen, but to evaluate, provide feedback, support the implementation of proposals and constantly encourage employees to participate.

Below are the recommended steps for an easy-to-implement and track suggestion system:

1. Generation and recording

Improvement opportunities can be generated during planned meetings, but this is not a rule. Suggestions can arise at any time during work, and those ideas must be recorded on a standard form (physical or electronic).

2. Evaluation

In this stage, the suggestions are evaluated by the superior and/or a specialist, in order to analyze the current situation, whether the idea is feasible and to identify the resources necessary for implementation.

3. Implementation

For the analyzed and confirmed suggestions, resources, the responsible person, the deadline and the implementation action will be allocated.

4. Follow-up and rewards

Following the implementation, follow-up is done, the results are compared before and after, and it is analyzed whether it can be replicated in other areas. Organizations can also develop a reward system to further motivate employees to participate.

Often, progress does not come from radical changes, but from small, but well-directed steps, which can start right from the production line.