“Dynamic Lean Assessment for Takt Time Implementation”

Increasing volatility, global competitiveness, and sales crisis all force the manufacturers to commit to the journey of world-class manufacturing performance via adopting “lean systems” to enable economic success in difficult times. Among the journey to lean, one of the hardest steps is measuring the progress of lean polices implementation especially in this highly dynamic market. This paper presents a dynamic model to evaluate the degree of leanness in manufacturing firms. The model is based on system dynamics approach and presents a “leanness score” for the manufacturing system. In addition, it examines the dynamics associated with the application of “One-piece flow” concept via “Takt time”. Results show that working on adjusting the system's cycle times to follow takt time will improve the overall performance. Improvements are reflected in the overall service level, overall WIP efficiency, and overall equipment effectiveness. The developed model with its performance metrics will help the decision makers in adopting different lean policies and assist in optimal parameters settings of the system.