Kaizen, Our Way of Life

What is Kaizen? It means change for better. It’s a Japanese term for continuous improvement and has been embraced by many organizations focused on delivering value to the customer, while eliminating waste, improving productivity, and achieving sustained continual improvement in their identified activities and processes.

This past January, APM participated in the first annual Lean Week globally dedicated to Field Services. During this week, members of APM, FieldCore, and GE, collaborated in group activities dedicated to identifying, trying, and implementing changes to current standard work that would create increased safety, quality, delivery, and cost through the elimination of waste.

Leading up to Kaizen Week, there was heavy preparation to ensure team readiness on Day 1. Lean leaders and coaches joined efforts daily to review Lean fundamentals and tools that were most applicable to each of the 50+ kaizens.

As Lean Week kicked-off, the teams were energized and eager get started. Teams brainstormed, try-stormed, and set their plans in motion to test if their ideas yielded the intended results. This enabled team members to think out of the box and assess results to further improve upon a current standard work process. At the end of the week, each team summarized and presented their results. APM showcased five Kaizen workouts that proved to be beneficial to their existing processes to 250+ participants.

The five Kaizens with APM representation and improvements were:

1. Bucket Pin Removal and Installation

2. 6FA Axial Alignment

3. Shroud Cooling Holes

4. 7FA Compressor Casing Removal

5. NRG Sunrise Execution Plan Improvement

 APM Bringing Value to the Table

APM was invited to participate and collaborate based on their expert knowledge of topics and activities targeted. APM came forth and delivered their wisdom. "APM came to the table with expert knowledge. We engaged in "try-storming" improvement ideas and efforts. The excitement, collaboration and learning that occurred during this time was remarkable" commented APM Business Improvement Director, Lisset Lopez.

"Everybody owns a part in Lean and process improvement. We should be sharing ideas for process/productivity improvements and putting those ideas to the test. This is how we get better; how we grow,” said Lisset.

APM received high praise from multiple counterparts for identifying efforts that would lean out procedures and attempting new ideas to achieve intended results. These good efforts led to new and improved standards that will be used to execute work scopes more efficiently.

 APM is equally proud of all team members who attended the week-long activities!