History of Lean (Six Sigma)

After World War II, Japanese manufacturers were faced with the dilemma of vast shortages of material, financial, and human resources. These conditions resulted in the birth of lean manufacturing concept. Toyota motor company, led by its president (Toyota), recognized that American automakers of the era were out-producing their Japanese counterparts; in the mid 1940’s American companies were outperforming their Japanese counterparts by a factor of ten. In order to make a move toward improvement early, Japanese leaders, such as, Shigeo Shingo and Taiichi Ohno, devised a new, disciplined, process-oriented system, which is known today as “Toyota Production System” or “Lean Manufacturing” (Abdullah, 2003).

Taiichi Ohno, who was given the task of developing a system that would enhance productivity at Toyota, is generally considered to be the primary force behind its system.

After some experimentation, the Toyota production system was developed and refined between 1945 and 1970, and is still growing today all over the world.(Liker, 2004). In 1980s, products were being brought to the market with higher quality and lower price. Consumers came to expect higher quality and lower prices as a requisite for purchase. Some manufacturers faded away while others began to look diligently for better ways to compete (Hobbs, 2004). In order to compete in today’s fiercely competitive market,

US manufacturers have come to realize that the traditional mass production concept has to be adapted to the new ideas of lean manufacturing because the Japanese companies developed, produced and distributed products with half or less human effort, capital investment, floor space, tools, materials, time, and overall expense (Khatri, et.al, 2011).