Lean manufacturing at a tier-1 automotive supplier

Abstract

The road to lean manufacturing has been long and hard for many companies. Intrigue Corporation is no exception. The company first introduced its version, the Intrigue Lean Manufacturing System, approximately ten years ago. Since then, the company has struggled with the system and continually refined it, attempting to make it stick. Different manufacturing plants have adopted the system with different amounts of energy. This thesis examines these implementations of the Intrigue Lean Manufacturing System and identifies the key factors that have inhibited a more thorough diffusion throughout Intrigue concluding that the ILMS did not take hold for two reasons. First, Intrigue did not understand the dynamics of change. Consequently, they did not take advantage of the high leverage points to tilt the odds of success in their favor. Second, the ILMS was incomplete and unstructured. Many additional elements are needed to guide individuals that are tasked with adopting the principles. The thesis recommends a model for Intrigue and other corporations to use to review the progress of any change initiative. The model is a powerful tool and aids one in understanding which dynamics may be potentially harmful and lead to failure of any change initiative. A redesign of the ILMS was begun to address many of these inhibiting factors. These activities and their subsequent implementation also describe in depth.