Gemba Audit: Streamlining Operations with Effective Gemba Audits

During a Gemba walk, the goal is to monitor workers, inquire about their responsibilities, and identify areas where design thinking can be improved. The term originates from the Japanese word “Gemba,” which translates to a real place and is commonly used to witness where a real job happens. Companies use Gemba Walk’s simple but effective lean management and enterprise to encourage continual development.

Understanding Safety in Gemba Walk

A safety Gemba Walk is a safe tour incorporating the Gemba approach principles. During this lean management process, participants observe the actual activities involved in completing everyday chores.

They identify opportunities for workplace safety. In contrast to the traditional safety walk-through, which strives to ensure that all precautions have been taken, a safety Gemba Walk actively seeks ways to ensure continuous improvement of workplace safety.

Gemba Walk Checklist

Having an operational excellence consulting checklist ready before a Gemba walk would be best. Utilize this checklist to narrow down your objectives.

The questions on the checklist should be tailored to ensure your familiarity with the process you will observe. However, the questions may change based on the change management topic you choose.

• How will you solve the problem?
• What exactly is the issue?
• If you have a problem, who should you contact?
• What are you focusing on right now?
• Is there a standard procedure for this sort of work?

Steps to Follow When Going for a Gemba Walk

Before you enter the shop floor, you should mark the value stream mapping of the Excel workbook strategy and process. The strategy must be based on your desired results. Here are the steps to consider.

Decide on a focus

Gemba visits require participants to agree on a topic ahead of time. You will be more efficient and productive if you give attention to this. Productivity, cost-effectiveness, and safety are just a few of the possible areas of inquiry. For Gemba Audit, it would help to list the questions you want to ask to be as specific as possible.

Get Your Team Ready

The squad being watched must be ready for anything that may come. All team members should see the Gemba walk as a shared activity whose final goal is constant refinement. Employees will have an easier time settling in and be more eager to work together.

Put Your Attention on the Procedure

Remember that a Gemba walk is not the time to assess your team’s work. In order to ensure a successful process, one needs to study, comprehend, and ensure it. Concentrating on people’s skills will only face opposition.

Join the action where value flows. If you follow the value stream, you can find locations with room for waste-related operations. You may boost your overall lean office performance by doing standard work.

Take Note of What You See

During the lean management philosophy exploration, refrain from offering ideas. Take notes or record anything that catches your attention on your phone.

Sometimes you want to jump in with a solution, but that would be a mistake. Do not analyze anything now. After considering all the data at your disposal, your accuracy will increase significantly.

The big picture may provide the basis for efficient problem-solving methods like the PDCA cycle. Superior to any snap judgment you could make.

A secondary set of eyes

Perhaps bringing in a coworker from a different division may be beneficial. A person whose operational excellence routine is different from yours. Those unfamiliar with process improvement may provide a new viewpoint and ask questions you never considered.

Follow-up

Nothing you learn or observe during your Gemba stroll should be kept to yourself; it must be shared with the team through PowerPoint diagrams. Otherwise, the squad will feel observed. Make sure the team understands why strategic planning will be required following the walk.

What Is the Ideal Frequency for a Gemba Visit?

Gemba Walks may be scheduled weekly, biweekly, or monthly, but this depends on the objectives, team size, facilitators, and results of the previous walk. If one of your company’s goals is to maintain a high level of quality, you may do Gemba walks more often than at normal intervals.

As a result, successful Gemba walks may be conducted more often by big organizations like Toyota production systems than SMEs since there are more places to optimize. The frequency of a Gemba Walk may also vary depending on the individual executing it; for example, a branch manager may visit the site more often than an operations director.