Gemba? What is the meaning of Gemba?
You can’t make the right decisions from the meeting room. You have to go, watch, and learn from the actual process. This is the beginning of what is called a Gemba Walk.
When Steve Blank was developing some of the core concepts of design thinking, he continually said get out of the building and go and learn from real customers. And the same goes for Lean.
What is Gemba?
In Lean, we talk about “going to the Gemba” or Gemba Walks. The Gemba means the “place where value is created”. The idea is simple: if you want to improve your business, you need to learn more about your processes, people, and customers; you need to go and see for yourself.
Managers and business leaders today are often so separated from the actual work by corporate structures. They have not seen the process. They have not spoken to any customers. And they don’t even talk to those who do the work daily.
Direct observation is a fundamental approach in Lean Management, fostering an organizational culture that boosts business performance. Involving management levels through direct observation at Gemba leads to significant operational advantages.
When you make decisions at arm’s length – there is no fundamental understanding of what is happening. Often, this causes customers and employees more pain. If you want to make a difference, go and see for yourself and learn what your employees need you to do to make customers happier.
The Gemba is also the place you go not only to learn but also to lead others. It is where you train your people, invest in colleagues’ learnings, and engage directly with your customers.
To supplement the idea of Gemba, Toyota adds the related “genchi gembustsu” to emphasise the literal meaning of the “real thing” and the real place. Chairman Fujio Cho says that lean leaders do three things – “Go see, ask why, show respect”.
A call to action. Everyone, from CEO downwards, has the responsibility to spend time on the shop floor watching how to produce the product or service. You need to learn how customers are feeling and how they interact with what you do. You need to consider how your employees are managing the work and if the work is balanced or perhaps leading to stress and burnout.
So what does Gemba Mean?
Gemba is a Japanese term that means “the real place”, and it is an essential concept in lean management. Gemba refers to the physical location where value is generated in various business contexts, such as manufacturing, retail, and service environments. It refers to the physical location where value is created, such as a factory floor or an office setting. Gemba emphasises the importance of going to the actual place of work in order to identify and eliminate waste, thereby improving efficiency and productivity.
Managers can obtain more accurate information about their operations by emphasising personal observation in the workplace and make better decisions. Gemba also encourages employees to get involved in process improvement by providing feedback on what can be improved or eliminated. “Don’t look with your eyes, look with your feet”Taiichi OhnoTweet
“Don’t look with your eyes, look with your feet”
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What is a Gemba Walk?
A Gemba Walk is a process where employees of a company go to the place where the work is actually done. This is in contrast to “going to the office,” which most people think of when they hear “work.” The purpose of a Gemba Walk is to see things for oneself and get ideas from the people who are actually doing the work. In this blog post, we will discuss what Gemba Walks are, why they are important, and how you can start implementing them in your business!
The Gemba is the place where the work is done. This could be in a factory, an office, or workplace. The Gemba Walk is a process where employees go to the Gemba to see things for themselves and get ideas from the people who are doing the work. The purpose of a Gemba Walk is to improve how work is done by seeing things firsthand and getting input from those doing the work.
Gemba Walks are an important tool for businesses because they help to improve communication and collaboration between employees. They also help to identify wasteful activities by allowing management to observe processes on the front lines to pinpoint inefficiencies and waste. Gemba Walks can be used in any business, but they are especially useful in manufacturing businesses. This is because many manufacturing businesses have a lot of moving parts and it can be difficult to keep track of everything that is happening. By going to the Gemba, employees can better understand what is happening in the workplace and how they can improve it.
Gemba Walk Daily Routine
In 2019, we had an opportunity to work with a Global Feight and Distribution centre in South Africa, DeliveryCo, and witnessed an excellent daily Gemba Walk routine which was core part of their continuous improvement activities. The Gemba Walk had been bought into the company two years previously. Every day, following the morning stand-up of the senior managers, one of the team would take one of the critical themes and begin a well-organised Gemba Walk of the distribution centre. They would follow the value stream discussing issues with the team, sharing a fresh perspective on issues being identified.
Stepping away from day-to-day tasks to directly observe processes on the shop floor helps in identifying wasteful activities and understanding the value stream.
The leaders gain valuable insight from the Gemba walk to understand how the actual work process works, where potential improvement projects may exist and with the team, identify continuous improvement efforts. Any key issues that need to be escalated to improve processes were escalated. This successful Gemba walk was the cornerstone of their continuous improvement activities because each day the team would gain valuable insights, and performing gemba walks became part of the daily routine.
Along with walking the value stream, the Gemba Walk Checklist would get the team involved and together, they would review the operational performance and dashboards, take the 5S lens and focus on a critical customer-focused theme. During the 20 to 60 mins + Gemba walk, the team members and leader would discuss current performance challenges, review current improvement activities and look for opportunities to remove blockers across the operations. This is critical for lean and six sigma programs.
There was a key structure but that structure allowed flexibility to explore issues and provide the daily forum for operational issues to be raised by the team leading to senior management engagement to help remove the issues where possible.
Gemba Walk Process: The 8 Steps in a Gemba Walk
When undertaking a Gemba walk, it is critical to set expectations across the team and make sure that the team and to get the team members involved. The goal is to have regular Gemba Walks. Frequent Gemba Walks allow you to keep them targeted. If a Gemba Walk takes too long it loses its impact and the effective Gemba Walk is lost.
It is essential to thoroughly probe the value stream to identify opportunities for improvement during a Gemba Walk.
Understand what is a gamba walk and the definition of the Gemba Walk.
Make sure the Gemba Walk Checklist Template is available for everyone
Be consistent with your Gemba Walks always following the Gemba Walk Checklists
So what are the key Gemba Walk Steps:
Step 1: Identify the Purpose for the Gemba Walk
Before you go on any Gemba Walk, you must identify the purpose of the Gemba Walk and the theme. This is part of creating the Gemba Walk Checklist. You might be looking for ways to improve productivity, reduce costs, reduce errors, improve processes, improve flow or help facilitate improvement ideas. But you need to be clear on the purpose otherwise, you will get lost and tied up in whatever is happening on the floor without clear improvements and outcomes.
Step 2: Ensure you understand the process you are about to observe
If you do not know the high-level process that you are about to observe, the chances are that you will not be able to fully grasp the opportunities that exist. So before you begin any Gemba Walk, make sure you understand what you are about to observe so that you can provide the necessary support, guidance and insights.
Step 3: Select a time you will be observing
The Gemba Walk is about mutual respect and a joint interest in making processes faster, safer, easier and just plain better, so it’s not about catching people out. Setting a time makes sure that the team can be made aware and that team leaders can be available to engage in their part of the Gemba Walk.
Step 4: Select a time you will be observing
The Gemba means the place where “value is created” so do not get team members up to the office to debrief you. You must go to where the work is being done and where the value is created. In the famous lean phrase by Ohno, “every leader must wash their hands at least 3 times a day”.
Step 5: Spend time to Observe the Processes and quality of service provided
During the Gemba Walk, the goal is always to be focused on the process and what stops the process from achieving its goals of maximising customer value. Observing where the service provider interacts directly with customers can provide valuable insights into improving service quality. So as you observe the process, consider the inputs into the process and are they fit for purpose. And how does the process, the inputs and the teams interact.
Step 6: Recognise how the process performs in its current state
Before jumping to solutions or opportunities, make sure you spend time observing and carefully understand how the current start is performing. Is the process performing as expected or is there delays, rework, confusion, movement etc?
Step 7: Visualise the gap between the ideal state and what actually happens
Now that you have understood the current status, what is the best ideal state and where are the gaps. The ideal state does not have to be a perfect future state but an achievable ideal state (given a number of restrictions). What you want to identify here is what is the gap that can potentially then be closed.
Step 8: Look for opportunities for improvements to close the gap
With a clear gap between the current and the ideal, what activities could be done by the team, managers, team leaders to help close this gap. Engage with the team, discuss options and build a document action plan for driving improvements.
The Gemba Circle
A variation that comes from Toyota on the Gemba Walk is the Gemba Circle which is ideal for any environment where the work is actually visible (not digitally based). Examples could be hospitals, warehouses, and production floors in manufacturing sectors.
The practice includes drawing a circle on the floor that someone can stand in. And then just ask them to stay within the circle and observe what is happening and let them identify the process, the waste and the potential challenges and improvement opportunities.
Standing in the Gemba Circle helps to identify opportunities for process improvement by thoroughly probing the value stream and using techniques like the 5 Whys to pinpoint problematic areas and tackle the root causes of process issues.
How long should they stay in the circle? Well apparently this can be up to 8 hours in Toyota but the goal is not the length of time. It is to encourage the person to get a deep understanding of the process and not to make superficial decisions without thoroughly understanding what is actually happening.
Sometimes the Gemba Circle is also referred to where employees gather together to discuss what they saw during their walk. This is a great way to share ideas and come up with solutions to problems that were identified during the walk. The Gemba Circle can be used in any type of business.
Summary – Gemba Walk
Gemba walks are a valuable way to improve business performance by identifying what is really happening on the shop floor. If you’re looking for a more structured way to learn about and implement Gemba walks in your organization, sign up for our Lean Six Sigma Yellow Belt or Lean Six Sigma Green Belt Course.
If you just want to learn a little more about lean for free, try our 100% Free Fundamentals of Lean Course to learn more. In this free on-demand training course, we’ll walk you through everything from identifying what your customers really want through to wastes within your processes. You won’t want to miss it!
