Implementation of Lean Manufacturing in Garment Factory

What is Lean Manufacturing?

Lean manufacturing is a systematic methodology to eliminate waste (non-value-added activities)

by continuous improvement which adds value to the customer and surely in manufacturing as
well but without hampering productivity. Lean Manufacturing is all about optimizing processes,
eliminating waste; eliminating inventory, building a quality product, a more efficient workplace
with less cost, and human effort. The manufacturing system works for customer satisfaction and
optimization of all resources.

Apparel manufacturing industries require functioning in time and making timely deliveries.
Failing to do so, results in increase in the cost and time of production, which any apparel
company cannot afford. Hence applying various lean manufacturing tools helps streamlining the
process of production, by eliminating or reducing possible wastages.

Principles of lean manufacturing

The lean manufacturing system abides closely to the following five principles:

1. Value: To identify and specify what generates value from the customer's /clients
perspective.

2. Mapping the value stream: Understanding the entire product life cycle to eliminate waste
in single every step of operation.

3. Flow: To maintain a flow in the production process from the sourcing of raw materials to
the delivery of the products. In order to minimize waste, the flow needs to be cautiously
designed.

4. Pull: Let the customer pull the value and start working only once the orders are received.

5. Perfection: Eliminating unnecessary steps in different levels of operation and achieving

perfection.
Lean tools

Lean ‘tools’ assist in the identification and steady elimination of waste (muda), the improvement
of quality, and production time and cost reduction.

Types of wastes in an apparel industry

Since lean manufacturing emphasizes on reducing wastages, there are common types of waste
that occur in every garment industry, which can be eliminated. The following are the different
kind of wastes:

1. Overproduction: One of the most prevalent problems in the apparel industry is

overproduction. Excess inventories will require more labor, time, storage, and ultimately remain
unproductive garments.

2. Waiting: When workers remain ineffective while waiting for instructions and raw materials or
due to machine breakdowns and lack of know-how, a lot of productive time is wasted which can
be avoided.

3. Transport: Shifting any kind of material from one place to another also leads to waste of time.

4. Over-processing: concentrating and give more than necessary time to a piece of garment
than required due to inappropriate tools or improper processing can be waived to increase
productivity.

5. Excessive raw material: More than required raw material or excess stock of finished goods
results in occupying storage space and increasing the inventory cost.

6. Defects: Repairing and replacing defective garments leads to loss of time and effort.
7. Unused employee creativity: When employees lack required skills and do not use their
creativity at work, the time taken to perform an operation consumes more time.
Solutions using Lean Tools

1. 5S:
5S is about sorting of things in your workplace and inventory stores. Keep workplace and floors
clean and arrange things in right order for easy access.

2. Visual displays:
Use visual displays as much as possible to communicate with people working in the factory.
Display necessary information for quick access. Production board at the end of the line, Mocks
of sewing operations at each work stations, quality inspection procedure on the quality checking
tables, displaying right and wrong product, displaying exit sign and labeling every item are few
example for visual displays factories can easily adopt.

3. Standardization of work process:

One core objective of lean manufacturing is an elimination of manufacturing wastes and non-
value added tasks from the internal processes and systems. For this factory has to set
standardized working method. When one follows standard working procedures, there is the
minimum chance of making errors.

4. Quick Changeover:
Quick changeover, one of the lean manufacturing tools, is used in reducing waste in garment
making process. While setting a line with new styles, line losses lot of time which is known as
set-up loss. Quick changeover or SMED method provides an efficient way to set lines for the
new style in less time.

5. Error proofing:
Error proofing aka Poka-Yoke is any mechanism in a lean manufacturing process that helps an
equipment operator to avoid mistakes. It helps in designing a process in such way that there
would not be minimum chance of producing defective product. Its purpose is to eliminate
product defects by preventing, correcting, or drawing attention to human errors as they occur.
Even error proofing technique can be used in information generation, reporting system.

6. Kanban:
Kanban is a workflow system. Kanban tool improves visibility and limit Work in Process. Where
factories use Kanban, it helps to eliminate building excess work in process (WIP) in production
lines.

7. Problem-solving:
Clothes are ever changing products. A garment manufacturer needs to work with the latest
products, new material and machines. When one does something, the first time there may be a
chance of having a problem. You have to short out the problem to meet your business goal.
Problem-solving tools help you and your team to find the possible solution without external
experts. Ishikawa’s Fishbone diagram method and 5 Whys are two famous tools widely used in
problem-solving.

8. Workload balancing:
In mass production, garments are made in a line where numbers of operators involve making a
single garment. A balanced line means every operator has workload and nobody sits idle
without work. This maximizes operator utilization. And as a result, you get maximum output from
a line. It is not only sewing line, workload balance is required everywhere in the company – like
department to department, process to process workload balance.

By implementing lean manufacturing tools, industries can deliver quality performance with
lesser defects and waste. Customer satisfaction and employee morale can also be improved.
The tools ensure to provide higher levels of efficiencies and fewer machine and process
breakdowns, which result in higher profits and increase business. Lean manufacturing tools help
the company excel by minimizing waste, maximizing value, and pursuing perfect.
 Implementation of Kaizen for Continuous
Improvement of Productivity in Garment Industry in
Bangladesh

Kaizen is a continuous improvement of process, often is considered to be the building block of

all lean production methods. The ultimate objective of this case study is to increase efficiency
and productivity in sewing system simplification, process standardization, reducing waste and
incremental improvements by using modern techniques like Kaizen. By implementing kaizen,
line efficiency has been improved up to 7% and Defect per Hundred units has also reduced. For
industries, to remain competitive and retain market share in this global market, continuous
improvement of manufacturing system processes has become necessary. Kaizen strives to
empower the workers, increase worker satisfaction, facilitates a sense of accomplishment,
thereby creating a pride of work. It not only ensures that manufacturing processes become
leaner and fitter, but eliminates waste where value is added.

Introduction

All the garments industries are labor intensive, so the best utilization of laborers of the industry
will assure the highest profit of the company. Bangladesh is a country where laborers are
available at low wages. Many garments have established their company in Bangladesh to be
benefited. So, improvement in product quality with incremental productivity becomes necessary.
Here comes the necessity of best utilization of modern techniques like KAIZEN in the garment
industry. By implementing Kaizen worker safety, worker satisfaction and pride of work were
created which motivated them into work. Through Kaizen strong small, incremental changes are
routinely applied and sustained over a long period which results in significant improvement in
efficiency, quality as well as productivity.

Kaizen

Kaizen is a Japanese hybrid work. It is a compound word involving two concepts: Kai (change)
and Zen (for the better). The term comes from Gemba Kaizen meaning ‘Continuous
Improvement’ (CI). Continuous Improvement is one of the core strategies for excellence in
production, and is considered vital in today’s competitive environment. It calls for endless effort
for improvement involving everyone in the organization. Kaizen requires no or little investment.
The principle behind is that a very large amount of small improvements are more effective in an
organizational environment than a few improvements of large value. This philosophy implies
that strong small, incremental changes are routinely applied and sustain over a long period
which results in significant improvement.
Function of KAIZEN:
Two functions related to the executable work are distinguished in Japan

● Maintenance of the existing condition relying on the operations related to complying with
current standard of technology and management,

● Improvement of the existing condition-kaizen, being the function playing the main role
while the procedures and instructions are strictly implemented.

Application process of KAIZEN

Method Application process of kaizen method basically consists of:

● Definition of the improvement area,

● Analysis and selection of the key problem,
● Identification of the cause of improvement,
● Planning the remedial Centre measures,
● Implementation of the improving project,
● Measuring, analyzing and comparison of the results,
● Standardization.

Techniques connected with KAIZEN

There are no strictly defined principles and instruments, which must be used by management
and employees, in order to achieve benefits and control the processes of continuous
improvement. However, several definitions and techniques are connected with kaizen.
These are:

TPM: TPM aims at maximization of machine utilization, operator, material, energy utilization,
reducing losses that affect the work efficiencies which are extremes of productivity.

5 WHY: Basic for kaizen and at the same time the simplest organizing technique
simultaneously, captivated by the motto “when you find a problem, ask why five times”; it asks
so many times as you will find the deepest reason of the problem.

PDCA: Process of kaizen idea application is closed in PDCA cycle, Where:

● Plan (P) refers to establishing the aim for improvement,

● Do (D) is connected with implementing the plan,
● Check (C) defines determining whether the implementation has brought the planned
improvement,
● Act (A) characterizes standardizing as the preventing recurrence of the original problem
or setting goals for the new improvement.

Poka-Yoke (Error Proof): poka-yoke solutions find application in stable processes and enable
to drop of frequency of defects for six sigma level
5S: The 5S quality tool is derived from five Japanese terms beginning with the letter "S" used to
create a workplace suited for visual control and lean production. The pillars of 5S are simple to
learn and important to implement.

1. Seiri: To separate needed tools, parts, and instructions from unneeded materials and to
remove the unneeded ones.
2. Seiton: To neatly arrange and identify parts and tools for ease of use.
3. Seiso: To conduct a cleanup campaign.
4. Seiketsu: To conduct seiri, seiton, and seiso daily to maintain a workplace in perfect
condition.
5. Shitsuke: To form the habit of always following the first four S’s.

Methodology
Total summarization of Kaizen implementation is given below:

➢ Collecting existing data including taking time calculation of existing line.

➢ Balancing line by reducing non-value added activities
➢ Identifying top 5 defects of current sewing line by root cause analysis and taking
corrective action to reduce these top 5 defects.
➢ Auditing 5S of existing layout, taking corrective action. Auditing 5S after Kaizen
implementation.
➢ Calculating the improvement in line efficiency and defect reduction after implementing
continuous corrective action known as Kaizen through 5days of observation.
 Kaizen Implementation
Before implementing Kaizen the existing data and layout were analyzed. The time study sheet
for a sewing line named line 13 and SMV are listed in the following table. Here 10% allowance
is considered. ISO specifies minimum 10% allowance for the entire operator.

Plan-Do-Check-Act Cycle

Plans were made to improve operation, the problems were identified and ideas were made to
solve those problems. Some changes were implemented on a small scale. By checking through
Data check sheets and graphical analysis we were confirmed that plan and action will bring
desired results. Then we act promptly to implement the changes though process
standardization.
Standard operation procedure (SOP)

Implementation of Standard operation is necessary because of making it possible to identify and

eliminate variation in operator work to sustain gains achieved from past Kaizen activities, to
provide baseline for future Kaizen activities. Creating Standard Operation:
1. Conducts cycle time analysis
2. Check documents each standard operation
3. Display the document
4. Ensures that all operators are trained

The objective of SOP is to prepare a standard operation sheet for all operations and machines.
To standardize operation procedure time study requires observing the existing method of
processes. Then analyze the processes slowly and eliminate the unnecessary movement to
standardized the method of processes. A standard method of process was analyzed by the line
supervisor. Then the ways or methods of processing were documented. If the operators follow
those methods properly, the non-value added time will be reduced as well as the cycle time
within the taken time.

Cycle time balancing

After implementing SOP the non-value added activity is reduced as a result the process
becomes standardized. Before analyzing the existing layout the taken time of the line 13 was
calculated. Taken time is the time which precisely matches production to customer demand.

Total cycle time limit (TTL) = Total value added activity (VA) + Total non-value added activity

Cycle time balancing by kaizen

Existing 5s score
5S is a process and method of creating and maintaining a safe, organized, clean and high
performance workplace. In the following table the 5S score evaluation & scoring criteria are that
five or more than five problems are scored as zero. Similarly four, three, two, one and zero
problem are considered as one, two, three, four and five score respectively.

5s score sheet before kaizen implementation

Corrective action plan for existing 5s score

The existing 5S score of the sewing floor was 2.67. To increase the working environment as
well as 5S score some corrective action was taken. These corrective actions are listed below:
1. Remove unnecessary items
2. Material storage review
3. Stretcher not to be blocked
4. Easy access to first aid box
5. Floor cleaning
6. Clean machine
7. 5S audit
5s score sheet after kaizen implementation
Reducing waste

The main objective of lean is to reduce waste. If sewing floor defective garments are regarded
as wastes. So, if defects are reduced, wastes are also reduced. It also improves the quality and
efficiency of garments. There are different types of defects in sewing floors. Some defects are
given below: 1. Stitch density uneven
2. Down stitch
3. Open stitch
4. Wrinkle
5. Uneven stitch
6. Piping damage
7. Wrong insertion of puller
8. Binding damage
9. Bad thread tension
10. Webbing damage
11. Pleat
12. Broken stitch
13. Zipper waviness
14. over stitch
15. Stitch on bending head.
16. Loose thread
17. Pinch 18. Needle mark 19. Oil spot 20. Fabric damage