The suggestion system
Set up, on the shop floor, a paper-based suggestion system that produces completed actions and dated responses, rather than an idea box that empties once and then goes silent.
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This course is aimed at team leaders, shop floor managers and continuous improvement facilitators who want to collect operators' ideas without drowning in forms or letting them down. It starts from a simple observation: the people who spend eight hours a day on the line see things that management does not see, and this unused knowledge is the eighth waste of Lean. By the end, you will know how to define the topics open to suggestions, design a good A5 form that can be filled in within two minutes, build the visual board that goes with it, organise the sorting and the response within a set deadline, and read the three indicators that tell you whether the system is living or dying. Each step takes four to five minutes to read and ends with an action to carry out on your line.
What you will be able to do
- Choose three suggestion scopes (for example HSE, quality, production) and know how to reject what falls outside them, including breakdowns and stock requests.
- Design a paper suggestion form with six fields, including the area reserved for management's response.
- Install a three-column suggestion board (submitted, accepted, completed) and update it every week.
- Organise the sorting of forms by front-line management, appoint an owner for major actions and keep to an announced response deadline.
- Monitor the system with three indicators: forms per person per month, rate of suggestions completed, average response time.
The path
- Why ideas stay at the workstation 4 min
- Framing the topics that are open and those that are refused 4 min
- The A5 card and the board that goes with it 5 min
- Sort, decide, respond within the lead time 5 min
- Keeping the system going after the first month 4 min
Prerequisites
No prior Lean tool required. You need to know your line, have a wall or a board available on the shop floor and be able to free up half an hour of management time per week for sorting the forms.
The closing quiz
The topic ends with a 7-question quiz, and a certificate is issued on success.