In May 2024 Lear Corporation hosted their first Onsite Insights visit for a group of senior leaders. They set an incredible standard for their first visit with an Net Promoter Visit Score of +100 – the highest score possible.
There were so many reasons for this – much was to do with the openness, honesty and authenticity of the hosts Jack Boatman (Continuous Improvement Manager) and Gavin Bullock (CI Lead). But it was also testimony to the high standards of engagement in continuous improvement and lean visible within the manufacturing facility.
Lear, a global automotive technology leader in Seating and E-Systems, enables superior in-vehicle experiences for consumers around the world. Lear’s diverse team of talented employees in 37 countries is driven by a commitment to innovation, operational excellence, and sustainability. Lear is Making every drive better™ by providing the technology for safer, smarter, and more comfortable journeys. Lear, headquartered in Southfield, Michigan, serves every major automaker in the world and ranks 189 on the Fortune 500. Further information about Lear is available at lear.com.
Some of the highlights of the visit included:
Kaizen Journey
Creating an improvement mindset has been pivotal to the Lear CI journey and fundamental to this they have embraced the phrase ‘Protect the next car’. This simple act creates a heart message, an emotion that can be embraced by all the team. The organizations kaizen competition and program also encourages the improvement mindset and embraces suggestions. The program focuses on recognition in various forms, partially monetary but primarily soft recognition – thank you’s and congratulations across the board. A nice touch seen on the site tour was the placement of the lightbulb symbol in areas the best Kaizen activities have occurred.
Visual Management
The site has a high standard of visual management, not just through the tiered meeting boards but also line side to control takt and buffer stocks. There is clear visualization of line performance and controls so all associates and team leaders have an understanding of what is required by hour and by shift.
The site also has an impressive Activity Centre (Obeya or Control room) where the Leadership team meet twice a day to review performance and projects on site.
Team Improvement Circles
There are so many reasons visitors loved the TIC program. Multi-disciplinary engagement across the site on projects that ranged from Process problem solving to increasing their charitable food bank donations. The program run in conjunction with their primary customer JLR is not about money. It is about establishing and encouraging effective problem solving methodology and enabling the team to apply this thinking to every aspect of their environment.
Engagement
Their Leaders on the Line program was clearly of interest to visitors – their name for Gemba walks which is undertaken weekly across all areas of the factory. The site and line managers are clearly present within the operations environment and there is a level of openness and trust between all of the team which shows very positive employee engagement.
We saw some great signage when entering the operations environment where all of the Leaderships contact details were shared with a link to the Whatsapp messaging platform. A small act with a big impact.
On the day of the visit the group were also lucky to see a HR initiative being undertaken in the on the floor training area – a pay drop-in clinic for all employees where they can come and talk directly to HR and the plant manager about any pay issues as they arose.
Another activity which resonated well was what I would call ‘Bunker Sessions’ an activity I first saw at Buhler Group in London (another of our hosts). Essentially this is a monthly meeting of associates and the Leadership Team where they get to discuss any ‘issues’ or ‘challenges’ that they currently face. The sessions often lead to unexpected CI gains and also support engagement and a culture of openness on the site.
Strategy Deployment
Jack Boatman shared how the strategy of ‘Together we Win’ a corporate led initiative is tiered throughout the company and site through a series of scorecards, which are all aligned to common objectives: Leadership; Work Environment, Employee Involvement and Team Empowerment.
Lear are definitely an organization committed to a journey of excellence. The customer is at the heart of their decision making and in this highly demanding environment they have created a aura of calm effectiveness, where the team genuinely enjoy their jobs and are engaged in improvement.
Lear’s next Onsite Insights visit is on 26 June 2024, for more information or to book CLICK HERE
About Onsite Insights
Established in 2004, the Onsite Insights visit program exists to encourage the sharing of innovation and best practice between companies. This is achieved through a series of one day visits to award winning companies where visitors get to see best practice in action. No theory, no text book, just what works and why from organizations that have achieved success.
For More Information contact:
Ailsa Carson
Programme Director
Onsite Insights
Ailsa.carson@sapartners.com