مطالعه موردی از تولید ناب با استفاده از پیاده سازی سیستم کانبان

Lean manufacturing has been the buzzword in the area of manufacturing for past few years especially in Japan. The Kanban system is one of the manufacturing strategies for lean production with minimal inventory and reduced costs. However, the Kanban system is not being implemented widely by manufacturing companies in Malaysia. Thus, the objectives of this case study are 1) to determine how does the Kanban system works effectively in multinational organization; and 2) to identify factors hindering Malaysian small and medium enterprises (SME) from implementing Kanban. Findings of the study suggest that top management commitment, vendor participation, inventory management and quality improvement are important for Kanban deployment and towards lean manufacturing.

In general, there are varieties of tools and techniques used in determining effective manufacturing system in a company. Kanban system is just one of the tools and techniques used in lean manufacturing besides other techniques like Quality Circle, 5S Housekeeping, and continuous improvement and many others. Lean is a set of tools that assist in the identification and elimination of waste that might improve quality as well as production time and cost.

In conclusion, the Kanban system implemented in this manufacturing company was found to be adequate due to the many benefits such as the operational costs, wastes, scraps and losses were minimized, over production stocks were controlled with flexible work stations. The factors that hinder SME companies from implementing the Kanban system are identified as ineffective inventory management, lack of supplier participation, lack of quality improvements and quality control and lack of employee participation and top management commitment. Implication of this study suggest that further research needs to be done on more SMEs so as to have more conclusive findings on Kanban implementation and barriers faced by the SME entrepreneurs. Other than that, the company must develop standard operating procedures for all processes involved in production line by improving the existing policy in order to make production process more efficient in future and it can be implemented by other manufacturing companies.