The Concept of Kaizen. Management Research Paper Essay

The Concept of Kaizen
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The Concept of Kaizen
Part I
Introduction
The concept of Kaizen refers to systematic activities that aim at continuous improvement of company functions. The emphasis in this concept is the need to involve all employees at every level of management down to the subordinates for the purposes of continuous improvement. The principle also relates to consumer-oriented strategy. In this case, the underlying principle that guarantees inclusiveness, continuous evolution of the entire organization. Further, it involves the empowerment of cross-functional teams that challenges the status quo that reflects the principles of efficient customer experience management. The principle of Kaizen makes an assumption on the fact that the manager of a particular task should have the most knowledge concerning the task. In this case, exposing them to the responsibility of continuous improvement concerning the task, there is possibly a transfer of ownership directly to those executing the task who ensures involvement of the entire organization (Desai and Mokashi, 2018).
History of Kaizen
The management techniques during the 1980s focused more on employee involvement alongside empowering through teamwork as well as interactive communications. The focus was also on the improvement of job design. However, the Japanese firms seemed to be effective in the implementation of these techniques as compared to others. This led to the development of a philosophy based on the fact that Japanese firms, considering global competitiveness, revealed a greater level of commitment towards the philosophy of continuous improvement as compared to their Western counterparts. This led to the development of the term Kaizen as a presentation of this philosophy from the Japanese. Therefore, Kaizen represents the Japanese philosophy that signifies process improvement and which roughly translates into “to break apart and investigate” and “improving upon the existing situation” (Haque et al., 2014).
Kaizen can best be referred to as the means of continuous improvement that encompass everyone within an organization from top to bottom. The Japanese management, as well as workers, upholds this concept with high esteem to the point of considering the principle as a customer-driven strategy for improvement. The philosophy works on the assumption that every area of our life (social, spiritual or personal) deserves to be continuously improved. There is the use of common sense and involves rigorous, scientific methods through statistical quality control as well as an adaptive framework of organizational values and beliefs. This ensures that employees alongside the management focus on zero defects through the processes. Engraved upon the philosophy is the principle of never being satisfied with yesterday’s accomplishments. However, it begins with the admission of existence of problems that eventually creates opportunities for change. This demands continuous improvement that largely depends on every individual across the team functions within the organization. In essence the people performing a task besides being knowledgeable should be encouraged to have confidence in their capabilit...