5 Pillars of the Visual Workplace: The Sourcebook for 5S Implementation (For Your Organization!)

As a quality and safety manager for more than 15 years, I STILL found this book to be wonderfully useful. A clean, well structured and smooth functioning work environment MUST be at the basis for quality and productivity. The text is well organized and presented with clearn B & W photos, flow charts and sample forms. Hirano also includes plenty of funny, true life stories to keep the book interesting. Highly recommended.

...this book shows you how. The author explains how costly untidiness and dirt can be. Imagine the cost of employees wandering around looking for tools instead of adding value through their work. This is one of the few books you can study and then implement the lessons learned from your study. For years to come every time you study it you will learn something new; therefore I recommend the sturdy hardcover edition. You will find your colleagues wanting to continually improve their 5S process too.

I checked this out from the library and read it in one day (I didn't do anything else all day, and I'm a fast reader). Hirano's style is very educational: he resorts to humor, he states his biases clearly, he details step-by-step instructions, he warns about pitfalls, he gives his own insight on overcoming those pitfalls. He walks the walk: the only photo of him in the book is of him cleaning the floor in a factory. For anyone already familiar with Lean Principles, the focus of this book is 5S, of which the English translation is approximately Sort, Straighten, Shine, Standardize, Sustain. However, Hirano never or rarely uses those, preferring instead to use more accurate (but less alliterative) words like, Organization, Orderliness, Cleanliness, Standardized Cleanup, and Discipline. He explains strategies for starting and for sustaining these "pillars", such as a ruthless red-tag campaign to initiate organization, signboards to maintain orderliness, and 5S patrols to maintain cleanliness and to improve on what already exists. He includes sample forms and kick-off campaign letters. Best of all, this book shows how 5S is the basis for all other Lean Principles, such as reducing muda and improving throughput. A fantastic resource that I know I will be using over and over.

The 5 Pillars described in this book are the 5S's derived from the Toyota Production System. Are: Organization, Orderliness, Cleanliness, Organized Cleanup and Discipline. The 5S's help lay a solid foundation for the implementation of the Just in Time system in any plant. The book talks about a step by step procedure for implementing this productivity improvement tool in any organization. This tool is highly effective in something as simple as an office area to something as complex as a Nuclear power plant. We realized an improvement of 11% in productivity at our manufacturing facility and has helped us increase the morale of the workers substantially. The chapters could have been put in a better order as one needs to jump from one chapter to the other for simple references. It covers all the details in depth, but is not put in the best possible manner.

Five Pillars is an outstanding resource for companies that are looking to implemenet JIT. The first step to any Continuous Improvement program is 5S! Hiroyuki Hirano brings practical experience to the manufacturing arena. His approach is no-nonsense and is an invaluable tool that will help your Continuous Improvement Teams to accomplish more. This is definitely a "MUST READ" for anyone who is seriously considering JIT / Continuous Improvement.