Comments on: What does 3P Stand For?

By: Lorenzo Mendoza

Lorenzo Mendoza — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 21:17:26 +0000

Creation of proprietary technology is a powerful example of the project execution and abilities business firms should have nowadays, to capitalize on market opportunities. On late November 2010, the Latin America sales force approached our operations team, about a big opportunity to take over on a poorly served business segment. Utilizing 3P (Production Preparation Process) I was able to put a team together, design and build a right sized machine, that generates zero waste, utilize minimum space, is operated with a third of labor compared with OEM machines, and produce to customer demand. The overall cost of this patentable piece of equipment was below 10% the cost of an OEM machine. The market penetration happened within a 8 months span. I had the opportunity to work with akao San on 3P almos 14 yeas ago, but recently have received extensive training on 3P from Kurosaka San, Shingijutsu consulting’s top talented subject matter expert. While KaiZen is about small and sustained improvement steps, 3P is about Kaikeku, a dramatic leap forward in performance that generates powerful business competitive advantages

By: Bruce Hamilton

Bruce Hamilton — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 20:24:33 +0000

Thanks for the thoughtful follow-ups to this post. They say “You’re never too old to learn”, but on reflection I think that the persons I know who keep on learning are the one’s who’ve never lost the natural curiosity they were born with. More about that in a later post.
Bruce

By: Tom Warda

Tom Warda — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 15:48:34 +0000

Bruce,

I’ve noted in other lean forums that there’s probably more mis-information than really good information out there on Nakao-san’s 3P process. Your article has the good stuff as usual. The company I work for was fortunate enough to work with Shingijutsu (and Nakao-san) for a number of years and I got to experience his 3P process. As you have so correctly stated, used properly, it can lead to some truly breakthrough processes. And as you have experienced, the effects on team members are equally amazing.

One component of the process that you didn’t mention always amused me. That would be the part where Nakao-san turned everybody back into 6 year old kids. (You even had to sign a “pledge” form.) His reasoning was that at that age, you were smart enough to follow his directions on the 3P process, but not smart enough to know “the way things were supposed to work.” Oh, and you were just smart / dumb enough to keep asking why. That is a truly critical component because it allows you to totally throw everything about your current process away and come up with something completely new, different and better. Some of the results we saw were absolutely awesome.

So the only additional advice I would offer would be to make sure you get an experienced 3P practitioner to guide you through the process if you’ve never done it before. Done correctly, it’s awesome. Done incorrectly, it can be pretty bad.

Tom

By: pcwilson5211

pcwilson5211 — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 14:42:19 +0000

Like many breakthroughs, we lucked into the 3P process about six years ago thanks to a friend forwarding an article. In a recent project, the team needed to balance ease of manufacturability, improved design for use, improved functionality and lowest enterprise cost for a USA made part from either iron, aluminum or polypropolene. The benchmark cost parts were made in China and India. We had the right people in the room from engineering, manufacturing, machining, assembly and supply chain who were emotionally committed to the project. Additionally they had gathered a lot of Voice of the Customer input and worked closely with casting and injection molding suppliers. The result was sufficient cost savings and additional features that kept these parts in a domestic supply chain and delighted our current customers (and attracted new ones!).

This breakthrough (or series of breakthroughs) resulted from having passionate, talented people utilizing the 3P process.