Effect of Kaizen Strategy on the Performance of Roto Moulders Ltd

Abstract

KAIZEN, a Japanese business management concept that calls for continuous improvement that promotes quality and productivity improvement as well as human resource development. It was implemented to improve organization efficiency by standardizing working procedure and eliminating wasteful activities through the collective effort of managers and staff of the organization. Kaizen was selected and implemented in Roto Moulders Ltd as working systems in order to improve processes and standardizing the working procedure by eliminating was full activities and reducing the long work flow. The purpose of this study was to establish the effects of kaizen strategy on the performance of Roto Moulders Ltd. The study was guided by three theories, the theory of lean management, Value Chain Theory and Theory of constraints. The data was collected using an interview guide, and the targeted respondents were 6 top managers. The study used a case study research design while the data was analyzed by use of content analysis since it was a qualitative data. The study found that kaizen strategy improves performance of RML, in addition it established that motivation among employees like; inability of management to involve them in decision making, lack of promotion, recognition of hardworking employees, lack of training, salary increment and poor working environments were factors that affected Kaizen practices within the organization context. Therefore, this study recommends that management to motivate employees using both monetary and non-monetary rewards for better performance. The study also recommended that to determine the actual performance of the Kaizen system, organizations should bridge the bureaucratic barriers and allow the top management to interact freely with the lower hierarchy members of the organization and build a proper rapport to enhance effective communication, efficient development of ideas and avoid dismissing the simple little ideas given by the junior staff about improvement of the organization.