I work on a FJ squadron and LEAN is well and truly under way.
Honestly and truthfully I am hard pushed to think of one single POSITIVE that has come out of it all so far, in my small world. In fact, I feel that the Aircraft Engineering side has been ripped off/conned/downright lied to. In simple terms we've seen Eng manpower seriously carved up, yet we pursue the same amount of flying (arguably more tenaciously) with the same number of aircrew as before, with more aircraft than was agreed to. Despite changes in operations, we struggle more now than I can ever remember in all my different postings.
There seems to be endless RIEs, meeting after meeting, briefing after briefing, change on top of change, lots of writing, lots of big and clever catchphrases and buzzwords from the LEAN and senior officer fraternity.
However, I seem to be doing a lot more work now as there are fewer people to do what is necessary, either because of reductions or diversions (also on the increase). Mealtimes and breaks certainly don't exist anymore. I've noticed lots of my peers are making small mistakes or oversights, unusually for them, and it's because they've too much on their plate but are determined to meet the targets; I've noticed myself doing the same thing. I worry that MY next mistake or oversight will be a big one, and it won't be through negligence either. We haven't even finished trimming the manpower yet!
What I would like to know is, when is the pain going to end? When am I going to have enough manpower to fly AND fix? When am I going to be able to start swimming rather than just fighting to keep my head above water?
LEAN may well have worked for Toyota, however that's the Manufacturing Industry - our game is vastly different and to me, is not conducive to LEAN being the be-all and end-all.
Our own people constantly looking to improve things? Yes.
Highly-paid clingons with no previous form telling us where we're going wrong? No. Sorry.
PS IIP was ditched a while ago. That was sh1te as well.