ABSTRACT:

The ultimate objective of manufacturing industries today is to increase productivity through

system simplification, organizational potential and incremental improvements by using
modern techniques like Kaizen. Most of the manufacturing industries are currently
encountering a necessity to respond to rapidly changing customer needs, desires and tastes.
For industries, to remain competitive and retain market share in this global market,
continuous improvement of manufacturing system processes has become necessary.
Competition and continuously increasing standards of customer satisfaction has proven to be
the endless driver of organizations performance improvement. Kaizen refers to continuous
improvement in performance, cost and quality. Kaizen strives to empower the workers,
increase worker satisfaction, facilitates a sense of accomplishment, thereby creating a pride of
work. It not only ensures that manufacturing processes become leaner and fitter, but eliminate
waste where value is added. Kaizen by now is a widely discussed, and applied manufacturing
philosophy, in a variety of industries across the globe. This paper discusses different articles
that have been published in this field and presents a review of literature.
REVIEW OF LITERATURE:

Abdolshah M and Jahan A (2006), How to Use Continuous Improvement Tools in Different
Life Periods of Organization:

Basically, in organizations, we face this problem that is, which continuous improvement tools
should be advised for an organization. In many cases, we have also observed that continuous
improvement tools in an organization haven't necessary efficiency and this is the reason that
they are disused. In fact, in every life period of organization, special continuous improvement
tools which are suitable, have efficiency. This subject is basically related to organization's
structure & specifications in that special period. Therefore we in this article try not only to
explain about continuous improvement tools, different life periods of organization and to
describe the features of every period, but also to make evolution between periods and tools so
that we can say certainly in every life period of organization, which tools should be used
toward continuous improvement.

Ahmed S, Hassan M H and Fen Y H (2005), Performance Measurement and Evaluation in an

Innovative Modern Manufacturing System:

The main objective of this study was to measure the performances after implementation of or
substitution by a modern and innovative manufacturing management system in a traditional
just-in-case environment. The study was carried out in a casting based manufacturing plant of
an electrical company which currently implementing the Japanese concept, Kaizen towards
achieving the higher productivity. The study has focused into the Performance Indicators
(PIs) currently being measured by the company. Careful investigations and observations have
been undertaken and then additional tangible and intangible performance indicators have
been introduced in order to show the effectiveness and efficiency of the implementation of
the system in an innovative manner. After analyzing the collected data, sufficient information
has been generated on various aspects of performance evaluation. The success or beauty of
the process has been recognized while the weakness or grey areas are noticed. Based on the
literature survey and practical consideration, a number of recommendations have been
suggested to the company to overcome the problems and improve their performances.
However, due to lack of financial data, monetary-based PIs could not be carried out in this
study.

Bassant J and Caffyn S (1994), Rediscovering Continuous Improvement, Technovation:

Continuous improvement (CI) is increasingly being seen as an important complement to more

radical, step-change forms of innovation. In essence, it involves a company-wide process of
enabling a continuing stream of focused incremental innovation. It has found particular
application in recent years in the area of quality improvement, but the principle can be
applied to many other divisions of business performance. Although simple to define, the
achievement of such CI activity and its maintenance over the long term is a major source of
difficulty. This paper reports on research in this area and highlights key areas within CI which
need to be addressed.