TRIZ Paper: Japan TRIZ Symposium 2009


The Role of TRIZ
in the System of Monozukuri Solution Methods
Osamu Kumasaka, Fumiko Kikuchi, Akio Fukushima
(Pioneer Corporation)
The Fifth TRIZ Symposium in Japan, Held by Japan TRIZ Society on Sept. 10-12, 2009 at National Women's Education Center, Ranzan-machi, Hiki-gun, Saitama, Japan
Introduction by Toru Nakagawa (Osaka Gakuin Univ.), Dec. 13, 2009
[Posted on Jul. 7, 2010] 

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Editor's Note (Toru Nakagawa, Jul. 3, 2010)

This is an excellent work presented last year at the 5th TRIZ Symposium in Japan by Osamu Kumasaka, Fumiko Kikuchi, and Akio Fukushima (Pioneer Corporation).  It was presented in a Poster session and obtained the 'Best presentation for myself' Award after the voting by Japanese participants. 

This work is based on an intensive wide-scoped research for many years and has been posted and used in their intranet home page.  'Monozukuri' is the Japanese word for 'making things' in a wide sense, including all the processes of planning, designing, manufacturing, production, etc. 

The Authors have built an Index Matrix for finding useful methods/tools from the current phases of jobs of Monozukuri.  The key idea of making the Index Matrix is to list up the engineers' intentions/questions along the phases of the whole Monozukuri process.  The table is as big as (37 questions) x (73 methods/submethods).  8 methods are listed in TRIZ and another in USIT.  The Index Matrix contains a very rich information about many methods and their effectiveness evaluation.  This presentation is indeed a valuable contribution to the industrial and technological society, I believe.  We wish that the Authors publicize the full contents of the Index Matrix, so that the contents will be validated and refined by many people. 

On the Japanese page we post the Poster slides in PDF , while on this English page the Poster Introduction slides in PDF .  Nakagawa's introduction to this paper is extracted from his "Personal Report of Japan TRIZ Symposium 2009" and is posted here in English; it describes some more on the Index Matrix in a readable form.  

 

[1] Abstact

The Role of TRIZ
in the System of Monozukuri Solution Methods

Osamu Kumasaka, Fumiko Kikuchi, Akio Fukushima
(Pioneer Corporation)

Abstract

The Monozukuri (i.e. manufacturing) process in Japan has become more and more sophisticated, complicated, and difficult with the change in social and industrial situations. For the purpose of guiding engineers in manufacturing, we have reviewed a wide range of methods and tools for assisting the Monozukuri process; they include 7 tools for product planning, new 7 QC tools, idea generation methods (including TRIZ), quality engineering, design of experiments, reliability engineering, knowledge management, project management, etc. etc. We further made an index matrix to relate these tools with the tasks in Monozukuri, in the phases of planning, development and designing, manufacturing, and marketing. In the present study, the role of TRIZ and related methods was revealed in this system especially by evaluating their interrelations and synergistic effects. As a result, the large possibility of TRIZ has been made clear in various steps of the Monozukuri process, contributable as a powerful idea creation tool. We wish to have some activities for promoting this recognition to be a common understanding of the system of Monozukuri methods.

 

[2]  Presentation Slides in PDF

Poster Introduction Slides in English in PDF (4  slides, 169 KB)

Poster Slides in Japanese in PDF (10 slides, 390 KB)

[3]  Introduction to the Presentation (by Nakagawa)

Excerpt from: 
Personal Report of The Fifth TRIZ Symposium in Japan, 2009, Part C. Integral Use of TRIZ with Relevant Methods
by Toru Nakagawa (Osaka Gakuin University), Nov. 28, 2009
Posted on Dec. 6, 2009 in "TRIZ Home Page in Japan"

Osamu Kumasaka, Fumiko Kikuchi, Akio Fukushima (Pioneer Corp.) [J19 P-B2] gave a nice Poster presentation with the title of "The Role of TRIZ in the System of Monozukuri Solution Methods".  This presentation is also based on an intensive wide-scoped research for many years, and has obtained the 'Best presentation for myself' Award after the voting by Japanese participants.  'Monozukuri' is the Japanese word for 'making things' in a wide sense, including all the processes of planning, designing, manufacturing, production, etc.  The Authors' Abstract is quoted here:

Complication and difficulty of the Monozukuri process in Japan has been increasing according to the change of social condition. While many subject solution tools are introduced, some engineers are frustrated to choose one for their problem. Therefore a subject indexed matrix was systematized for the benefit to related engineers. And the role of TRIZ in this system was studied by means of evaluating interrelations and synergistic effects among those tools. As a result, possibility of TRIZ contribution was indicated on wide steps of the Monozukuri process as a new idea creation tool.

In the slide (right-upper), the Authors summarize the requirements on the engineers for  improving the efficiency of developing/designing new products. 

Such requirements come to the engineers in different forms, as shown in the next slide (right-lower).  Engineers are requested to meet them and, of course, they want to fulfill the requirements as much as possible.  But they are heavy tasks.  A lot of methods and tools are introduced (in the world, or sometimes in the engineers' company).  But usually each method/tool is explained/taught individually and hence the engineers have to learn any of the methods/tools one by one before becoming able to apply it to their own job.  Learning a method/tool and even using it are not their goal by themselves.  The engineers want to obtain results in their jobs effectively.  They want to learn what kind of methods/tools are useful for their purpose in their current stage of jobs and environments. 

For improving such a situation of presenting methods and tools to the engineers, the Authors have built an Index Matrix for finding useful methods/tools from the current phases of jobs of Monozukuri.  The key idea of making the Index Matrix is to list up the engineers' intentions/questions along the phases of the whole Monozukuri process. 

The big table shown in the following slide (below) is the Index Matrix for finding useful methods/tools from the subjects/requests in various phases of Monozukuri process.  The Authors built this table and posted it in their intranet Web site in Pioneer Corp.  The Index Matrix is so big that you cannot read the individual rows of subjects and individual columns of methods/tools.  In individual cells, the circle states that the method/tool is effective for the subject/requirement, while the triangle represents partial/weak effectiveness.   The columns in light blue show  8 components of TRIZ and another column in green shows USIT. 

For realizing the value of this Index Matrix, we should closely look at the subjects (rows) and the methods (columns).  The subjects (written in Japanese) are composed of:

1. Planning: 
         -- Want to find a key product/technology which can grasp the hearts of customers.
        -- Want to plan a product which can have highly attractive quality.
         -- Want to select the best among multiple of alternative plans.    (and 3 more rows.)

2. Development & designing:
        -- Want to define the technologies which we should develop for ourselves.
       -- Want to realize a novel functionality.
       -- Want to reduce the time of technology development.   (and 11 more rows)

3.  Manufacturing:
       -- Want to stabilize (or make robust) the newly-developed product characteristics. 
       -- Want to define rationally the standards and tolerances of products and of process inspections.
       -- Want to replace a part of the system with cheaper ones.  (and 12 more rows)

4.  Quality in the market:
       -- Want to reduce the claims for the market.
       -- Want to respond more quickly to the market problems.

The methods and tools in the columns are:

*** As shown above, the Index Matrix built and provided in the company's intranet site contains a very rich information about many methods and their effectiveness evaluation.  This presentation is indeed a valuable contribution to the industrial and technological society.  The contents of the Index Matrix should be validated and refined by many people.  And the Index Matrix will give us number of suggestions for further development in various technological methodologies.  Congratulations to the Award given by the paticpants voting!

 

 

Top of this page Abstract Poster Introduction Slides in PDF   Nakagawa's Introduction Poster Slides in Japanese, PDF Nakagawa's Personal Report of Japan TRIZ Symp. 2009 Japan TRIZ Symp. 2009 Japanese page

 

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Last updated on Jul. 7, 2010.     Access point:  Editor: nakagawa@ogu.ac.jp