I first encounter the word "PDCA", Plan Do Check Act, I felt this is so simple. Of course it is simple! But what exactly the meaning behind the "P" "D" "C" and "A" is very powerful. So I name it the loop you can never get out, it is close. I also was wondering why they call it cycle! And I just realize that it is rotating only if you considering and challenging for a continous improvement/kaizen (popular word!).
None of these four letters have less important but for me I put a little bit heavier weight on the "P" which not just planning but it is about studying/investigation/taking the real picture of what happening now. Most of my time, I use it and call it the losses intelligent/deployment and from that that picture we can perform a deep analysis using RCFA if applicable. We have to be sure at the beginning of what problem we are going to solve!
The "D" part or "Just-do-it" could be matter of execution discipline!
Check for result "C" is often confusing sometime, what are we exactly check? This is often the result from what we have been done, do the "D" part impact on the bottom line? Since shopfloor people is the first front line to react with deviation, things that require monitor must be in their language meaning it must be measureable at their level for example measure/monitor number of defect or breakdown but not OEE. Because only from that level will give them the opportunity to react with the deviation using whatever tools relevant!
The "Act" for me, I give the most powerful part that stop the PDCA wheel from rolling back or the gain will keep holding! How? Let me elaborate a little bit more! Most of the time, we come with the new ideas during the "P" part as from the analysis which could be new SOP, OPL, PM system, etc... require! After execute these new "Preventive" ideas and it has proven success! At this step we have to consolidate these into the "new standards work" and provide training to people to do the same things. That is why in Toyota Production System, Standard Work is very important as Taichii Ohno mention, correct if I am wrong, "Where there is no Standard, there is no Kaizen"! I believe what he had refered to is here. We can only see the real improvement obviously only if we have the "first standard" which we can compare the "Before" and "After". When we compile these standards together, it is becoming the "system" which is dependence of people I mean the whole process still keep running at what require eventhought key people has retired! As Jim Collins mentioned "great companies build clock not time tellers" in his book "Build to Last, Goods to Great, and How Mighty Fall".
I attached here my handwriting just a picture, scrape it or keep it if find it useful!
