Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Value Stream Design

Where are its limits?

As comprehensive experiences from different industries and highly diverse types of production of the past few years have clearly revealed: In principle, there are no limits!

This is particularly true for the value stream analysis which can be very helpful to any factory when it comes to making productions more transparent. The value stream analysis is applicable in any type of piece production - from pencils to container ships, the only difference lies in the effort required.

The value stream design is subject to certain constraints, in particular with a view to easy applicability of the different solution components regarding serial production in variant and single piece production. Nevertheless, it offers numerous suggestions for production optimization; even new production procedures may be designed in accordance with the lean principle in order to create a lean factory.

How do I determine a product family?

A product family is characterized by similarities, in this case regarding production. A product family comprises all products which are produced in similar production procedures and with the aid of identical resources. The family members are determined top down from the functional scheme of production procedure or bottom up from the different machines utilized.

Initially, a strong-selling product family of low variance should be chosen.

Is there a fool-proof method for the design of the best possible future state concept?

Yes! The nine design guidelines provide practitioners with an explicit code of practice for the optimal redesign of production procedures. Their order of application is firmly determined and thus enables the step-by-step development of the best possible future state concept taking into account all respective applicable restrictions and boundary conditions.

According to its most important principle, a value stream may only be controlled at one point, i. e. the pacemaker process. The remaining design guidelines describe how to lay out the capacity profile of a production, how to design a laminar material flow and how to adequately trigger suitably dimensioned release units.