It always amazes me how far organisation of all sizes will take the concept of Poke-Yoke (error proofing) within their business; I recently purchased a dual VGA Graphics card for my work computer (for those of you who are not that technically minded this is a device which will allow me to use up to three monitors at once on the same machine). The reasons why I took the time to buy this is the subject matter of a separate blog, however I can assure you that the reasons are rooted in lean principles (at least in my head anyway).
In the end, I purchased an item from China via an eBay trader. The item arrived within 5 days rather than the 14 day delivery time advertised and was in perfect condition when it arrived. Upon opening the packaging I found a note as follows:
"Please remember to leave us positive feedback. Remember for every bit of positive feedback we receive, we will donate $1 to Unicef"
This is, in fact a very inventive demonstration of how this firm was able to 'error-proof' the feedback aspect of the transaction.
Recently eBay has prevented sellers leaving buyers bad feedback in response to buyers leaving a negative comment, this ensures the feedback is a fairer reflection of the actual transaction, not simply 'tit for tat' positive feedback essentially taking the ability to influence customers feedback out of the retailers hands. Or does it?
The true sense of poke-Yoke is preventing defects, often incorrectly assumed to only apply to errors, as negative feedback could be considered a defect this is clearly Poke-Yoke at its most inventive, offering a charitable donation in response for a few clicks.
Whether the final donations are made is a different matter entirely and outside the scope of this blog, but it does force you to think about ways in which you can prevent defects on every aspect of the transaction.
Feel free to let me know of any other examples like this that you may have come across.
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