What do Lego, toast, F1 pitstops and balancing have in common? They all play a part in our unique Lean Champion course for manufacturers. Manufacturing Advisor Angela Robinson explains how this fully-funded training will leave you in prime position for a successful and profitable 2024.

Join the next one-day Lean Champion workshop

(plus optional onsite support with a specialist Manufacturing Advisor)

Tuesday 16th April 2024 in Whitefield, Bury

Wednesday 15th May 2024 in Trafford Park, Manchester

Thursday 13th June 2024 in Trafford Park, Manchester

Sign up

Do you want to make tangible improvements in quality, cost and delivery in 2024? Dreaming of a company culture that values continuous improvement and loves problem solving? Heard about lean manufacturing but aren’t sure how it relates to your business, or want to refresh your knowledge?

Stop right now and read the rest of this blog, because I’ve got four reasons why our fully-funded Lean Champion training could be just the ticket.

What is Lean Champion?

Lean Champion is a one-day workshop of in-person interactive learning – plus optional on-site post course support – that helps anyone in a manufacturing role develop the foundations of what it means to be a lean business.

What does it mean to be lean? It simply means giving the customer what they value, 100 per cent of the time, at a price that shows they aren’t paying for waste.

Lean Champion teaches you The What, The What Else and The How of all things lean as it applies to your specific manufacturing environment, resulting in:

• Effective identification of problems
• Improved flow
• Stronger shopfloor relationships
• Reduced day-to-day variability
• Reduced waste
• Better information
• Standardised improvement
• Better Quality, Cost and Delivery than your competitors

1. You’ve never been on training like it

I’ve seen ‘lean awareness’ training delivered a lot over the years. They tend to be off-the-shelf, one-size-fits-all courses that try to cover too many topics at once and leave people feeling a bit bamboozled. At worst, it can feel a bit like Death by PowerPoint.

Lean Champion is about as far from Death by PowerPoint as you can get – it’s fun, interactive and focuses on practical, hands-on learning.

You’ll learn about how to design a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP), explore ways to streamline changeovers by looking at how F1 teams have cut pitstop times from over a minute to under 2 seconds.

Best of all, you will develop an in-depth understanding of how to achieve flow through a manufacturing process using our Lego factory simulation and gain a foundational appreciation of efficient manufacturing operations.

I won’t say any more about these games because I don’t want to spoil the surprise! But the point is, you will learn how to embed lean behaviours and practices in your team in a way that’s engaging and easy to remember. It’s not rammed with theoretical content that will overwhelm and confuse.

Everything is designed to be meaningful to real-world everyday manufacturing problems, so you can take what you’ve learnt and run with it immediately.

2. Big or small, familiar or not, this is for you

You may be completely new to the concept of lean manufacturing. Or perhaps you’ve given it a go before and progress has stalled. Either way, Lean Champion offers a completely fresh and unique way into the world of lean.

Our emphasis on the practical rather than the theoretical means that, no matter whether you’re an ops director looking at it for the first time, or a continuous improvement manager looking to update their knowledge, Lean Champion is designed to work for all.

You don’t have to be a large, complex manufacturing operation to capitalise on the benefits. Candy’s Cupcakes, a small cakemaker in Ashton-under-Lyne, was one of our Lean Champion graduates back in 2023, and they were completely new to lean manufacturing.

Their Lean Champion, Amy, has gone on to become a real advocate within the workplace, implementing SOPs and re-arranging the production line to enhance productivity.  

“During my participation in the Lean Champion Programme, I was able to think about something that I previously did not consider relevant to my daily routine, which was very helpful.

“The coach used various scenarios to illustrate different issues that we could encounter and explained them from multiple perspectives. This has not only shown me the relevance of the issues but also prompted me to explore different approaches to handle the problems.”

Amy Walker, Candy’s Cupcakes

Candy’s Cupcakes, Tameside – read the full case study

Our workshop programme is delivered regularly throughout the year at venues across Greater Manchester. They are perfect if you have 1 or 2 people in your business who want to dip their toes in.

Over one full-day workshop, you’ll meet and work alongside other peers to learn the foundations of lean leadership to take back to your organisation.

Following the workshop, you have the option of follow-up one-to-one guidance to support progress on the projects and problems you identify during your training.

A lot of companies try and fail with continuous improvement. Often, it’s because they’ve not involved everyone in the business. As my colleague Geoff explains, continuous improvement is all about culture. Attending a Lean Champion workshop can be the perfect solution.

The outcome of a workshop is a workforce who are inspired to start considering how to implement improvements in their own station. They leave with a better understanding of what a lean culture means for them, as well as an understanding of what their colleagues elsewhere are going through. It creates a sense of ownership and camaraderie.

Ideally, you want continuous improvement to be a self-managing process that everyone is bought into. What better way to do that than with an enjoyable day of team-building activities, as Manchester-based steel fabricator Thomas Storey found out for themselves:

“The Manufacturing Team illustrated the theory of lean techniques in very practical ways, so the event ended up being highly interactive and engaging.

“Examples were used that drew from our own production processes, so our staff could immediately relate to how improvements could be made. Overall, all our delegates felt the ideas and concepts were a great opportunity to remove waste and make their lives easier.”

Phil Ramsdale, Thomas Storey

3. Access to an A-team of manufacturing experts

Once you’re through Lean Champion training, it doesn’t have to end there. Our A-team of experts can continue to provide one-to-one support to guide you through the implementation process.

And make no mistake, this really is an A-team. We have individuals who can provide valuable insight into everything and anything in the manufacturing world.

The one thing we all have in common is that we’re incredibly passionate about making manufacturers better and helping you deliver on your aspirations as a business.

We’re a real superhero group of people to work with. The only thing that’s missing is the capes!

4. Did I mention it’s fully funded?

I have over 15 years’ experience in manufacturing, much of that travelling the length and breadth of the country, meeting manufacturers of all shapes and sizes to find the right solution for their needs.

Most of that work I have been involved with previously has been purely commercial. But now I’m part of an A-team who can provide fully funded support to any manufacturer within the Greater Manchester region.

There are lots of outfits out there charging a fortune for off-the-shelf lean manufacturing training. But here you have a group of people, with decades of knowledge between them, available at no cost to your business. If that’s not a total no-brainer, I don’t know what is!

Not sure if Lean Champion is right for you?

My job in this superhero team is to really understand the problems you face and develop a tailor-made solution.

We also have two other training programmes starting in 2024 that may be exactly what you need.

• Our Manufacturing Culture and Leadership course is designed for team leaders wanting to improve their leadership skills and drive their team to success
• Our Sales and Marketing for Manufacturers course is all about creating a winning marketing strategy that will help you stand out from your competitors, attract more customers, and build long term value into your business.

All of these courses have open workshops you can join. Get in touch, I’ll come to your site for a walk-round, get to know you and then assess what support may be right for you.

Remember, it’s fully-funded – you’ve got nothing to lose, and everything to gain!