Steps 5 & 6 — Implement & Confirm
Analysis and planning are preparation. Kaizen is the change itself — the new method running on the floor, confirmed against a measurable standard, and locked in so it cannot revert.
Most kaizen failures occur not in analysis but in execution. The plan looks right on paper; the floor never changes. Step 5 closes that gap by installing the new method through deliberate guidance. Step 6 closes it permanently by comparing actual results to expected ones, updating standards, and feeding what was learned into the next improvement cycle.
By the end of this section, you should understand:
- why implementation requires active cooperation with affected people and departments,
- the five guidance points for leading team members through an unfamiliar method,
- why Job Instruction's four-step approach is the correct tool for installing a new work method,
- how to create an environment where change is accepted rather than resisted,
- why confirmation must be quantitative and judged against standards, not feelings,
- how to update Work Standards and Standardized Work so improvement holds,
- why discovering a new problem is evidence the kaizen worked, not that it failed.
1Step 5 — Implement the Plan
No matter how carefully a plan is drawn up, it cannot be called kaizen until it is running on the floor. Implementation is where abstract analysis becomes concrete change — and where the most careful plans encounter the most friction.
2Cooperate with Affected People and Departments
Even slight changes ripple through an organization. A change at one station affects the upstream process that feeds it and the downstream process that receives it. Engineering may need to adjust a fixture, a maintenance crew may need to relocate a tool cart, and adjacent departments may need to revise their timing. Implementing without consulting these parties wastes time and invites rework — and at worst, disrupts production in a way that negates the improvement.
The people who must be involved in any non-trivial change include:
- the manufacturing manager and team leader responsible for the area,
- team members doing the affected work,
- engineering staff if tooling, fixtures, or layouts change,
- operators in upstream and downstream processes.
A plan is not kaizen until it is successfully implemented. Communicating and cooperating with everyone the change touches is not a courtesy — it is a precondition for the change to hold.
Involving others early reduces resistance, surfaces conflicts the plan did not anticipate, and builds the broad support that keeps a new method from quietly reverting to the old one.
In practice, the most overlooked stakeholder is the upstream operator who feeds the changed station. If the new method changes part orientation or presentation, the upstream operator must know before the change goes live. Discovering this on the first run costs more time than the conversation would have.
3Provide Guidance to Team Members
Even when a change is clearly better, team members may resist it. Their existing procedures have become automatic; the new procedure demands conscious attention at every step. This is not obstinacy — it is the normal cost of learning a new physical skill. Understanding that cost, and planning for it, is part of the team leader's job.
The Toyota Kaizen course identifies five guidance points that apply whenever a new work method is being installed:
Employees need to hear the new method explained and physically try it. Hearing alone produces understanding; trying out produces performance. People act on experience, not only on information.
Performing an unfamiliar task is genuinely unpleasant — unused muscles, conscious attention to each step, slower pace. Acknowledging this instead of dismissing it is what keeps team members engaged rather than resentful.
Kaizen does not yield its full benefit the first day. Habit and skill build through practice. Judging a new method before workers are accustomed to it is comparing a novice's performance to an expert's — the result is misleading.
Use the language of the floor, not the language of the improvement report. Confirm that the explanation was understood before the first attempt at the new procedure. An explanation that is technically accurate but practically unclear is not an explanation.
Showing the new method, step by step, is more effective than describing it. A worker who has seen the motion performed correctly makes fewer early mistakes and reaches proficiency faster than one who has only heard it described.
The five guidance points apply whenever a kaizen changes the way work is performed. They address both the intellectual and physical dimensions of adopting a new procedure.
What to notice: the five points are not abstract management advice. Each one addresses a specific failure mode: abandoning training after a verbal briefing; dismissing resistance as attitude; judging too early; using jargon; relying on description when demonstration would serve. Together they cover the full range of reasons a new method fails to take root.
4Job Instruction as the Installation Tool
The five guidance points describe what good instruction accomplishes. Job Instruction describes how to deliver it. The JI four-step approach — Prepare, Present, Try Out, Follow Up — is the correct tool for installing a new work method after kaizen, and the two are intended to be used together.
Put the worker at ease. State the job. Find out what they already know. Get them interested in learning the new method. Place them correctly.
Tell, show, and illustrate one important step at a time. Stress each key point. Instruct clearly, completely, and patiently — no more than the worker can master.
Have the worker do the job. Have them explain each key point as they perform. Correct errors immediately. Continue until you know they know.
Put them on their own. Designate who they go to for help. Check frequently. Encourage questions. Taper off extra coaching as performance stabilizes.
JI's four-step method is the structured approach for installing a changed work method after a kaizen improvement. It converts the five guidance points into a repeatable sequence.
What to notice: Follow Up is an active step, not a passive one. The team leader checks frequently in the period immediately after installation — this is precisely the learning period where errors compound and habits either form correctly or incorrectly. See the full Job Instruction guide for the complete breakdown-of-job preparation and key-point identification that makes each presentation precise.
Running a brief group demonstration and then declaring the new method "trained." Group briefings address Point 1 (explain) but skip Points 2 through 5. The learning period is individual, not collective. One person watching ten others struggle with a new grip does not develop that grip themselves. Job Instruction is one-on-one for a reason.
5Create an Environment Conducive to Change
Individual guidance is necessary but not sufficient. The broader work environment either supports change or quietly resists it. The Toyota framing uses a sports analogy that is worth stating plainly: the manufacturing manager is the team manager, the team leader is the coach, and the team members are the players. When those roles are clear and each person fulfills them, a kaizen change can take hold. When the roles blur or the coach is absent during the transition, the new method erodes.
In practical terms, this means:
- Team leaders are present on the floor during the early days of a new method — not managing from a distance.
- Resistance is addressed through patient explanation and encouragement, not dismissal or pressure.
- The leader models the attitude that improvement is normal, expected, and ongoing — not exceptional and disruptive.
An environment where leaders work hard alongside their people and take problems seriously creates the conditions for further kaizen. A lively work environment is itself a result of continuous improvement — and also its fuel.
6Step 6 — Confirm the Results
After implementation comes confirmation. The question is not "do you think the change worked?" The question is "what did the data show, against what you expected, item by item?"
When asked how a new method is working out, the team leader who can only say "I think it's better" has not confirmed anything. Confirmation requires measurement.
Without standards there can be no kaizen. Standards define the baseline against which improvement is measured. Judging a result without a solid standard is not evaluation — it is an impression. The standard established in Step 4 is the measuring stick for Step 6.
7Before and After — Quantify Each Item
Confirmation compares the actual result, item by item, against both the baseline and the expected improvement. The before/after comparison is the most direct form. Each metric that was targeted in Step 4 must be re-measured after a learning period — not on day one, when performance reflects unfamiliarity, but once operators are working at a stable pace.
| Metric | Before | After | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Productivity | 5 parts / person-hour | 8 parts / person-hour | +60 % |
| Scrap rate | 2.0 % defective | 0.5 % defective | −75 % |
| In-process inventory | 7,000 pieces | 17 pieces | −99.8 % |
| Production lead time | 6 days | 30 minutes | −99.7 % |
Each metric targeted in Step 4 is measured again after a learning period and reported in concrete terms. The result is not a summary impression but a line-by-line account.
What to notice: the inventory and lead-time figures look implausible until you trace them back to their cause: the elimination of a batch-and-queue step. A 99 % reduction in lead time is not unusual when flow replaces batching. These are the numbers that reveal whether the countermeasures in the plan actually addressed the root causes — not whether the team "felt" the improvement.
8Effect Confirmation — Tracking the Trend
A single before/after comparison captures the end state. A run chart captures the path — showing when each countermeasure landed and how the metric responded. This is the effect confirmation method used in Step 6, and it connects directly to the countermeasure table built in Step 4.
The grinding-machine example threaded through this guide illustrates the principle. The top-three defect types identified in Step 2 — finish-grinder defects and rough-grinder defects — were tracked week by week as the countermeasures were implemented. The target line established the standard. The step-changes in the run chart correspond to specific actions: a spindle bearing replacement, then a coolant formula change, and finally a shortened wheel-dressing interval. The first two corrected abnormal conditions and produced the large early drops; the third was different in kind — it optimized a normal-but-suboptimal process parameter and was written into standardized work, and it is what carried both lines below the target and held them there.
Defect rates for finish-grinder and rough-grinder operations tracked week by week as countermeasures were implemented. Each action steps the rate down to a new level that then holds, until the third countermeasure — at Wk 9 — carries both lines below the 1% target, where they stay through the following weeks.
What to notice: each countermeasure produces a step-change followed by a plateau — the rate drops the week the action lands and then holds flat, not drifting on its own. A continued slide with no new action would mean some other change is at work and unaccounted for. The spindle-bearing fix moves only the finish grinder (its own spindle); the coolant change moves both. The chart is not closed out until the target is actually met and held — and the target line was set before implementation, not drawn after the fact to match results.
9Judge Against the Objective, Not Feelings
The source course is direct on this point: when reviewing an improvement, avoid conclusions based on impatient judgment. An employee skilled at the previous method is not yet skilled at the new one. Measuring performance before the learning period is complete produces a comparison between an expert's performance and a novice's — and the new method will lose that comparison unfairly.
The standard for judgment is the objective set in Step 4, applied after the learning period has concluded. Item by item, not as a single overall impression. Where results fell short of expectations, that shortfall is the input to the next kaizen cycle — not evidence that the approach was wrong.
The most common error in confirmation is abandoning a valid improvement too early. A new combination of jobs, or a changed layout, requires several weeks before operators reach their previous pace. Leaders who check on day three and declare "no benefit" have measured the learning curve, not the improvement. Allow the time, then measure.
10Update Work Standards and Standardized Work
Confirmation is not complete until the improved method is documented and the documentation replaces the old version. Without this step, the improvement is held in place only by memory and supervision — and it will erode.
The documents that require updating after a kaizen improvement include:
- Work Standards — the written specification of the correct method, key points, and quality checks for the operation.
- Job Instruction breakdown sheets — the structured teaching documents used to train to the new standard.
- Standardized Work charts — the operator-sequence, takt time, and standard in-process stock documents that define the production pattern.
Updating standards is both a technical step and a commitment: the organization is declaring that this is now the correct method. The updated document is what is trained to when a new operator joins the area — and it is the baseline for the next kaizen.
Treating standardization as paperwork rather than as a mechanism. Standards are not filed and forgotten — they are the operational definition of the current best method. A kaizen that produces results but leaves the old standard in place has not been completed. Within weeks, the area will revert. The standard is the chock that holds the wheel in position; without it, the improvement rolls back.
11Discover New Problems and Begin Again
After confirmation, one of two things happens: the results matched expectations, or they did not. In either case, the cycle continues.
Where results fell short, the remaining gap becomes the next problem statement. Occasionally the bottleneck shifts — the countermeasures addressed the most constrained point, and now a different point limits the system. In those cases, the lens must widen from the individual station to the process as a whole, and kaizen must be applied as a total-system activity rather than to one isolated step.
Where results met or exceeded expectations, that success reveals what was not visible before. Problems that were hidden by the previous constraint become visible once the constraint is removed. This is progress, not regression. A newly visible problem is evidence that the previous kaizen worked.
The course describes the categories to scan at each confirmation cycle: quality, safety, cost, efficiency, and work conditions. Taking them up one at a time, studying each in detail, and making the next one the goal of the next improvement activity is the rhythm of sustained kaizen.
12Kaizen Is Endless
The six-step cycle is not a project with a defined end. It is the operating rhythm of a production area that is continuously improving.
The source course ends with a statement that has become one of the foundational positions of Toyota-style kaizen:
Simply attempting to maintain the status quo will one day be seen in hindsight as a strategy equivalent to retreat. One cannot say that the present situation is the best. Today's best is not necessarily that of tomorrow's.
The logic is competitive, not philosophical. Technology advances, customer requirements change, and competitors improve. An organization that holds its current method as the final answer will find, over time, that the answer has become wrong. The only sustainable position is continuous improvement — not dramatic reinvention, but the steady accumulation of small, disciplined gains by people who know how to observe, analyze, and change their own work.
This is what the kaizen skill set is for. The six steps exist not to manage a project but to give every team leader a repeatable method for turning observation into improvement. Used regularly, at every level, across every function, that method compounds.
Each PDCA cycle advances the process one step up the staircase toward target state. The standard (chock) holds each gain in place so the next cycle starts from the new position, not the old one.
What to notice: the chocks are load-bearing. Without updated Work Standards and Standardized Work, there is nothing to prevent the process from sliding back to the previous step when attention moves elsewhere. PDCA without standardization produces temporary results. Standards without PDCA produce stagnation. Together, they produce continuous improvement.
Section summary
Step 5 — Implement. A plan becomes kaizen only when it is running on the floor. Implementation requires active cooperation with all affected people and departments — manufacturing management, team members, engineering, and upstream and downstream operators. Guidance to team members follows five points: explain and let them try it; acknowledge the discomfort of unfamiliar tasks; allow a learning period before judging; instruct in words people understand; demonstrate, because imitation teaches well. Job Instruction's four-step approach — Prepare, Present, Try Out, Follow Up — is the structured tool for installing a new method. The work environment itself must support change: the manager as team manager, the team leader as coach, the team members as players.
Step 6 — Confirm. Confirmation is quantitative. "I think it's working" is not confirmation. Standards are the basis for comparison; without a solid standard there is no kaizen — only an impression. Judge each metric against the objective set in Step 4, item by item, after the learning period concludes. Track the trend with a run chart to show when each countermeasure produced its effect. Where results fell short, the gap is the next problem statement; where a new problem becomes visible, that is progress. Update Work Standards, Job Instruction breakdowns, and Standardized Work charts so the gain is locked in and the new standard becomes the baseline for the next cycle.
Kaizen is endless. Today's best method is not tomorrow's. The standard is the chock that holds each gain in place; PDCA is the wheel that keeps rolling. Attempting to maintain the status quo is, over time, equivalent to retreat.