Continuous improvement system: team members’ perceptions

Abstract

The complexity, competition and fast changing of the global market requires the companies to seek excellence, if they crave for good performance and success. To reach this purpose, it is mandatory the existence of a Continuous Improvement (CI) culture within the companies. This concept, also known as Kaizen, mean “change for the better” and it defends that a very large of small improvements applied and sustained over the time, brings more value than a few big improvements. The objective of this paper is to evaluate the effect of lean teamwork after a Continuous Improvement system had been implemented in Lipor, a Public Organization based in Oporto that treats the municipal waste. The CI system implemented a few years ago, was possible to maintain and adapt over the years through the creation of a Kaizen Team, Natural Teams, Project Teams and the cooperation between them, cultivating this Continuous Improvement culture in the company’s core. The results of the survey done to the workers regarding the CI system demonstrated that the majority consider that their work process has improved significantly with Kaizen and highlighted the importance for them to be involved in improving team’s processes