Value streaming made easy | Paper airplane training game

[@justinnoll3838]

Thank you! I was trying to remember how we ran this game a few years ago for an upcoming class I am doing on Lean. I really like the added value of incorporating the VSM training into the activity, we had not done that previously. Thanks!

[@TomMentink]

Great to see, Justin. I'm happy to hear from anyone finding value in my content, and you're even going to use it for the benefit of a whole other group - super!

[@elizabethcm4286]

great training material! thank you so much.

[@TomMentink]

Hope you enjoy it and that it will help you teach Lean to your colleagues/students

[@susanablanco6912]

LOVED IT! Gracias!

[@TomMentink]

Thanks for sharing that. Hope you’ll have much fun using the game.

[@maj791]

Great video! Loved it. How often do you usually make an order as a client? Just wondering about this and mix of colors in orders. To make the game (1round) attractive and to make the results satisfying after improvements in next rounds. Do you have any tips?

[@TomMentink]

I usually start with a roll every 30 seconds, just one plane ordered of the colour that was rolled. You might want to hint to the teams that they could negotiate with the client about higher or lower sales volumes (which translates to rolling every 20 sec, or every 40 or 45 sec.), but they will have to deliver on that promise of course 😉 Round one will be interesting in any case - they will make a mess of it because everything is new. Do mention that while they're allowed to build up stock, any inventory in the factory will be counted and cost them money 'for keeping raw materials and WIP'. A general bonus tip (if you can handle the extra workload as the game master 😅): ask the team members how they feel after each round, how smooth were things, how's their stress level, etc. At first, you'll likely hear that some stations are super busy and can't handle the load while others are relaxed, almost bored (and probably laughing at those busy colleagues, since it's all a game anyway). If you do rounds with good kanban, and definitely if you do a full silent round, you'll see that stress levels go down a lot (the silent round with kanbans in place is the most productive and relaxed 'factory floor' anyone has ever experienced).

[@thenetworkofusourglobalnou1446]

Hi Tom, love this! Nice work. Will be trying it in a logistics setting! Will let you know how I get on. Cheers Trish

[@thenetworkofusourglobalnou1446]

p.s. love your comment about personalising it to your audience, that's so key! :)

[@TomMentink]

Thanks for letting me know you like my videos, and great to hear that you’ll be making it into your own version. Some of my thought for logistical focus: - have the different workstations on separate tables that are not in logical order in the first round - have the customer add (back-order) defect planes to the next order - put a good focus on WIP/stock levels and use this to spot bottlenecks (important tool for logistics people)

[@thenetworkofusourglobalnou1446]

@@TomMentink Ohhh - gold! Yes! Thanks for that.... will definitely add those in, especially the defect one! ... but actually they're all great tweaks for the team - working in logistics/transportation.... and absolutely send you a debrief of how we got on and what the team discovered and learnt! Appreciate the input! :) Be nice to connect further sometime... Cheers Trish

[@edgarmunoz4741]

Hi Tom, great video I am looking into incorporating this into my lean company training and show the value of lean within a manufacturing system. My question is how is the dice roller keeping track of their demand, do they track their rolls and we verify it at the end? When mentioning inventory is the 1st operator the only operator allowed to have inventory stacked? They can have a stack of folded papers with stars on them ready for the start of the demand. Then the dice roller rolls 10 times and then we start production based on the orders? Thank you so much!

[@TomMentink]

The generic answer is "try it out, it's all a learning experience" 😇 I wouldn't let the 'client' roll ahead, unless you don't have enough players and need to play that role yourself. Give them a big piece of paper on which they'll do the registration of what they rolled and what the team delivered. The client doesn't work for the team that is their supplier, so if your colleagues are very competitive, you can even select 'the client' from the other team, so that they're more interested in giving the production team a hard time than in trying to cheat your game. On where to place inventory: that really is your and/or their choice. If you'd like to make specific points about your factory situation, then sort of force it into the game; if it's more generally about Lean, then just go ahead and let them make inventory wherever they want (they will get a small 'penalty' for all WIP at the end of the round, so if they have loads of inventory they see that hurt their score). I would advice to have at least one round where you decide where to place inventory: which will be between 1 and 3 planes between each station (1-3 of each color from the moment the star is placed). It's very doable with just 1 plane (per color), but you'll probably want to start with 3 to show the system and only after that challenge them to go to 1 inventory place. On the folded paper - any sheet that is not pristine is WIP, so any folds, drawings or other prep means it counts as WIP during the calculation. If you have enough time to do 4 rounds, it's great to do the last round in silence: if all the kanban systems are in place, people don't need to scream across the table to expedite colors or defects). If you plan on doing this, make sure to ask everyone to rate the stress level after each round. At first, people will think this is about the difference in stress between the operators (high stress) and warehouse/quality (low stress), so they won't expect that last round's huge effect - great additional way to not just see, but really feel, the effect of Lean on an organization.

[@hemangkelaiya6245]

Nice explanation 👍

[@TomMentink]

Thanks for your kind words, glad you liked it.

[@maquito1967]

Thanks for sharing. Very good explanation Tom. I am currently working on a value stream mapping for services; however, people have not been in contact with tools to improve their work, so I am starting with identifying waste and obstacles to flow. However, I guess if I can mix the training into the game, ie after the second round, explain customization and lane balancing, and then do a third round or ideal state, what do you suggest?

[@TomMentink]

Yes, that’s a good approach. But it will slow down the pace of the game and might feel as if you planned everything. If you just mention some concepts, but do the real training afterwards (with plenty of recollections and examples of what the groups used during the game they just played) you’ll be able to tie it together better. I’ve seen both approaches work fine. Just don’t do the training before the game - let people feel and discover before explaining stuff.

[@fetabrown]

Thanks, interesting activity

[@TomMentink]

Great to hear that you liked the video and the game idea. Thanks for sharing that, it brings a smile to my face to hear from people who use my materials 😊

[@futerko999]

WOW, Tom! That's really brilliant video! Actually we want to do this in our logistic team to work on waste topic in LEAN management. One question about customer role: should he/she roll dice before every round or during the round?

[@TomMentink]

Great to hear, Thomasz, thanks for sharing that. The customer is rolling a lot during the game rounds - for instance, during a 5 min round they roll every 30 seconds. These roll determine how much of which airplane is the next order. Do the rolling during the round, so that it remains a random surprise - keeps the whole feel more active.

[@futerko999]

@@TomMentink Oh, I see! Thanks for explaining that. Can't wait to try it with our team. One more time: great content Tom. Very helpful and valuable. Cheers!

[@gaylonryan8879]

I am delivering a Value Stream Mapping training to other leaders and new hires in the quality department. Would you recommend conducting the game at the beginning of the training presentation or at the end?

[@TomMentink]

I would recommend doing this training BEFORE the VSM theory. It can be a great start of the day, with more formal VSM training to end the morning and putting it into practice in the afternoon. Depending on the rest of your training program, this game can also be a great ‘pick-me-up’ after your lunch break (if you have other topics before lunch, then do this game and end the day by explaining what everyone just did in VSM terms).

[@visionzCS]

Hello, do you happen to have a written instructions on this game? Thank you!

[@TomMentink]

Sorry, don’t have that anymore - I actually didn’t use any documentation for this after our team started using live drawings and flip charts as a major part of our training delivery (much more interaction with the group compared to using only PowerPoint). I know there are people/companies that love using a bunch of templates and instructions for it (in fact, I used to do just that with a Lego-based Lean game), but one of the big advantages of the paper airplane game is that it hardly requires any materials. You can just instruct people and draw out some things on a flip chart or big poster per team, draw some squares on a piece of paper for inventory control if you want, etc. Like that, you even show that Lean really doesn’t necessitate specialized tools and equipment 😉

[@srenporskrog1431]

Hi Tom. Very nice video. Excellent for learning through experience. I am managing a large SAFe-based software development program with about 150 people devided over 15 teams. The challenge is that compared to the game you show the variability of the requirements/features flowing through the value stream is very high. In your game it is extremely low as you produce the same again and again. In software development our requirements might be big or small and it might even be tricky to follow how much process time is put into the requirements at each step. Any suggestions on how to modify your game for high variability and low visibility of actual process time? Thanks for an excellent video on this.

[@TomMentink]

Hi Søren, thanks for your kind words. I would not be hasty with making the game itself more difficult, as it is meant to show the principles within no more than half a day (game + VSM training). The best way to learn is to follow this game up with projects immediately - train your project team members and sponsors just before making the VSM’s together and doing one or more flow improvement teams. If you do want to incorporate things into the game, here are some suggestions: Non-leveled load: recolor the dice to have 3 red, 2 green and 1 blue side. Full usage of capacity: actively suggest the ‘managers’ that they may agree with the ‘clients’ to roll more often (every 20 sec) or less often (40 s) to get the most out of the capacity of their factory. Changing market: make different dice, with differing colors and number of sides per color - 1 or 2 times during a game round, the ‘client’ randomly changes dice. For this to really show effect, the round may have to be longer than usual (8 or 10 minutes, for instance). Different time required for different product variations: blue stars have to be fully colored in, the other colors only have an outline. Erratic demands: ‘client’ rolls the die twice, if the second roll has the same color, they order 2 planes (if different color, nothing happens). A change that I really like, especially when teaching the stress reduction that comes from visual stock management, is that the 3rd round nobody talks - you will probably see that even though there is less communication, the efficiency probably is higher and the stress levels lower.

[@srenporskrog1431]

@@TomMentink This is simply brilliant. Thank you! I will try and work with some of your suggestions for some of my client workshops. Really good stuff. Thanks.

[@davidjournot1741]

Hi Tom, I have seen some of your KZbin videos, it's great content! I'm currently building an online software for factory stream optimization, which is in early development stage. I would like to know if you could take a couple minutes to answer 4-5 questions and thus help me build a better product. Thanks

[@TomMentink]

Hi David, happy to help you along. Please send me an email (address is on my channel about page). Or you can post the questions here; you’ll have a broader community that can help you, but no option for pictures, table, etc.

[@davidjournot1741]

@@TomMentink thank you very much for accepting my request. Your email adress doesn't seem to be publicly visible on your KZbin channel. You can find me on facebook if it's easier.