LOST TREASURE: Ford’s original philosophy of ‘CANDO’

The Visit
Ford made significant contributions to lean thinking, and paved the way fifty years before Lean was born. An important Ford principle is CANDO, invented probably before 1920, is an acronym for five steps: Cleaning up, Arranging, Neatness, Discipline and Ongoing improvement. Coming from an industrialist CANDO is simple to follow, crisp and practical.   

After the war, Japan was eager to learn from America. Notably, a team from Toyota visited Ford in 1950. The team was awed by the scale of Ford. Toyota produced just 40 automobiles per day while Ford did 8,000 a day. Toyota decided to adopt American automobile mass production methods with a few changes. A Toyota team was trained at Ford. In 1956 Taiichi Ohno, the company’s chief engineer visited Ford and the Piggly Wiggly supermarket chain. Based on those observations began the development of Toyota Production System, which eventually led to the formation of the 5S practice.   

Japan adapted CANDO as 5S which stands for five Japanese words that begin with the letter S: Seiri, Seiton, Seiso, Seiketsu, Shitsuke. 5S was in practice before it was published in 1973 by Productivity Press.   A mapping between CANDO and 5S can be seen here:   

Cleaning up                               Seiri   
Arranging                                  Seitori   
Neatness                                  Seiso   
Discipline                                  Shitsuke   
Ongoing Improvement               Seiketsu   
                                               
                                      - Courtesy: William A. Levinson   

"Ford’s “CANDO” philosophy marks a striking resemblance to the 5S that Taiichi is credited with. In fact Ford’s FPS (Ford Production System) was one of his inspirations”.

American Roots   

The Ford principle had strong American roots. In 1827, Charles A. Goodrich, an American writer and Congregational minister, popularized the motto, “a place for everything and everything in its place” when he wrote and published an article call “Neatness”.   

The quest for order can be seen in Rudyard Kipling’s Eathen:      

“Keep away from dirtiness -- keep away from mess.”   

Henry Ford wrote in his book Today and Tomorrow (1926): "The first job was to clean up— that is always the first thing to do in order to find out what you are about…We cannot afford to have dirt around— it is too expensive. … Everything is painted and kept painted a light color, so the least bit of dirt will show. We do not paint to cover up dirt— we paint white or light gray in order that cleanliness may be the order of things and not the exception."   

Ford, along with pioneers such as Taylor  and Gilbreth showed concern for waste in manufacturing and worked on methods for reducing it.   Ford’s approach for quality is expressed in his famous quote:     

“Quality means doing it right when no one is looking”   

Ford's interest in teamwork can be seen in his quote:   

"Coming together is a beginning; keeping together is progress; working together is success."   

On learning from mistakes, the spirit of continual improvement, Ford said:   

"Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently."   

"Even a mistake may turn out to be the one thing necessary to worthwhile achievement."   

Ford joined the elite club of CEO’s who, in the years to come, would promote quality: Robert Galvin of Motorola, Larry Bossidy of Allied Signal, Jack Welch of GE. Quality expressed by these industrialists as a business idiom is a great achievement of American business culture.

Translation of 5S   

Taiichi Ohno, creator of 5S framework, was a practical man who "cared not much for reports or models." For a practical purpose to improve visibility his students developed methods such as 5S and Kanban. Unfortunately, when introduced in the West, 5S was wrongly dubbed as "housekeeping." The purpose of 5S is to promote visibility and make "Kaizen opportunities" instantly obvious.   

The first four steps of CANDO proffer 5S visibility and the fifth presses for Kaizen improvement. This argument leads us to the equation:

               CANDO = 5S + Kaizen

   It is said that Toyota implemented two steps of 5S first, and with time added two more. The fifth step was added much later. In contrast, CANDO philosophy brings all the five steps and Kaizen to the table.   Though they may have adapted 5S today, originally (a long time  ago)Toyota taught 4S. The idea of “self discipline” or “sustaining” didn’t come into it because that was embedded thoroughly in the culture. It was taught elsewhere.      

Attempts to find single word labels equivalent to those five Japanese words have mostly failed, due to linguistic challenges. Such translators have made heavy weather to find words that begin with letter S, a poor strategy. However, sans poetic brevity, fuller explanations of each Japanese word in 5S using a few lines of text, have conveyed true meaning such as here:   "Following are explanations of the original five S's, to the best of my ability:

Seiri（整理) does not mean Sort. In everyday Japanese, it means sort out, as in resolving administrative problems. In 5S, it means removing from the shop floor the items you don’t use routinely.   

Seiton (整頓） does not mean Set in order. In everyday Japanese, it means arranging neatly. In 5S, it refers to having assigned locations and labels for everything you retain on the shop floor.   

Seiso (清掃) means Clean, not Shine. The idea is to have production operators clean their own workplaces at shift end, so that they notice details like spills, frayed cables, or broken lamps. It is not about making them pretty.   

Seiketsu（清潔)　does not mean Standardize. In everyday Japanese, it is a noun meaning cleanliness. In 5S, it is the reduction of the first three S’s to daily practice by management enforcement, through things like checklists, assignment of responsibility for daily housekeeping activities, and routine audits.   

Shitsuke（躾) does not mean Sustain. In everyday Japanese, it is a noun, meaning upbringing. It is not an action but the condition you  reach when the performance of the first three S’s has become second-nature to the organization. As long as you tell your kid to brush his teeth every day, you are practicing Seiketsu; once he does it without prompting, you have achieved Shitsuke."  

                   - Michel Baudin

Ongoing Improvement in CANDO philosophy   

The last letter in Ford’s CANDO philosophy, namely O, standing for ongoing improvement, deserves special mention. Ongoing improvement was called continuous improvement by Deming who later changed the phrase to continual improvement. Japan adapted it as Kaizen, now a pillar of Lean. Ongoing improvement was called POOGI (Process of Ongoing Improvement) (1984) by Eliyahu Goldratt, the Theory of Constraints guru from Israel.   In this sense CANDO emerges much bigger than 5S; it combines 5S and Kaizen into a holistic approach. Ford’s including of ongoing improvement in CANDO reminds one of Shewhart’s spirit of attaching PDCA wheel to control chart. In both the cases, the philosophy becomes complete only when improvement is part of it.   

Today continual improvement has become the foundation for enterprise excellence.   Juran's "Managerial Breakthrough"  (1964) completes a picture with Ford’s ongoing improvement of CANDO (1920).This combination, fusing two approaches, is a forerunner for Lean Six Sigma. But we missed the forest for the trees. We failed to see the benefits of the combination and never saw them together. For continual improvement we look up to Japan and not Ford. The Ford practice, unfortunately, is not celebrated. Deming had to ask (1980) "If Japan can, why can't we?"   

Do Not Imitate, Internalize   
Japan’s Lean success lies in the way they internalized American values. Japan focused on human psyche, the fourth point in Deming’s system of profound knowledge and beefed up 5S in terms of deeply human values such as humility and respect for others. They did not blindly copy the West. But the West is trying to imitate 5S resulting in frequent failures of 5S implementation.   

It is worth recalling the experience of an Indian company (TVS) which long time ago won the Deming award from Japan. During the quality journey several teachers from Japan visited them and when the company thought they have completely implemented the Japanese system, the teachers asked:   

“You have shown how you can do things our (Japanese) way. That  is not enough. Now you must do it all your way”   That goes to prove that copying is easier, but less important, than internalizing.

Needed A Continual Improvement Renaissance  

I prefer to see 5S as a CANDO kernel shaped-- by an outer layer of culture. The kernel is philosophy and the shell, practice. Today when we implement 5S the challenges are in the outer layer. To implement Lean, let us implement CANDO and then mold an outer shell with values integrated from global best practices. We need to move towards a continual improvement renaissance.   For that to happen, we need to recognize our own heritage and internal strengths.

Bibliography   

• Henry Ford and Samuel Crowther, “My Life And Work (The Autobiography of Henry Ford)” ISBN 1420928198, 1922
  
• Henry Ford, “Today and Tomorrow”, Special Edition of Ford's 1926 Classic, Productivity Press, 1988
  
• William A. Levinson “Henry Ford's Lean Vision: Enduring Principles from the First Ford Motor Plant”, Productivity Press, 2002.
  
• The System Company.How Scientific Management is Applied. London: A. W. Shaw Company, Ltd. 1911
  
• Taiichi Ohno, Norman Bodek, “Toyota Production System: Beyond large-scale production” Productivity Press, 1978
  
• Masaaki Imai, “Kaizen: The Key To Japan's Competitive Success” 1st Edition, McGraw-Hill Education, 1986
  
• Hiroyuki Hirano, “5S for Operators: 5 Pillars of the Visual Workplace (For Your Organization!)”, 1st Edition, Productivity Press, 1996