Can you teach a 5 year old how to do Lean 5S? (#1)


  1. I have set up my office in my daughters’ playroom. I have three girls who are ages 5, 3, and 1. Because I am away from my family for most of the year (roughly 45 weeks per year), I love that I can see them play when I work from home. Since I am apart from my wife and my girls so much working on projects or teaching classes, sharing an office with my daughters’ playroom allows me to optimize on the short time we have together.
  2. If you have children, or even any experience with children,I am certain you can picture what our office/play room resembles when the day is over. Very similar to a small tornado touching down directly in the middle of the room, there are Barbies, Shopkins, Ponies, and Princesses strewn all about. Every toy they own is somewhere on the floor.
  3. Every day our three girls dump the entirety of their toys on the floor, and every night when it’s time to get ready for bed, they negotiate and plead to get out of cleaning up. To our girls, cleaning up all their toys is an unimaginable feat. If I’m being honest, cleaning up all their toys is a pretty daunting task for my wife and I. Ultimately, me or my wife clean up the bulk of the mess while our daughters offer their services by putting toys where we want them to go.
  4. In the midst of working our way through this grueling task one Sunday night, I had an epiphany. Part of my job is to mentor organizations on how to use tools to avoid the exact dilemma my family is in right now! Why couldn’t I teach my girls to use these tools? This train of thought led to a Lean 5S course right in our play room.
  5. The first “S” in our Lean 5S event was “Sort.” It is in this task that we need to remove what doesn’t belong. When my girls went to visit their Grandma, I sorted all of their toys by type. When they came back home,they ran down the hall to their playroom. They were stunned when they saw that all of their toys were already on the floor. I told them that we are going to gather what they do not use anymore and donate those toys to children who need them. We sifted each pile and I was so proud of how generous our daughters were. When we were done, we reduced our toy stock by almost 50%.
  6. Then we moved on to the second “S” which is “Set in Order.”In the Lean 5S methodology, the idea behind this “S” is that “everything has a place and everything in its place.” Before we completed our “Sort” process, the girls would dump out every bin to find a certain toy that they wanted to play with. By the end of the day, there would be no walking space on the playroom floor and every type of toy was jumbled together.
  7. My eldest daughter has just begun to read. My middle daughter is very smart; although she hasn’t finished “War and Peace” quite yet.Because of this, I let my girls pick out four images and then printed them on apiece of paper and laminated them. Each picture represented the four different toy groups: My Little Ponies, Barbies, Disney Princesses, and Shopkins. I used white Duck Tape to attach these pictures to the front of their toy bins.
  8. I showed my girls the new process and they adored it. When I quizzed them where some of their toys were supposed to go they would eagerly jump to the right bin.
  9. Then it was time for a hybrid of the last three “S’s,”Shine, Standardize, and Sustain. We did this to see if we could finalize this new process into a habit. When it came time to clean up on the first night,toys were all over the place. I put the bins on the floor around the outskirts of the disaster area and set a timer on my computer for 10 minutes. I went through the rules with my girls and added in a little bit of friendly competition: “When the timer buzzes the game is over. You have 10 minutes to pick up all of your toys. Any toy left out when the timer goes off will be given away to children in need. Whoever cleans up the most toys will win.”
  10. Their results were incredible! The cleaned all of their toys up with over a minute to spare. Every toy was in the right spot. Occasionally I had to coach them through the process when they would try to put a toy in the wrong bin. A little over half way through, the girls had become a well-oiled machine. After they had cleaned the entire room and put everything in it’s place, I gave them lots of high fives and hugs as rewards. They eagerly ran to grab their mom so she could see the wonderful job they had done. She was astounded by how clean the playroom was and awed at the girl’s excitement and motivation to do it on their own!
  11. It is now four days into our Lean 5S process. Each night the girls have consistently picked all of the toys up before the buzzer goes off.Just yesterday my eldest daughter came up with the idea that “if we don’t takeout all of our toys, we do not have to pick them all up.” She is going to be my future Master Black Belt. 😊

  12. About Six Sigma Development Solutions, Inc.

    We are Certified as an Accredited Training Organization with the International Association of Six Sigma Certification (IASSC)

    “The IASSC Accredited Training Organization (ATO) designation validates Six Sigma Development Solutions, Inc. has demonstrated adequate management systems, courseware with a high degree of correlation to the subject matter contained in the IASSC Bodies of Knowledge, delivery schema consistent with such content and highly qualified instructors.”

    We Provide Public Lean Six Sigma Lean Six Sigma Green Belt and Lean Six Sigma Black Belt Certification Training Courses in 34 Cities across the globe.


    We Provide Onsite Lean Six Sigma Certification Training. Some of the training's we provide are: Lean Six Sigma Black Belt, Lean Six Sigma Green Belt, Lean Six Sigma Yellow Belt, Lean Six Sigma Champions Training and Lean Certifications for Healthcare, Finance, I.T, Manufacturing, Processing, Logistics, Retail Sales and Government.

    SSDSI will come to your site to train for your choice of the Lean Six Sigma Certification Levels. Onsite training is more cost effective than open enrollment training when training larger groups of team members.

    Benefits of Onsite Training:

    The Training is focused on Your Opportunities

    SSDSI uses your opportunities in class (vs. generic examples)

    You will get the experience of a seasoned Lean and Six Sigma Master Black Belt who will help mentor you while completing your Lean and Six Sigma Project

    You can train up to 20 employees for one fixed cost (this cost includes courseware and the instructors travel & lodging)

    Our courses are full of games, simulations, and active learning to help the adult learner

    SSDSI can customize the training to meet your company’s particular training needs

    For More Information Contact: Kevin Clay, MBB at 866-922-6566 or kclay@sixsigmadsi.com

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