IBEC assessment at YAKULT HONSHA CO., LTD. KYOTO PLANTOn January 30th, 2001, a second IBEC assessment in Japan took place at Yakult Honsha Co., Ltd. Kyoto Plant. The assessment was conducted by Chikafumi Morita, IBEC qualified auditor, also Executive Board Director of Japan Quality Assurance Organization(JQA) and Vice President of IQNet, and Hiroyuki Sakumoto(Deputy Senior Director of ISO Certification Center, JQA) as an observer.
Yakult Group consists of approximately 180 companies, including marketing companies for distribution of Yakult's products, bottling companies, and other relevant affiliates, centering Yakult Honsha Co.,Ltd. Its operation covers food and beverage products, cosmetics, and pharmaceuticals, in pursuit of a company that contributes to 'people's healthy life'.
The IBEC assessment was conducted as follows:
1) Interview the top management of Yakult Kyoto Plant and employees of each department. Assess the relative information gathered from the documents and records of Yakult Kyoto Plant.
2) Check the information collected against the relevant criteria, using the IBEC assessment checklists. Determine the strengths and areas for improvement.
3) Calculate the points of the strengths and areas for improvement for each sub- criteria under each criteria.
The best practices of the Yakult Kyoto Plant were follows:
- The leadership of the plant manager was well performed in accordance with the policy and strategy.
- The health care management of the employees was strongly emphasized.
- The policy of the plant was kept in good consistency with that of the Honsha headquarter.
- The ISO9000:2000 process approach was well introduced.
- The plant was aiming for a future compliant plant following plant manager's policy and was strengthening the training of the technical skilled people accordingly.
The difficult point encountered during assessment was how to write down in the assessment report about the real complaints of the employees sampled during the 'People Results'.
Yakult Honsha Co., Ltd. Kyoto Plant (Yakult Kyoto Plant), which took the IBEC assessment, is one of the 12 national plants under the management of Yakult Honsha Co., Ltd. Production Department.
Yakult Kyoto Plant engages in the production of dairy products, lactobacillus-based beverages, and fermented milk, and its turnover for the fiscal year 1999 was US$110,461,590.
Yakult Kyoto Plant has received HACCP approval from the Ministry of Health and Welfare as well as ISO14001 certificate from Japan Quality Assurance Organization(JQA), a leading IQNet member.
The IBEC partial assessment was conducted at Yakult Kyoto Plant. Based on the Excellence Model of EFQM, the assessment was integrated with ISO14001, and in accordance with the request from the Yakult Kyoto Plant, three criteria below were assessed:
1) Policy and Strategy
2) People
3) People Results
For 'Policy and Strategy', the assessment covered how the company plans, implements, reviews, and runs the policy and strategy within the activities of the company.
For 'People', the assessment covered how the company manages and develops the people's ability by personal level, team level, and organizational level. In addition, in relation to the Policy and Strategy, the audit assessed whether those activities were effectively planned.
For 'People Results', the assessment covered the objectives of the company in relation to its people, how it differs from the people's expectation towards the company, and how much people are satisfied with it.