Case Study 11
Anonymized

Found Us Cold, Bought Four Times: A Repeat 6S and TPM Program

A North American heavy-process manufacturer found Incito through an inbound search, with no referral and no outbound push. Its Lean organization then engaged Incito four separate times in 2024 to deploy floor-level 6S capability and assess maintenance excellence across its operations.

4 engagementsSeparately purchased within 2024

Inbound originThe client found Incito directly

Two sitesNorth American heavy-process operations

Client

Heavy-process manufacturer · Anonymized

Service

6S model-area deployment · TPM health check

Status

Anonymized case study

The Engagement at a Glance

An Experienced Buyer That Came Back Four Times.

The client's own Lean organization ran the selection. Each of the four engagements in 2024 was a separate purchase decision, made by people who buy this kind of work for a living.

Exhibit 1 · Engagement at a Glance

Industry

Global heavy-process manufacturing, North American operation.

How it began

Inbound. The client found Incito directly, with no referral or outbound push.

Client context

An existing North America Lean organization engaged Incito to deploy 6S and TPM capability on its plant floors.

Scope

TPM deep-dive assessment, a one-year deployment roadmap, 6S model-area deployments, and Kaizen implementation support.

Engagement pattern

Four separate engagements within 2024.

Engagement result

Four separately purchased engagements across two sites.

The clearest signal a client trusts the work is that they buy it again, four times in one year.

Why This Pattern Matters

A First Engagement Is a Hypothesis. A Fourth Is a Judgment.

Buying improvement support once tells you very little. Buying it four times in a single year, from the same firm, through a Lean organization that could have run the work itself, is a different kind of signal, and a different bar for the partner to clear each time.

Exhibit 2 · What Each Purchase Decision Tested

A single engagement suggests

A fourth engagement reflects

The decision

Someone was willing to try an unfamiliar firm once

The same buyers chose to spend again, knowing exactly what they got

The alternative

Untested against any other option

Tested against doing it internally, and against every other firm available

The scrutiny

The buyer has no direct experience of the delivery

Every prior engagement informs the next buying decision

This client

Cleared this bar once, in an inbound first purchase

Then cleared it three more times inside twelve months

Four separate purchases show the judgment of the people closest to the work.

Incito's Role

Deploy Practical 6S and TPM on the Floor: Assess, Roadmap, Stand Up Model Areas.

Not a strategy exercise and not a training course. The work was floor-level, in the plants, with the client's own teams inside the model areas.

Exhibit 3 · The Delivered Scope Across 2024

TPM deep-dive assessment

A maintenance-excellence health check establishing where the operation actually stood.

One-year deployment roadmap

A sequenced plan the client's Lean organization could own and run.

6S model-area deployment

Model areas stood up on the floor, including a full value-stream 6S deployment.

Kaizen implementation support

Hands-on support while the client's teams executed the improvements themselves.

Across four engagements, the work covered TPM assessment, deployment roadmapping, 6S model-area deployment and Kaizen support.

Four separate engagements in one year suggest the client continued finding value in that role.

Client Ownership

Floor-Level Deployment Only Holds When the Client Owns It.

The conditions below show how Incito builds 6S and TPM deployment for client ownership and staying power.

Exhibit 4 · How Incito Builds Client-Owned Deployment

What the approach requires

Why it decides the outcome

Start with a model area

One area taken far enough to be visibly different

A site adopts what it can see working, not what it has been told about

Work where the work is

Time spent on the process line, not in the review room

In heavy process operations the constraint is on the line, and it is rarely visible from a report

Assess before roadmapping

A health check establishing the real current state first

A roadmap built on an assumed starting point sequences the wrong work

Client teams execute

Kaizen support alongside the client's people, not instead of them

Capability that was never exercised by the client does not survive the engagement

A deployment is only real once the client's own teams have run it without us.

Repeat Selection

Repeat Selection by an Experienced Client.

Four separate buying decisions in one year show continued confidence from an experienced client.

Exhibit 5 · Four Buying Decisions in 2024

Engagements separately purchased in one year

Inbound origin

The client found Incito directly, with no referral and no outbound push

Two plant sites

North American operation of a global manufacturer

The client found Incito directly, then chose to buy four separate engagements across two plant sites.

A client that found us on its own and then bought four times is the quietest compliment the work receives, and the hardest to manufacture.

Executive Implication

A Lean Function of Your Own Doesn't Mean You Have Floor Capability.

Many large manufacturers have a corporate or regional Lean organization and still find that 6S and TPM never take hold at the process. The gap is rarely intent. It is bandwidth, sequencing and time on the floor.

01A Lean team stretched thin

Central capability exists, but not enough of it to stand up model areas site by site.

026S that never stuck

Housekeeping campaigns have been run before and have quietly faded.

03Reactive maintenance

Equipment sets the schedule, and planned work loses to breakdowns.

04No agreed starting point

Sites disagree on the current state, so any roadmap is contested before it begins.

05Multiple plants to cover

What works at one site has to be reproducible at the next one.

Incito deploys floor-level capability alongside your Lean organization, not over the top of it.

6S and TPM that hold at the process?

Talk with Incito about standing up model areas your own teams can reproduce.

866.697.LEAN
www.incito.com