Example gallery · 18 examples · 5S and visual management
A visual management example is anything that lets a person see the state of the work without asking. A whiteboard with the next 3 jobs ends 6 trips a shift to the planning office. A green band on a gauge shows normal pressure at a glance. Below are 18 examples sorted by what the visual does: display, standard, metric or control. Each has the before, the after, what changed and what it cost. The stations and numbers are illustrative. They are made up to show what a good write-up looks like, and are not results from a real plant or customer.
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More about it on the visual management audit checklist page.
Want the long version? Types of Visual Management Tools in Manufacturing: The four categories: displays, controls, metrics and standards.
Each card is one change at one station. Before and After give the same measure, taken the same way. The paragraph says what changed and who keeps it. Cost is materials only unless it says otherwise.
Showing 18 of 18 examples
Share information: what is running, where things are and what is next.
A whiteboard at the line shows the next 3 jobs with part number, quantity and die. The planner updates it at 6 am and 2 pm. Setters stage the next die from the board.
Every pipe got a label with its contents and an arrow for flow direction. Each shutoff valve got a numbered tag that matches the drawing. Maintenance timed a shutoff drill before and after. The utilities technician owns the labels.
Hanging signs now name each aisle, and every bay has a location label at eye level that matches the pick list. New pickers no longer depend on someone who knows the building. The warehouse lead owns the signs.
A board with four columns replaced the suggestion box: new, reviewing, doing, done. Each idea is a card with a name and a date. The supervisor goes through the board with the team every Thursday.
Show what good looks like, at the place the work is done.
The quality engineer and the customer agreed three sample panels: best acceptable, worst acceptable and reject. They hang at the inspection station under the same light as the parts. The samples are replaced every 6 months.
Each of the 12 pressure gauges got a green band for its normal range, set by maintenance from the machine manual. The operator no longer reads numbers against a list. A needle outside the green gets a tag.
A single page at the machine shows a correct label, the two most common wrong ones and the allowed position in millimetres. The operator checks the first carton of each run against it. The quality technician owns the page.
A red line on the post beside the wrapper marks 60 inches, the limit for the customer's racking. A pallet that covers the line is too tall. The shipping lead repaints the line when it fades.
Show plan against actual, so a miss is seen within the hour or the day.
The operator writes actual output against a plan of 60 an hour, with a reason for any miss. After two missed hours in a row the supervisor comes to the line. The supervisor signs the board at the end of the shift.
A board with five columns for safety, quality, cost, delivery and people replaced a slide deck. Each column shows yesterday as red or green, and actions sit below with a name and a date. The area manager runs the meeting standing at the board.
A cross with one box per day hangs at the dock office. At the start of the next shift each day is coloured green, yellow for a near miss or red for an injury. Near misses are written on a card beside it. The dock supervisor owns the cross.
The tester makes a tally mark by defect type on a sheet at the bench, where the team can see it. By Wednesday of the first week one defect type stood out, and the team traced it to a connector that was not fully seated. The quality technician totals the sheet weekly.
Steer what happens: limit a quantity, mark a path or call for help.
A pull cord at the filler turns on a yellow light and sounds a short tone in the team leader's area. The team leader goes to the line when it lights. Each call is logged with its cause.
Each packaging item now has two bins. When the first is empty, its card goes in the reorder slot and the line works from the second. Purchasing collects the cards daily. The stores lead owns the card quantities.
Totes used to stack on pallets beside assembly, and the newest were used first. A gravity roller lane now holds 12 totes at most, loaded at one end and unloaded at the other. When the lane is full, molding stops that part. The molding supervisor owns the limit.
Each weekly PM task is a card in a slot, red side out. The technician turns it to green when the task is done. At the Friday meeting any card still red is talked through. The maintenance supervisor owns the board.
A marked walkway now runs along the wall, with striped crossings where it meets the forklift route and a stop line for trucks at each one. The safety lead walked it with the drivers before taping. The dock supervisor checks the tape monthly.
A red, lidded bin with a label sits at every press. Suspect parts go only there, and nothing in a red bin goes back to the line without a decision from quality. The quality technician empties and records the bins each shift.
These examples are illustrative. The stations and numbers are made up and are not results from a real plant or a customer. Measure your own before and after, the same way both times, before you copy one.
Stand where the work is done and check each point.
The Lean Enterprise Institute's Lean Lexicon defines visual management as placing tools, parts, production activities and indicators of performance in plain view, so everyone involved can understand the status of the system at a glance. The test for each example on this page is the same. A person walking past should be able to tell normal from abnormal without asking.
The four groups run from sharing to steering. A display tells people something. A standard shows what good looks like. A metric shows plan against actual. A control limits what can happen: a lane that holds 12 totes, or a bin that takes only suspect parts.
Colours carry meaning, so keep them consistent. OSHA 29 CFR 1910.144 makes red the basic colour for fire protection equipment, danger and stop, and yellow the basic colour for caution and physical hazards. 29 CFR 1910.145 covers accident prevention signs and tags. Do not rely on colour alone. Pair it with a word, a shape or a position, so the signal still works for someone who is colour blind.
The cards are the short version. These guides explain the method and walk through examples in full.
All our articles on this subject are in the 5s and visual management topic.
Puts daily huddles on live, cascaded dashboards, so the shop floor and the top floor see the same numbers and act on them at every tier.
See Tiered MeetingsDigital T-cards for layered process audits, scheduled by cadence, red until done, with every finding tracked to an action.
See Kamishibai Board SoftwareFAQ
An hour-by-hour board. The operator writes actual output against the plan each hour, with a reason for any miss. Anyone walking past can see whether the line is ahead or behind, and the supervisor knows when to come. Floor markings, shadow boards, andon lights and kanban cards are other common examples.
A common split is four: visual displays that share information, visual standards that show what good looks like, visual metrics that show plan against actual, and visual controls that limit or direct what people do. The examples on this page are sorted the same way.
A display informs and leaves the decision to the reader: a schedule board, a sign, a label. A control builds the decision in. A FIFO lane that holds 12 totes stops overproduction by having no room for a thirteenth. Controls are stronger, so use one where a display has not been enough.
Only what the team acts on. For a daily board that usually means yesterday's result against target for safety, quality, delivery and cost, the top problems, and open actions with a name and a date. If nobody changes what they do because of a chart, take it down.
Use red and yellow the way OSHA 29 CFR 1910.144 does: red for danger and stop, yellow for caution. For everything else, write one plant colour guide and post it. Pair each colour with a word or a shape, so it still reads for people who are colour blind.
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