| 17 nzdairy Using Lean Management philosophy Richard Loader DAIRY PEOPLE » Grassmere Dairy Since 2016 Manawatu dairy farmers Mat and Jana Hocken have been utilising the Lean Management philosophy, a set of systems and principles first developed by Toyota to eliminate waste and achieve the best possible efficiency in its car manufacturing operations. The Hocken’s dairy operation encompasses two dairy units separated by a road with a collective milking platform of 282 hectares. While one farm is home to 430 cows, the other is home to 490. The dairy units are supported by a 153-hectare effective run-off that is home to the young stock, 150 bulls and also grows 20 hectares of maize, grass silage and summer crops. The units are operated by a team of five, including a farm role and a shed role on each farm, overseen by a farms manager. “Jana has worked in Lean Management all around the word for over twenty years, including time spent with Toyota in Europe and Australia,” says Mat. “She has written a book called The Lean Dairy Farm and has founded The LeanFarm Project, delivering training workshops to farmers across New Zealand and globally. Essentially, no farmer or farm owner is brilliant at everything, but brilliant outcomes can be achieved by farmers and their teams if good processes and systems are put in place.” The five principles of Lean encompass identifying value, mapping the value stream, creating flow, establishing a pull system, and striving for continuous improvement. “There are many Lean tools that can help farmers. A key starting point is having a mindset for change and continuous improvement. Then standardising processes so that team members can spend their time making good decisions on the things that are really important. Another important element is visualising the data collected on farm. Our team rooms have white boards with the information that we need to run the To learn more or chat with a rep in your region go to halterhq.com Pasture management Virtual fencing and herding Heat detection Animal health “Having Halter on the farm has fast tracked our business growth. We’re running the lowest farm working expense that we’ve run for a few years now.” Dan Blair Sebakwe Farming, Canterbury “We hit peak production much earlier this year and held it for six weeks – that’s unheard of for us.” Greg and Michaela McCracken Silverhill Trust Farm, Te Hana “With Halter, we’re not limited by time or fences anymore. We can truly prioritise what’s best for our cows.” Teagan Gray Gray Farms, Hauraki Plains farm and we have regular weekly, monthly and seasonal team meetings. The idea is that anyone can come in and understand what is going on on-farm.” Mat says the key to implementing Lean on farm was creating a bottom up process. “The team who work at the ‘coal face’ know the challenges and problems they face day-to-day. They must be involved in developing the systems, processes and standards. That creates buy-in from the team. The team were very responsive to the changes because it meant that problems and hindrances to their daily work were dealt with. Everyone has a standardised role and with that comes responsibility and accountability. That gave the team a lot of confidence in themselves to do their work, and a lot of mistakes have been removed. We’ve been able to cut hours and waste out of the day just by streamlining our processes, while at the same time the quality of milk, maintenance and grazing has improved. We have a roster throughout the year where everyone gets two days off with five days on every week, including during calving. We target 45- 50 hours a week, though there’s a bit of a peak during calving.” Jana Hocken.
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