November 19, 2025
2025 marked the third year of our Re:Build Cutting Dynamics’ Lean Transformation, a journey guided by our True North principles: Safety, Quality, On-Time Delivery, Growth, and Cash Management. Year one was like drinking from a fire hose: absorbing a vast amount of Lean knowledge and tools. Year two felt like the teenage years: learning from missteps, experimenting, and discovering what worked best across our teams. Now, in year three, Lean has become more than a methodology; it’s a way of thinking, planning, and operating across every site and function.
Lean is not just a set of tools for problem-solving and waste elimination; it’s how we prepare for growth opportunities, align company strategy, and flow work efficiently through our facilities. This mindset has enabled breakthroughs that go beyond incremental gains, such as the innovative approaches our teams implemented to scale production capacity while maintaining quality and efficiency rapidly.
In this post, we’ll share the story of our 2025 Lean journey, from measurable accomplishments and cultural transformation to a deep dive into a production breakthrough and lessons that will shape the path forward into 2026.
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2025 was a year of measurable progress in our Lean transformation journey. Across the organization, teams built on past improvements to strengthen daily management, expand training participation, and drive meaningful operational results.
Rapid Improvement Events (RIEs): Ten RIEs were completed this year, with three more planned before year-end. These events targeted key production and process challenges while providing new development opportunities for 15 employees who participated for the first time.
These numbers represent more than metrics; they reflect an organization learning, adapting, and improving together.
At both our Wonder and Pin Oak facilities, 2025 marked a turning point in how teams approach collaboration, ownership, and continuous improvement. The shift wasn’t just about new tools or layouts; it was about people thinking differently about their work and each other.
At our Wonder facility, the team wrapped up their 2P planning as part of a major facility expansion, implementing two new flow cells designed for greater efficiency and flexibility. Cell leaders stepped up to take ownership of the new production areas, driving improvements in material flow and team coordination.
Meanwhile, at our Pin Oak facility, the team recently completed a dual event to prepare for a significant increase in production. Using Lean principles, they planned and executed a ramp-up strategy that more than doubled output capacity without adding a second shift. By redesigning workflows and adopting a true cell-based production model, the team demonstrated how careful planning and cross-functional collaboration can achieve significant results with minimal added resources.
These site-level transformations reflect a more profound cultural shift taking hold across the organization. Teams are embracing the idea that empowering people is the only sustainable way to build a Lean culture. Leadership, engineering, and quality functions are aligning around a shared purpose: to support the employees who create value through hands-on work.
The mindset has evolved from “my department” to “our process.” When one team faces a challenge, everyone rallies to solve it because success depends on the product leaving the building on time, together. Breaking down silos and strengthening this sense of unity has become one of the most impactful outcomes of our Lean journey so far.
When two major programs called for rapid production increases, one ramping from 450 to 700 units by May 2026, and another from 60 to 175 units by January 2026, the teams faced a significant challenge: how to scale efficiently without simply adding people or resources.
Meeting aggressive delivery targets required a new approach to production flow. The goal was clear: to determine the most efficient way to meet growing customer demand, maximizing value-added work and maintaining quality, all without resorting to an additional shift.
To tackle this challenge, cross-functional teams used the A3 problem-solving method, grounding their work in data, observation, and collaboration. They went to the Gemba to observe the actual assembly processes in real-time, engaging directly with operators to identify pain points and inefficiencies.
Each team documented forms of waste they observed, whether in material movement, waiting, or redundant handling, and plotted those issues on a current-state process map. From there, they worked systematically to reduce or eliminate each source of waste, aligning improvements with Lean principles.
Through this deep-dive analysis, the teams identified a key opportunity: transitioning from batch processing to a true flow-line approach. By reconfiguring workstations and optimizing the sequence of operations, they could significantly increase throughput without adding headcount or significant equipment investments.
The outcomes speak for themselves:
For one program, the team determined they could meet the full production ramp simply by switching to flow-line operations enabled by waste elimination and improved fixturing.
For the second, the new process allowed the team to meet demand by adding just two people, rather than launching an entire second shift.
This event exemplifies how disciplined Lean problem-solving can uncover hidden capacity, reduce waste, and achieve growth without unnecessary expansion. By engaging the people closest to the work and focusing on data-driven solutions, the teams demonstrated that innovation often starts with seeing old problems in new ways.
As Lean practices continue to mature across the organization, the focus has shifted from implementation to sustainability, ensuring that every improvement becomes an integral part of our daily work.
Teams at all facilities are now using MDI boards and PCBs, including hour-by-hour tracking tools. These visual management systems help teams identify performance trends, respond quickly to issues, and maintain accountability throughout the shift. The result is a more proactive, transparent approach to daily problem-solving.
For all new process improvements, our teams have taken the proactive step of creating LPAs specifically for the new processes introduced this year. These audits will help sustain gains made through recent RIEs and reinforce standard work as part of the company’s long-term Lean foundation.
With over 90% of the workforce now trained in Lean 101, the next step is deepening that knowledge. A new Lean 201 course is being developed to equip employees with advanced tools and techniques for continuous improvement. To maintain consistency going forward, Lean 101 will be integrated into the new-hire onboarding process, ensuring that every employee starts their journey with a shared understanding of Lean principles.
The progress made in 2025 laid the groundwork for an even more focused Lean transformation in the year ahead. Building on this year’s lessons, teams are setting ambitious but achievable goals that target performance, quality, and sustainability.
Improving delivery reliability remains a top priority for 2026. The company-wide goal is to achieve 90% or higher OTD across all other programs. By leveraging Lean tools, refining communication between teams, and eliminating process variability, we aim to strengthen customer trust and ensure dependable, predictable performance across every product line.
In 2026, the focus will shift from detecting issues to building quality directly into the process. Rather than relying on end-of-line inspections to find defects, teams will apply Lean problem-solving methods to design error-proof processes and eliminate root causes earlier in the workflow. Although scrap averaged 0.79% in 2025, the goal is to make that number trend steadily downward by improving standardization, training, and in-process controls.
Sustainability will continue to be guided by the LPA framework, which achieved a 93% pass rate in 2025. However, increasing audit completion rates, currently in the 70% range, will be a key focus area moving forward. By maintaining consistency in daily management and reinforcing accountability, the organization can ensure its improvements are both measurable and lasting.
Three years into our Lean transformation, the results speak for themselves; however, the real success lies in how our people think, collaborate, and continually improve every day. Across sites, teams are applying Lean principles not just to solve problems, but to anticipate them; not just to react to change, but to lead it.
The progress made in 2025, from improved on-time delivery and expanded visual management to empowered teams and sustainable process improvements, shows what’s possible when everyone takes ownership of continuous improvement. The production breakthrough achieved this year is just one example of how Lean thinking enables growth without unnecessary complexity or cost.
As we look ahead to 2026, our focus remains steady: to build quality into every process, strengthen our delivery performance, and sustain the cultural momentum that drives us forward. The journey isn’t about reaching an endpoint; it’s about continuing to learn, adapt, and improve together.
Contact our team to learn more about our capabilities or to initiate a discussion about your specific requirements.
Our team at Re:Build Cutting Dynamics wants to ensure that all your questions regarding our Lean transformation have been answered. With that in mind, feel free to contact us today with any questions you may have. We look forward to assisting you.
