Visual Control

"Visual control" is a technique employed in many places and contexts whereby control of an activity or process is made easier or more effective by deliberate use of visual signals. These signals can be of many forms, from different coloured clothing for different teams, to focussing measures upon the size of the problem and not the size of the activity, to kanban and heijunka boxes and many other diverse examples. Visual control communicates very effectively the information needed for decision making. An example is the use of painted tool silhouettes in tool racks to indicate which tool should be clipped to a particular location is an effective way of not only encouraging tools to always be kept in standard locations but allows almost instant audit of missing tools. Visual control is very often about replacing textual or numeric data displays with carefully designed graphical displays whose meaning can be understood at a glance and are therefore more likely to be effective at communicating the required message.