In theory a good escalation system. In practice there must be strong guarantees and trust that there are no repercussions for triggering. Otherwise management will tell you over and over to "pull the andon cord / escalate earle & often" but really no one does.
Not only must there be trust, but there must also be a resolve to make deeper fixes to problems surfaced through the andon system. It's a typical mistake to forget that part. If the response to a problem is that someone comes and patches over the immediate symptom, then the cord will keep being pulled for the same reasons so often no work will end up getting done.
Then the andon system is abandoned as "didn't work for our organisation".
The example I like is that it should be a valid reason to pull the andon cord (and thus stop the entire line!) that you need to go to the bathroom, because if it repeats, it indicates scheduling has not left sufficient space for bathroom breaks between shifts at the line.
Trader Joe's cashier bells have entered the chat.
Ironically, the "request assistance" button and accompanying blinking light on top of your stand at self-checkout are the "self-managing" version of that where you as the customer are partly an employee. oh well
Then the andon system is abandoned as "didn't work for our organisation".
The example I like is that it should be a valid reason to pull the andon cord (and thus stop the entire line!) that you need to go to the bathroom, because if it repeats, it indicates scheduling has not left sufficient space for bathroom breaks between shifts at the line.
EDIT: Found it: https://davidoks.blog/p/why-japanese-companies-do-so-many
Search for “Ford plant”, second occurrence for that particular bit. The article made rounds on HN a couple months ago.