tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32909109287167809292024-02-19T02:47:30.946-07:00Bringing Out the Best at WorkThis blog is devoted to exploring how organizations bring out the best in their people who in turn bring out the best in their organizations. How do effective people contribute to effective organizations? How do effective organizations contribute to effective people?Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.comBlogger37125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-63332875023211876702011-10-31T10:27:00.001-07:002011-10-31T10:32:29.165-07:00Sometimes We Remove Technology<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; tab-stops: .5in 1.0in 1.5in; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .25in;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 120%;">I consulted in a plant that had a large machine that cut rubber tubing into pre-determined lengths. Next to the machine, I spotted a large wire container with cut tubing lengths. It was labeled with a red tag with the word REJECT visible from twenty feet away. The detail on the tag revealed that the tubing contained in this container had been cut too short. It was probably going to have to be scrapped.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; tab-stops: .5in 1.0in 1.5in; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .25in;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 120%;">I asked why the tubing had been cut too short. Probably human error in setting the machine, I was told. The specs were not entered correctly and no one noticed until a full container had been cut. We formed a work group to find a way to prevent this problem from every happening again.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; tab-stops: .5in 1.0in 1.5in; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .25in;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 120%;">We discovered that the internal customers for these products were two assembly lines. Tubing that was too long could easily be cut down to size. Tubing that was too short could not be used because it did not reach the two points in the assembly that needed to be linked. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; tab-stops: .5in 1.0in 1.5in; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .25in;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 120%;">We quickly came to the idea that the tubing was quite easy to cut, so why not cut it just-in-time. The team designed a guillotine (actually a small paper cutter), mounted it on a bench with a channel and a stop that measured the tubing to the required length, making it easy to cut just one piece when it was needed. The roll of tubing was too large to have on the assembly line. We cut off enough to supply the line for one day and rolled it onto a smaller reel. Our arrangement worked well for a week on the first line. After that we duplicated the process on the second line. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; tab-stops: .5in 1.0in 1.5in; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .25in;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 120%;">Later the company negotiated with the supplier and was able to get tubing in smaller rolls suitable for putting directly on the assembly line. Within the company there was some resistance to taking a “perfectly good” machine out of service, when it was still being paid for. When I toured plants in Japan that were practicing lean manufacturing and continuous improvement, I saw several yards filled with equipment covered by tarps. We were told that this was equipment taken out of</span><span style="font-family: Cochin; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 120%;"> </span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 120%;">service by efforts to make processes lean and reliable.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-4222177810917434332011-09-08T15:14:00.000-07:002011-09-08T15:14:51.760-07:00Unemployment and the EconomyI have talked to a few "small business" owners over the last month. I've asked them what most affects their hiring decisions. Is it taxes? Is it regulations? Is it demand?<br />
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These are owners of businesses with 100 to 200 employees, focused on manufacturing and importing. The answer is always demand. Some noticed a clear drop in demand when gas prices last went up. <br />
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They would like lower taxes, and there are regulations that are onerous. Some regulations seem stupid. Others make sense and the fact that they apply to everyone in a particular market is seen as a good thing. A lot of regulations are complex and require hiring consultants to help assure compliance. <br />
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But it comes back to the need for demand. Without demand there is no growth. Without demand there is a need to reduce labor or reduce hours. Sometimes both are required. Construction companies have been particularly hard hit with the real estate collapse. Hiring requires orders to build.<br />
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I come down on the side of government efforts to stimulate demand, through creating jobs that our society needs to have done. Rehabilitating existing infrastructure and developing new infrastructure are real needs. They offer the opportunity to hire people who in turn will purchase goods and services from others. We should also look at simplifying our tax system and at revising and sometimes simplifying regulations that are onerous.Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-54391587515736167052011-05-31T09:32:00.000-07:002011-05-31T09:32:19.414-07:00Whose Responsibility Is It?<span style="font-size: small;"> </span><span style="font-size: small;">I have a reflexive reaction when workers get blamed for problems in the workplace. I have found that the vast majority of workers in a wide variety of workplaces do the best they can with the material, methods, machinery, and measurements that they are given to do the job. Often they are severely lacking. Material is of poor quality and doesn’t meet the specifications (sometimes the specifications don’t even meet the requirements). Machinery frequently jams, malfunctions or breaks down. They are not adequately instructed in the methods required or the reasons to follow them. Insufficient data, or the wrong data, is collected to give them the feedback that they need.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Often workers struggle. Sometimes they get fed up. Instead of solving a problem or seeking help to solve it, the merely wait for someone else to do it. They may have even been told that thinking about solving problems or improving the work is not their job. If this goes on for long, bad habits develop. I have been in plants were it seems that most workers are chatting, drinking coffee, or reading a newspaper, rather than doing productive work.</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Edwards_Deming">Edwards Deming</a> said often that the responsibility for solving problems and providing all the resources needed for work lies squarely on management. I agree. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masaaki_Imai">Masaaki Imai</a> points out that fixing blame does little to solve problems and much to interfere with problem solutions. People who risk being blamed are more likely to hide problems. The manager who asks to understand what went wrong will get a lot more useful information than the one who wants to know who to blame.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;">If kaizen and lean practices are going to be successful, the bulk of the responsibility falls to management. This isn’t to say that management knows how to do it. When I have involved General Managers and company Presidents in kaizen workshops (something which can be pretty hard to do, because they are too busy to devote that amount of time to a workshop), I have often heard them say, “I had no idea.” </span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">So, what do managers have to do? They need to understand that their organization is a system. There are flows of material in the system, with a lot of waste between one spot that adds value and another. A big waste is in-process inventory, often not including the material that is actually needed at the moment, because more than necessary of a different material has been produced.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">The value adding stations require support around the Five Ms (People [formerly Manpower], Machines, Methods, Measurements, and Material. Value adding fails, doesn’t get done, gets done wrong, produces poor quality, because one or more of these support systems have been inadequate. The wrong person has been assigned to the job with inadequate training, or compensation has fallen down and affected morale. The machines don’t work the way they are supposed to work because their is not an adequate preventive maintenance system. When machines break down it takes a long time to get them up and running again. Standard methods (the best, easiest, safest ways) have not been developed, communicated, or improved, leaving an untrained worker to use her best judgment. The worker is expected to “make do” with material that is of poor quality, of insufficient quantity, or not located conveniently. Wrong things or no things are measured to inform everyone of how we are doing. The worker does not know what is expected. The supervisor can’t tell who needs the most help to get back on track.</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">I have barely scratched the surface here of the kinds of inadequacies that the support systems can present. Some companies manage all of the support systems quite well. An awful lot struggle from crisis to crisis, leaving no time to pay attention to the systems issues.</span>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-46940114203166583852011-03-29T14:13:00.002-07:002011-03-29T14:54:32.698-07:00Quick Changeover Workshop - Part 2<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In the last posting I listed the following techniques to reduce the time it takes to changeover a machine from one product to another.</span><span style="font-family: Times;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">1.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"> </span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A verbal written record of every action of the people doing the changeover</span><span style="font-family: Times;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">2.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"> </span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A spaghetti diagram of the changeover operators’ movements.</span><span style="font-family: Times;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">3.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"> </span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A measurement of the distant walked, either using a pedometer or counting the operators’ steps.</span><span style="font-family: Times;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">4.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"> </span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A written capture of ideas for improving the changeover, as these come to mind.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">This is the form that I use make a written record of what people are doing during the changeover that is being observed:</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidnpj7Srozs74bFG-oBzQ7mNllyDmRXQ0dVvp_LpB3Cz88G3p1E5BTaqzyoE-Wj7C2p3ZUq9MbMgztiuPezA0T7EDTV20yruOEJ4yNi9WHcgvkAp8Cbdne1Hc8Cthzk6obBCJYw732Pg/s1600/Changeover+Activity+Log+filled+out+form+Sheet1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="312" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidnpj7Srozs74bFG-oBzQ7mNllyDmRXQ0dVvp_LpB3Cz88G3p1E5BTaqzyoE-Wj7C2p3ZUq9MbMgztiuPezA0T7EDTV20yruOEJ4yNi9WHcgvkAp8Cbdne1Hc8Cthzk6obBCJYw732Pg/s320/Changeover+Activity+Log+filled+out+form+Sheet1.jpg" width="320" /></a></div></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We record the activity of the operator being followed in detail. We especially want to be able to distinguish among the activities that could be done before the machine stops producing or after it is producing again, those that must be done while the machine is stopped, and those which are simply waste or muda.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In the example, the operator could have had the lock and tag ready before shutting the machine down. This could be “external” time. The actual act of locking out must be done after the machine is shut down.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Walking to the opposite side of the press adds no value to the changeover process. If the lever were next to the electrical panel where the lockout is placed, the walking could be eliminated.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The operator must hold the lever down for 56 seconds to release the pneumatic pressure. We again have waste. A different release mechanism would allow him to pull the lever or push the button once and go on to the next element of activity.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Now the operator goes to fetch a hand truck. Accumulating product in a container is waste, leading to the additional waste requiring a hand truck to move it. If the next operation were performed immediately, on an adjacent machine, there would be no need to move these parts with a hand truck. For immediate purposes, we can think of this activity as potentially external. The hand truck could be put close at hand before the machine was shut down.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In the workshop we typically leave the three right-hand columns blank until after the changeover is complete, focusing instead on keeping track of the running time at the start of each new activity, in the left-hand column.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Normally, we will fill many pages of this form in one changeover. After the observation is complete, we categorize each item as Internal, External, or Muda, putting the time for the element in the corresponding column on the worksheet. We then add up the times in each column and calculate their percentage of total time. The time that must be internal will be a small fraction of the total time, revealing that we spend most of the changeover doing things that are wasteful or could be done before after the period during which the machine is not producing.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The spaghetti diagram of the operators movement gives us a visual representation of the amount of activity that is wasted in movement without adding value. Here is a typical first spaghetti diagram:</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4OaVWaQaTQSZA7Pzzdl7O_xj3H6cjZcwWV9H21lrTXxfNGtKyOcpq6Xt12EylkM-mM_C_2cTs2nJcWVpugsYmVM8kH1hfn-VhDxrMMI5D21eixbP4RELBT39s6Vl95-F8IsCPAUSbiA/s1600/spaghetti+diagram+for+post.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4OaVWaQaTQSZA7Pzzdl7O_xj3H6cjZcwWV9H21lrTXxfNGtKyOcpq6Xt12EylkM-mM_C_2cTs2nJcWVpugsYmVM8kH1hfn-VhDxrMMI5D21eixbP4RELBT39s6Vl95-F8IsCPAUSbiA/s320/spaghetti+diagram+for+post.jpg" width="266" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">As we make improvements and repeat our observations we can see the impact dramatically by comparing spaghetti diagrams.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Data from a pedometer or by having an observer count the number of steps the operator takes is provides a measure of the potential for improvement and actual improvements obtained in the workshop. The number of steps and distance traveled should drop dramatically.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Throughout the changeover the members of the team will have ideas about ways the changeover can be improved. If all nuts were the same size, we could work with a single wrench instead of the half-dozen sizes we use now. We would waste less time hunting for the right wrench. If we chance the design of a clamp, we can eliminate a tool altogether. These ideas should be written down as they come to mind. Some teams have each observer keep his own notes. Others have a single recorder to whom all observers give their ideas to be written down. It is useful to note the running time on the note, to place it in context for later discussions.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">After the first changeover has been observed, the team gathers to discuss their observations and select improvements that can be done quickly to reduce the time it takes to changeover the equipment, writing the ideas on a flip chart. The Detailed Activity Log is completed by identifying those activities that could be external and those that are muda. The team considers what simple changes might eliminate the muda or make internal activity external. These ease of doing this will vary widely, but there is always much that can be done quickly and inexpensively. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Tool boards can be installed, on which all of the tools needed are in a designated location and within reach. The first versions can be done with a magic marker on a piece of cardboard. In fact they should not be made too permanent and pretty, as we often find ways to eliminate tools, requiring the tool-board to be changed. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Is hunting for fasteners taking up time? We can pre-stage the exact fasteners that are needed, where they are needed. Are we spending a lot of time spinning down nuts because bolts are longer than they need to be? Let’s select bolts of optimum length. Are we wasting time because small parts fall and must be retrieved? What can we do with small parts trays to prevent this from happening.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In some types of changeovers we discover opportunities to standardize that will he contribute to reducing the times they take. Standardizing die heights can make changing stamping presses quicker. When there are problems to standardize to a single height, we can we at least minimize the variation by standardizing to two or three heights instead of a half dozen or more. Often we can we standardize clamps and bolts. Generally we ask, where can we eliminate variation through standardization?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A changeover improvement workshop can be exciting and inspiring. It is not unusually to reduce the time it takes to conduct a particular changeover in half with one or two iterations, implementing low-cost / no-cost improvements after each observation. Getting to SMED (Single-Minute-Exchange-of-Dies) will take more work, but the workshop will provide good indications of where that work needs to be done.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">There is a danger that the necessary changes will not be standardized and maintained. While the team was working, everything was meticulously pre-staged, but we did not then put the procedures into place so that the pre-staging is always done. While the machine is running, who is going to get the tooling and material ready, so that the internal time can be kept to a minimum? The operator may or many not be able to do it. If not, who will? This will require a change in the operating processes in support of changeover.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Quick changeover is not independent of equipment maintenance. An unreliable machine can be difficult to changeover in a reliable time. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">As with a lot of lean processes, if the quick changeover is to be sustained, it requires a vision of how it fits in the overall system. This vision must be translated into leadership that helps others see the big picture and understand all of the changes that are required.</span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-70516422553722990942010-08-30T15:19:00.000-07:002010-08-30T15:19:56.642-07:00A Step-By-Step Process for a Changeover Workshop (Part 1)<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />
</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Changeovers take time. Different models need different dies, different fixtures, and different settings. Usually, all of these have to be changed. During the changeover process, I’m making nothing. I am very tempted to make more than I need when I have everything set and ready to run. I may only need 100, but I will go ahead an make 500 or 1,000 units, because at least the machine was productive, and I can put the extra pieces on the shelf, ready for when they are needed.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Then they sit on the shelf. I didn’t need them when I made them. I t can turn out that now that I have made them, I won’t need them for a long time. Depending on what “they” are they can get dirty or damaged just from sitting. The can rust or otherwise deteriorate. In any case, I’d better keep track of them, because I need to know where I put them when I need them. So someone will have to keep (or enter into the system) an accurate record of how may I stored and where I put them.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">When I need some again, I need to remember to look up how many I have already and where I put them. Sometimes we go ahead and make a fresh batch because we forget that days, weeks, even months ago, we made some of these.<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">It would be better if we could make the changeover so short that the easiest thing to do is to make exactly the number we need when we need them. What if we could change from one product to another on a piece of equipment in less than ten minutes? That would make a big difference, but it can seem like wishful thinking, because now it takes us over an hour and sometimes longer. We can’t even predict how long it will take. It depends on how things go.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">SMED stands for Single Minute Exchange of Dies. Single minute really means single digits. SMED means changing dies (or whatever has to change) in less than ten minutes. Our aim is to do this consistently.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">If we have a machine that is idle most of the time anyway, the need to get it down to SMED is not as great. The ideal machine for a SMED or quick change workshop is a machine that gets heavy use, and now takes an hour or so to change over if things go reasonably well.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Our first step is to pick a machine or set of machines that take around an hour to change over. Then, we form a team. The team should have eight to twelve people: An operator who runs the machine; a person who does the changeover (this may be the same as the operator); a supervisor from the area; depending on the equipment, a tool-maker, a maintenance person, a manufacturing engineer, an industrial engineer; and it is often useful to have one or more people who are completely naïve about the process, who can ask, “Why do you do that?” without fear of looking foolish.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We start by giving the team a brief orientation about our approach to shortening the changeover time. Our goal is to shorted the time that the machine is actually not producing, often referred to as the “internal” time. We want to identify all the activity that takes place during the time the equipment is not running. One of our early steps will be to make some of the “internal” activity “external.” By this we mean that some of the things we do while the equipment is stopped can be done before we actually shut down the machine. Others can be done after the machine is up and running again. The latter include cleaning up and putting away tools and tooling.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We summarize our effort by using the analogy of a pit stop in an auto race. We want to get the car back into the race as quickly as possible. We do this by having everything at hand. Fuel can be added quickly. Tires are ready and can be changed out very quickly. The car gets back in the race, and then the tires that have been removed are put away, along with any tools that were used.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In our case we want to get our equipment back into production as quickly as possible. The team will carefully observe a changeover to see how we do it now. Then we will begin to make changes that make the changeover quicker.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">These are the techniques for observing the changeover, recording data as we observe the work. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">1.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A verbal written record of every action of the people doing the changeover<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">2.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A spaghetti diagram of the changeover operators’ movements.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">3.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A measurement of the distant walked, either using a pedometer or counting the operators’ steps.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">4.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A written capture of ideas for improving the changeover, as these come to mind.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Sometimes the team is tempted to make a video of the entire changeover process. Video can be a very useful tool, but at the initial stages of a workshop I would argue strongly against using video. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The techniques listed above make it possible to move much more quickly to implementing changes that get results. When an hour or more of video is recorded, the next step almost inevitably becomes watching the video and extracting data from it. The techniques we will detail here extract and summarize important data as we go.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In the next posting we will go into detail about using the four techniques listed.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-69354971299992281062010-08-30T13:58:00.000-07:002010-08-30T13:58:37.123-07:00Getting back to the Blog<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />
<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">This blog has been dormant for awhile. I was out of the country – in Mexico – for a couple of weeks, working on a project with an NGO. It involved particularly long hours and was very engrossing. When I returned home, I had some post-project work to do, and kind of got out of my writing groove. I’m in the process of getting back to it.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I have a couple of posts in the works that should be up soon.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-36319706190886203862010-07-13T11:00:00.000-07:002010-07-13T11:00:03.776-07:00Fixing Blame for the Deepwater Horizon Blowout is a Bad Idea<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />
</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Much of the news coverage about the BP Deepwater Horizon oil blowout focuses on who is to blame and who is trying to avoid blame or pass it on to someone else. There is a consensus that BP has a lot of the blame. The <a href="http://www.mms.gov/">Minerals Management Service (MMS)</a> of the U. S. Department of Interior gets a lot of blame, particularly due to a scandal during the Bush Administration alleging sex and cocaine parties in which the MMS and the oil companies participated. Democrats blame Bush, because it happened on his watch. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Interior Secretary Salazaar and President Obama are blamed because they weren’t quick enough to clean house at MMS. Everyone, including the U. S. Coast Guard gets blamed because the capping of the well to stop the spewing oil and natural gas is taking so long.<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Being quick to find blame does not help much. It is much more productive to ask questions such as: Why did the explosion happen? Why did the blowout preventer fail? To what extent were the problems caused by equipment, procedures, information, materials used, and the way people were trained and supervised? What short-term and long-term effects are this crisis and the response going to have not only on the coast, but also on the Gulf of Mexico itself? What can we learn from this experience if there is ever a blowout again anywhere in the world?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Some drilling rigs are already being moved to other oil fields. What are the risks of more blowouts because of regulations elsewere that are lax or non-existent? I am not taking a position here. I thnik the question deserves attention. What kinds of regulation, based on risk analysis, not emotion, will give us real protection from this ever happening again? What can be done to substantially improve the response if it does happen? These are a few of the questions that we need to asked to answer an over-arching question: What do we need to do so this <i>never</i> happens again?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Fortunately, many of these questions <i>are</i> being asked, often without much fanfare or attention. This work is the important part of the response to the blowout, along with containing and permanently capping the runaway well. It is hard to tell if we are asking them enough.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">World-class companies tend to be slow to fix blame. There is a often repeated story of Thomas J. Watson, founder of IBM calling in an employee who was involved in an error that cost the company ten million dollars. He questioned him about what had happened and how it happened. Finally, he thanked the employee and told him he could go.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Aren’t you going to fire me?” asked the employee.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Why would I fire you? I’ve just invested ten million dollars in you education.” Watson replied.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Seeking whom to blame takes our attention away from learning from a problem. As Masaaki Imai likes to say, “A problem is a mountain of treasure.” There is always much that we can learn from it.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">There is a huge amount we can learn from the Deepwater Horizon blowout. Let’s focus on that. In our workplaces let’s also learn instead assigning blame.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-39679226918538783842010-07-10T08:13:00.000-07:002010-07-10T08:13:51.917-07:00Why I Call It “Bringing Out the Best At Work”<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />
</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In the early 1970s I was a graduate student at The Wright Institute. were I was the second student to be admitted to its Graduate School. The first group of twelve students came together in 1970 into program was little more than a vision of the founders of the Institute. We created the first curriculum and went across the street to the University of California Berkeley to recruit part-time faculty.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The Wright Institute Graduate School offered a Ph.D in Social-Clinical Psychology. The idea was to integrate the two fields which did not communicate much to each other. Graduates who became clinicians would have more awareness of the social contributors to mental health. Some of us would become, in a sense, clinicians to organizations. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In a clinical case seminar, a student was presenting his patient to the group and going on about various theoretical models. The professor stopped him and asked, “What does the patient say the problem is?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“She says her work is driving her crazy.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“What does she do?” The class participants leaned forward to hear the answer.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“We haven’t gotten to that yet,” the blushing student therapist said.</span><br />
<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">This struck me. We spend most of our waking lives at work. Surely psychology should take an interest in how work affects us emotionally. Several of us students got together and started a seminar that we called “The Ecology of Work,” to explore how work affects people.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Since then my core interest has been: How do organizations bring out the best in people, and how do people bring out the best in organizations? I have also stated it as: How do organizations contribute to making people productive, and how do people contribute to making organizations productive. I am using the word <i>productive </i>in a more holistic and organic sense that number of pieces per labor-hour. In both the person and the organization I mean being healthy and making contributions to society. To be productive in this sense an organization has be productive in the more conventional sense and to be profitable.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">My first opportunity to study and facilitate change in a factory came while I was still a graduate student. I was one of the resident third party staff in an experiment in cooperation between labor and management, the <b>Bolivar Project</b>.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Most of my career has been as an independent contractor, not as an employee. I learned a lot about industrial engineering and quality systems. I taught courses in statistical process control, six sigma (before the days of colored belts), design for manufacturability, and problem solving, when training was the only field I could find that would put food on the table.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In the late 1980s I got involved with the Kaizen Institute of America. In those days, and throughout the 1990s, practically all of the consultants at the Kaizen Institute were independent contractors. I deepened my understanding of lean, just-in-time, and the kaizen approach to continuous improvement. I had a chance to work under the guidance of Japanese <i>sensei</i> who had become experts through their careers in Toyota. My fellow contract consultants and I had a very collegial relationship. We all learned a great deal from each other and kept each other honest.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Throughout my career as a trainer and consultant, the ways organizations and people accommodate to each other have fascinated me. Most of my consulting has been with kaizen and lean initiatives for the last twenty five years. In all of these endeavors, my “semi-secret agenda” has been to facilitate making work better for the workers. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The strategies that have grown out of the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Production_System"><b>Toyota Production System</b></a> and other Japanese automakers systems as well—Toyota is not the only company to develop lean strategies—are at their best excellent and central to workplaces that are healthy with healthy people. Taiichi Ohno’s said, “Time is life. We should not expect our people to come waste it at work.” Eliminating waste can be and should be humanizing. It is not always so, but it certainly can be.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">This blog is designed to share some of my experiences, as they come to mind. Even when I get somewhat “technical,” with OEE, takt time, cycle time, and SMED, my intent is to have healthy people in healthy workplaces be a connecting thread.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I don’t know it all. I hope to learn from my readers’ comments. Please let me know if you disagree with or question anything I have to say. Do you have experiences that can shed more light? Let’s develop some interesting dialogues.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Notes: <b><a href="http://www.wi.edu/index.html">The Wright Institute</a> </b>has gone through some changes since my time. It now offers a Psy.D rather than a Ph.D and the program appears to be heavily clinical. I have had no contact with the Institute in many years. The <b>Bolivar Project </b>provided interesting learning on several levels. The experiment fell apart after Sidney Harman, the CEO left. For an interesting discussion see <span class="addmd">Joanne B. Ciulla, </span></span></i><span class="addmd"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b>The Working Life</b> (<a href="http://tinyurl.com/39fuovc%20"><b>excerpt in Google Books</b></a>) </span></span><b> </b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-56919950820723853212010-07-07T16:08:00.000-07:002010-07-07T16:08:19.030-07:00OEE – A way to Speak with Data, But It Only Works If We Use It<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />
<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Speaking with data is an important part of the journey to becoming a World Class organization. It is a way to make the invisible visible, to see things that we are otherwise likely to miss. It is also a way to get the attention of people who control the purse strings, when we need resources to solve a problem. I first discussed speaking with data in my post<b> March 15, 2010. (http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/05/speak-with-data.html)</b><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">OEE, which stands for Overall Equipment Effectiveness, can be a useful tool for managing and continuously improving. There are three components to OEE:<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt 1in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">1.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Availability</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> (Planned uptime minus unplanned downtime)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt 1in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">2.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Performance</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> (Planned operating time minus minor stoppages and running slow. It is calculated by dividing the number of pieces produced by the pieces that would be produced at the rated or standard speed)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt 1in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">3.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Quality</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> (All pieces produced minus defective pieces produced divided by all pieces produced)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt 1in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Some companies have a mistaken view of the OEE of their equipment. I have been told that a certain machine has an OEE of .90 or .95, when I can see that it is running slowly, creating scrap, or is down fairly often. There is a convention that any OEE of .85 or above means that the equipment is working at a world-class level. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Fairly high numbers in each of the three components can lead to an OEE that is still below level of .85. I have seen estimates that OEE in American manufacturing tends to run around .60. I have not seen studies on which this claim is based, but it feels right to me as a ballpark. I have also been in plants where most of the equipment does not even reach that level.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Let’s consider a few examples:<o:p></o:p></span></div><table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="MsoNormalTable" style="border-collapse: collapse; margin-left: 4.6pt; width: 289px;"><tbody>
<tr style="height: 13pt;"> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color windowtext windowtext; border-style: solid none solid solid; border-width: 1pt medium 1pt 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 32.3pt;" valign="bottom" width="32"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">OEE<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 19pt;" valign="bottom" width="19"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">=<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 71pt;" valign="bottom" width="71"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">Availability<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">x<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 76.5pt;" valign="bottom" width="77"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">Performance<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">x<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext windowtext windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid solid solid none; border-width: 1pt 1pt 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.75in;" valign="bottom" width="54"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">Quality<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> </tr>
<tr style="height: 13pt;"> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color windowtext windowtext; border-style: none none solid solid; border-width: medium medium 1pt 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 32.3pt;" valign="bottom" width="32"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border: medium none; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 19pt;" valign="bottom" width="19"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">=<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border: medium none; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 71pt;" valign="bottom" width="71"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">0.8<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color windowtext; border-style: none none solid; border-width: medium medium 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">x<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color windowtext; border-style: none none solid; border-width: medium medium 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 76.5pt;" valign="bottom" width="77"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">0.9<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color windowtext; border-style: none none solid; border-width: medium medium 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">x<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color windowtext windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: none solid solid none; border-width: medium 1pt 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.75in;" valign="bottom" width="54"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">0.99<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> </tr>
<tr style="height: 13pt;"> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 32.3pt;" valign="bottom" width="32"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color windowtext windowtext; border-style: solid none solid solid; border-width: 1pt medium 1pt 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 19pt;" valign="bottom" width="19"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">=<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext windowtext windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid solid solid none; border-width: 1pt 1pt 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 71pt;" valign="bottom" width="71"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">0.71<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 76.5pt;" valign="bottom" width="77"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.75in;" valign="bottom" width="54"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> </tr>
</tbody></table><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The first example does not reach and OEE of .85. One combination that does reach the world-class level is:<o:p></o:p></span></div><table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="MsoNormalTable" style="border-collapse: collapse; margin-left: 4.6pt; width: 289px;"><tbody>
<tr style="height: 13pt;"> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color windowtext windowtext; border-style: solid none solid solid; border-width: 1pt medium 1pt 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 32.3pt;" valign="bottom" width="32"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">OEE<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 19pt;" valign="bottom" width="19"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">=<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 71pt;" valign="bottom" width="71"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">Availability<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">x<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 76.5pt;" valign="bottom" width="77"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">Performance<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">x<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext windowtext windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid solid solid none; border-width: 1pt 1pt 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.75in;" valign="bottom" width="54"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">Quality<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> </tr>
<tr style="height: 13pt;"> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color windowtext windowtext; border-style: none none solid solid; border-width: medium medium 1pt 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 32.3pt;" valign="bottom" width="32"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border: medium none; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 19pt;" valign="bottom" width="19"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">=<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border: medium none; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 71pt;" valign="bottom" width="71"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">0.9<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color windowtext; border-style: none none solid; border-width: medium medium 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">x<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color windowtext; border-style: none none solid; border-width: medium medium 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 76.5pt;" valign="bottom" width="77"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">0.95<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color windowtext; border-style: none none solid; border-width: medium medium 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">x<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color windowtext windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: none solid solid none; border-width: medium 1pt 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.75in;" valign="bottom" width="54"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">0.99<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> </tr>
<tr style="height: 13pt;"> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 32.3pt;" valign="bottom" width="32"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color windowtext windowtext; border-style: solid none solid solid; border-width: 1pt medium 1pt 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 19pt;" valign="bottom" width="19"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">=<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext windowtext windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid solid solid none; border-width: 1pt 1pt 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 71pt;" valign="bottom" width="71"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">0.85<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 76.5pt;" valign="bottom" width="77"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.75in;" valign="bottom" width="54"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> </tr>
</tbody></table><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">This combination still falls short:<o:p></o:p></span></div><table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="MsoNormalTable" style="border-collapse: collapse; margin-left: 4.6pt; width: 289px;"><tbody>
<tr style="height: 13pt;"> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color windowtext windowtext; border-style: solid none solid solid; border-width: 1pt medium 1pt 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 32.3pt;" valign="bottom" width="32"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">OEE<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 19pt;" valign="bottom" width="19"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">=<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 71pt;" valign="bottom" width="71"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">Availability<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">x<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 76.5pt;" valign="bottom" width="77"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">Performance<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid none; border-width: 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">x<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext windowtext windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid solid solid none; border-width: 1pt 1pt 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.75in;" valign="bottom" width="54"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">Quality<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> </tr>
<tr style="height: 13pt;"> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color windowtext windowtext; border-style: none none solid solid; border-width: medium medium 1pt 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 32.3pt;" valign="bottom" width="32"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border: medium none; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 19pt;" valign="bottom" width="19"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">=<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border: medium none; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 71pt;" valign="bottom" width="71"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">0.9<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color windowtext; border-style: none none solid; border-width: medium medium 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">x<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color windowtext; border-style: none none solid; border-width: medium medium 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 76.5pt;" valign="bottom" width="77"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">0.9<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color windowtext; border-style: none none solid; border-width: medium medium 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">x<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color windowtext windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: none solid solid none; border-width: medium 1pt 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.75in;" valign="bottom" width="54"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">0.9<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> </tr>
<tr style="height: 13pt;"> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 32.3pt;" valign="bottom" width="32"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext -moz-use-text-color windowtext windowtext; border-style: solid none solid solid; border-width: 1pt medium 1pt 1pt; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 19pt;" valign="bottom" width="19"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">=<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="border-color: windowtext windowtext windowtext -moz-use-text-color; border-style: solid solid solid none; border-width: 1pt 1pt 1pt medium; height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 71pt;" valign="bottom" width="71"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10pt;">0.73<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 76.5pt;" valign="bottom" width="77"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.25in;" valign="bottom" width="18"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> <td nowrap="nowrap" style="height: 13pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt; width: 0.75in;" valign="bottom" width="54"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div></td> </tr>
</tbody></table><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">It does not make much sense to make these calculations, unless we use the data. It is also important that we not use the data to beat people up, but to help us figure out where we need to focus our attention in order to improve.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">One way to do this is to calculate the OEE for a given machine daily, at the machine. If the OEE is consistently .85 or better, there are probably other pieces of equipment that need our attention more than this one. We still might want to ask whether this is an unusual level for this machine. To know this, we would need to have a history. I advocate not only manually calculating but also manually plotting OEE for each piece of equipment we are monitoring. Here is a way to present the data.<o:p></o:p></span><b><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></i></b><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">(Click on the image to enlarge it)</span></i><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></div></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt; text-align: center;"><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTJJBOoEyCshU2fxqigHS7EA6Js9BMX-GNWa-E_va8yR7eW8doVKVdcvGCH88sGM-rY8wQZTh4Q9MP5WlxfPFHgpsvh7s7fq9hIeb6Qevl77NxwUwYjXja7mYOeA5e_3dPrRUBcqfZpg/s1600/OEE+Tracking++Example.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="348" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTJJBOoEyCshU2fxqigHS7EA6Js9BMX-GNWa-E_va8yR7eW8doVKVdcvGCH88sGM-rY8wQZTh4Q9MP5WlxfPFHgpsvh7s7fq9hIeb6Qevl77NxwUwYjXja7mYOeA5e_3dPrRUBcqfZpg/s640/OEE+Tracking++Example.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">On the graph we see that on Monday, the 5th, we suddenly had a drop to <b>.15</b>. We should want to know what caused this drop. Our first question: Was it a problem of availability, of performance, or of quality? A glance at the bottom of the chart, where the three components are recorded, we can tell immediately that or biggest problem was availability. The machine was down. We ought to find out right away what caused the machine to go down, so that we can take action to insure that this problem never happens again.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">On Friday, the 9th, we had another drop in OEE. A quick look at the data tells us that this time we had a problem with performance. That is where we need to dig in to find out what happened and take corrective action.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Increasingly, calculations such as OEE are made by statistical packages into which data is, in some cases,collected automatically. Interesting high level graphs and reports can be generated. When I work with clients, I insist that the operator, at the machine, create this graph manually. If we only have a report that comes out at the end of the week we miss an opportunity to act. When OEE suddenly drops, we want to start asking what happened right away—the same day. OEE charts on the machines that are being monitored can a part of visual control.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">To begin to use OEE, I would not suggest that we start monitoring and charting every machine. Begin with some critical operations that we need to improve. Strive for consistency, then strive for improving OEE. Some equipment may never need to be plotted because it is reliable and has a capacity far in excess of what we need. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">World class OEE, .85 or better, is a factor to consider when ordering new equipment and calculating the needed capacity. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I have had occasion to work with teams planning a new line and the equipment to be purchased for them. They planned as if the equipment would run at its stated capacity 100% or the time. The improvements above .85 can be pretty challenging. While part of achieving world class is demanding excellence of ourselves, plan with a .85 OEE in mind, nothing higher.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">To get operators to record the data and make the calculations, we should explain that these data will help us solve problems around availability, performance, and quality. Then, we need to earn credibility by using the data for that purpose. It is discouraging to engage in an activity that does not add value to the product <i>or</i> the process. Too often we start data collection and quickly forget why we are doing it. Start small. Stay with it. Show some results. Spread the process from the early examples.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Notes: </span></i><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://theleanthinker.wordpress.com/2010/07/05/oee-%E2%80%93-overall-equipment-effectiveness/">The Lean Thinker</a> </span></b><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">has recently described how to calculate the three components of OEE.</span></i><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><i> I chose to focus more on what to do with the OEE calculation, once you have it. </i></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><i><br />
</i></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><i>While for reasons that I hope are clear, I object to capturing the data and doing the calculations in a centralized system. I do not object to the operator having templates on a screen into which we can plug the data that give us the components and overall OEE that we then plot manually.</i></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin: 0in 0in 12pt;"><br />
</div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-10340491822116760552010-07-02T13:35:00.004-07:002010-07-03T06:34:49.232-07:00Lean Manufacturing Requires Responsive and Reliable Maintenance<style>
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<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Lean operations require maintenance that is responsive and reliable. When we have isolated operations that are adding value to pieces in a batch that eventually gets passed on to another operation, one machine going down does not present itself as a critical event.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">If we have many operations organized in a cell and one piece of equipment breaks down, the entire cell goes down. We require equipment that does not go down very often – ideally not at all – and when it does go down we need to get it up and running as quickly as possible. This imposes requirements on the maintenance system. The maintenance system is not limited to the maintenance function. The system includes standard procedures that are followed by the operators and equipment that does not breakdown and/or can be repaired quickly.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A good way to begin to improve the maintenance system starts with a workshop focused on a single piece of equipment that is or will be critical to a lean, one-piece-at-a-time operation. The workshop team goes through a process of detailing the machine.</span><br />
<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The equipment is shut down and (this is very important) locked and tagged out so that no one will be injured in the process. The first tools are rags, brushes of various sizes, detergent, cleaning solutions, and sometimes solvents. The team swarms over the equipment cleaning it from top to bottom. Sometimes there is a temptation to bring out a steam cleaner to get through the gunk. This is best discouraged, because we are using cleaning as a way of inspecting it to identify problems that require attention, not just to get the machine clean. Cleaning by hand allows us to catch problems large and small.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The team members have tags that can be easily wired or tied to the machine close to where a problem is detected. The problems include every loose or missing screw, cracked glass including lenses on dial gauges, and leaks of every kind. In short, any condition of the machine that is not optimal is tagged. The tag includes the date and time it is fastened, the condition to be corrected, and it’s precise location. The information is also recorded on a list. In some cases a two-part tag is used so that a copy can be retained, instead of writing up a list. Tags are numbered to help track the actions taken to resolve the conditions.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In addition to problems, we may see opportunities for improvement. Any gauge that provides information to the operator should be easily visible. This sometimes requires re-locating or re-orienting it. Gauges should show operating ranges, so the operator can easily see when pressure, temperature, or other variables are outside the range. Usually the range is indicated by painting markings on the dial face or on the lens itself. Digital readouts have the operating ranges affixed near the gauge.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We label controls better and placed them within easier reach. Shadow boards are made to hold hand tools, or their standard locations are otherwise be indicated. Adjustments are often made easier by reducing the number of turns required, putting a 90 degree handle on the wheel to be turned so that it can be cranked, standardizing fasteners so that fewer different size wrenches are required, improving signage to remind operators of required steps and precautions. We make lubrication points more accessible, and install lights to indicate that certain actions are required.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Often simple modifications can be made so that the machine will stop automatically before running out of material or jamming, preventing a crash. We modify conditions that make the equipment difficult to clean, such as piping that makes it hard to sweep or nooks and crannies of the equipment where dirt or chips or debris get caught.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">One or more members of the team are maintenance personnel who can start making repairs and fixes and removing the tags. Once the correction is made, the tag is removed and tacked or taped to an easel board to keep track of progress.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Including maintenance personnel also allows us to use their experience with the machine and knowledge of what breaks down frequently. If a history of the machine and its maintenance has been kept, this will be data for the team to study.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The team will use their experience and knowledge of the history of the machine to design a standard procedure for preventive maintenance for this equipment. A good procedure will specify the continued use of tags to identify any item that needs attention. It will also detail the preventive maintenance of the equipment that can be done by the machine operator. This is known as autonomous maintenance. Problems that jeopardize safety or quality requires immediate attention. All operators of this equipment will need to be trained on the standard procedure and its importance.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The Maintenance Department will be expected to stay on top of all pending tags. Since the tags have the time and date that they were placed, it will be easy to see what items are taking a long time and may need follow-up, special attention, or additional resources.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Operators and maintenance personnel become a team to keep the machine in optimum condition, which support from management and supervision to overcome any obstacles. These workshops lead to a different way of operating for several people. The team or a portion of it will need to keep a close watch on the new procedures to make sure they are being followed. The team periodically reviews the standard procedures discovering their shortcomings and making adjustments to improve the standards.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Over time other machines will undergo a similar process. They will have standard procedures created, including for autonomous maintenance. The new teamwork between maintenance personnel and value-adding operators will expand to include more equipment. The Maintenance Department will usually find that their operating procedures will have to be modified to meet the new approach. It is vital that the on-going process be followed and evaluated, or there is a real danger that the equipment and the behavior of maintenance personnel and operators will revert to what they were before. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">These approaches become Total Productive Maintenance (TPM), as they are integrated into all of the operations and the operators, maintenance personnel, management and supervision all settle into their new roles.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-8027280070931370552010-06-25T12:44:00.000-07:002010-06-25T12:44:41.331-07:00Standard Procedures Do Not Have To Be Regimented<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Sometimes standardization smacks of regimentation. Workers say, “We each have our favorite way of doing things.” Implicit in this is,<i> We like it the way it is. Don’t try to shoehorn us into a one-size-fits-all mold.<o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Standard work is essential to mass production, even to fairly small-scale mass production. It is at the core of a quality process that provides a quality product. A defect is essentially something that deviates from what it should be. The best way to get consistent results is by having a consistent--that is standardized--process.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Standardized work can be regimented, but in the best cases it is organic. Standards are developed based on our experience of what needs to be controlled in the process. The standards are implemented. Their effectiveness is studied and adjustments are made to improve them. New standards emerge on the basis of our experience of what needs to be controlled in the process.</span><br />
<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A standard should be the <i>best, easiest, safest way</i> to accomplish something that we do repeatedly. <i>Best</i> includes the approach that gets us the most consistent results in terms of quality, cost and delivery. <i>Best</i> includes procedures and devices that prevent mistakes from happening. <i>Easiest </i>includes avoiding strain and wasted effort. <i>Safest </i>is the way least likely to cause injury or harm to oneself or others. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The standard way is not the <i>right way. </i>It is the <i>best, easiest, safest way </i>until we come up with a<i> better, easier, or safer way. </i>Thinking of it as the <i>right way</i> shuts out the possibilities for improvement.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Keeping standards organic helps us get compliance by everyone involved. If there are opportunities to participate in improving standards, people will be more willing to abide by them, while studying their results.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Here is an example of a standard (the best, easiest safest way) to make coffee in an automatic coffee maker that has a thermos carafe. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">To make coffee we: Remove the old coffee and filter, put in a new filter and put in the appropriate amount of fresh coffee grounds, empty the carafe of any left-over coffee and rinse, add fresh water to the tank, start coffee maker.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">What does our experience say can go wrong? If we don’t put in a fresh filter, with fresh coffee, we will get an awful drink. If we don’t put any water in, we will not get any coffee at all, until we remedy the problem. If we do not empty and rinse the carafe, we may flood our counter, because the new coffee added to the old overflows the thermos.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Let’s rank things that can go wrong from worst consequences to least:<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Symbol;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Flooded counter<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Symbol;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Awful tasting coffee<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Symbol;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">No coffee gets made until we add the missing water.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I can minimize the possibility of these consequences by following this standard procedure:<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">1.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Empty and rinse the carafe (insures no flooding).<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">2.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Discard the old filter and grounds and replace with new filter and fresh coffee grounds (insures good tasting, fresh coffee).<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">3.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Add water and start machine (insures there will be coffee after the necessary interval).<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">If our counter becomes flooded when we have this standard, it is easier to tell what went wrong. Not only do we suspect that the standard was not followed, we also can quickly discern what part of the standard was missing in the practice.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Standard procedures can be extensive and complex. The best, easiest, safest way to start up a piece of equipment may include dozens of steps. To make sure that all steps are followed we use a checklist of all the things that must be done in their standard sequence. Using a checklist insures that we do not leave any steps out and that everything is done in the best possible sequence.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Experienced pilots use checklists before takeoff and landing and in other circumstances. Their experience might suggest that this is unnecessary, but we know that when there are a lot of steps, critical steps can be forgotten. In <i>The Checklist Manifesto, </i><a href="http://gawande.com/">Atul Gawande</a><b> </b>gives us a fascinating description of how checklists came to be used in aviation and in other fields, including building skyscrapers. He has been a pioneer in the use of checklists in surgery and post surgical care, and cites cases in which their use has saved lives.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A world class organization has many standard procedures, and many of them are spelled out in checklists. A fire-fighting organization, rushing from one crisis to another, has few standard procedures. Each person being able to do his or her work guided only by personal preferences is likely to contribute to crises. The world class organization has organic standards that are continuously evolving one the basis of the organization’s collective experience.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Asking employees to participate in developing and improving standard procedures is one of the ways to bring out the best in people and in the organization.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-9485892319583588722010-06-19T08:05:00.001-07:002010-06-19T08:06:48.560-07:00Stretch SMED Consulting<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I arrived in Spain not knowing who the client was or what was expected of me. I was to help conduct a workshop with the European branch of the <a href="http://www.kaizen.com/">Kaizen Institute</a>. My fluency in Spanish along with some experience in kaizen consulting got me the job.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In the opening lecture, I was introduced to 50 to 60 people as a leading expert in SMED (single minute exchange of dies). I have facilitated five or six workshops to reduce the time to changeover equipment from one product to another. I seem to have a knack to help a workshop team cut changeover time in half, starting from an hour and an half to two hours. I have a process that has always worked so far. I did not feel like an expert.<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The plant was actually a series of plants, with a stamping plant at one end and a final assembly plant at the other. The products were automobiles. I would be facilitating one of three workshops. Mine would be in stamping. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The Superintendent of the Stamping Plant led me to his spacious office and invited me to sit.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Bob, I am really looking forward to what you can do with this line, we have been working on it for months, and taken hours out of the changeover. It now takes under one hour.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“We’ll have to see what the team can do,” I said. <i>I hope my process works, </i>I thought.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We gathered the team, seven Spanish supervisors, mid-level managers and engineers, and an equal number who had come just for the workshop from Germany. I don’t speak German. The Germans did not speak Spanish but did speak English. I was going to have to say everything in Spanish and English.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Let’s go look at the line we will be watching.” We swarmed out to an area the size of a football field on which four presses three stories tall were linked together by transfers. The sheets of steel went in at one end. The side of a car came out the other. The entire process had four or five operators. It seemed to be running fine.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A knot formed in my stomach. I knew nothing about the operation of these presses, or their changeover process.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We gathered in our meeting room for me to provide an introduction to SMED and explain the activities of the team. Our job was to time the <i>internal time </i>of the changeover, from last good piece to the first good piece of a series of good pieces. The <i>external time </i>was composed of activities done in preparation for the changeover, and things that could be done after the line was up and running again. We would identify activities taking internal time that could be moved to external time, before the equipment was shut down or after it was up and running again.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We would look for waste, activity that was not adding value to the changeover; hunting through a pile of nuts and bolts for one that was the right size; putting twenty turns to a nut, before reaching the last partial turn that torques the nut tight.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We would watch the people doing the changeover and capture their movements on a spaghetti diagram, on a layout of the equipment and surrounding areas. A pair of people would write down as much as they could that happened during the time the machine was down, keeping a running tally of the elapsed time in the left margin. Everyone would try to make notes of ideas that could eliminate waste or make internal time into external time.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We went to observe our first changeover. We would not be able to watch the entire process, so we focused on one press and its transfer to the next. The last good piece was ejected. We started the stopwatches. The exchange of the dies themselves was almost entirely automatic. The existing die was released from hydraulic clamps. It rolled out on a track. The new die waited on the track on the other side. It rolled in and the hydraulic clamps closed.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">On the transfers there were dozens of fixtures that moved the part from one stamping press to the next. A team swarmed over the area, changing fixtures and adjusting their heights. The spaghetti diagrams looked like bowls of spaghetti. The written records captured a lot of activity that did not add value. The team participants had many good ideas.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The first changeover took around 49 minutes. The team standardized procedures and sequences and fabricated some special tools to reduce the time to 30 minutes the next time. The final observed changeover time was down to 22 minutes, after further tool modifications and better pre-staging of tools and fixtures. The Spanish members of the team felt that they knew what they needed to do to get under ten minutes, including by eliminating some tools altogether.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The process worked.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="tr"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The Superintendent of the Machining Plant was delighted with the results, and he felt that the participants had learned a useful process that they would apply to other operations. I never got back to that plant. I wonder if they got the line changeover under ten minutes. How successful they were at applying the process to other operations?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="tr"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I never felt that nervous again about doing a changeover workshop. I never again did one with such enormous equipment, although I have done many involving stamping presses.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
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</div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-994865561603472232010-06-17T08:31:00.000-07:002010-06-17T08:31:43.333-07:00Leadership in the Workplace<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />
</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I have mentioned that leadership places a crucial role in bringing out the best in people and the organization at the workplace. We will explore the nature and role of leadership.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I have explored leadership with clients by contrasting it to management. Management focuses on maintaining the <i>states quo</i>. This is important. Organizations need to have consistency. There need to be standard procedures. Value-adding processes cannot accomplish their purpose without support around people, machines, methods, materials and measurement. These support systems need to be managed.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Leadership is focused on change. If we want to move the organization to a new way of operating that is lean, world class, and brings out the best in people and systems, we often need to change the way we do things. Many of my posts so far have been about things that need to change and how they need to be changed.<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I have also mentioned that change often does not stick. New habits are hard to learn, especially when support systems do not change to support the new ways of working. We need leaders in the organization to get this change to take place.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">If we think about people in our lives who we would consider leaders, as I have done with workshop participants, we come to realize that they do not simply “make us” <i>do things </i>differently, they have an effect on how we think and how we feel, and it is through their effect on our thinking and feeling that they lead us to change our way of doing.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We usually believe that change comes from <i>analyzing </i>a situation, <i>thinking </i>about what we have analyzed and as a result <i>changing </i>the way that we do something. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Heart-Change-Real-Life-Stories-Organizations/dp/1578512549/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1276787813&sr=1-2">John Kotter and Dan Cohen</a> conducted interviews with hundreds of people in organizations around the world and found that large-scale change happens by impacting <i>feeling </i>rather than thinking. Big chance takes place from <i>seeing </i>then <i>feeling.<o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Chip Heath and Dan Heath cite this study in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Switch-Change-Things-When-Hard/dp/0385528752/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1276788499&sr=1-1"><i>Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard</i><i>, </i></a>illustrating the point with a story of a manager who wanted to change the purchasing system of a large company. He realized that the company made over 400 separate purchases of gloves. There were many different kinds of gloves, but sometimes identical gloves were purchased from different suppliers by different plants at prices that could vary by several dollars per pair for exactly the same gloves.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">This manager acquired a sample of every glove the company used, including duplicates at different prices. He put a price tag on each glove and piled them on a conference table at corporate headquarters. Top management <i>saw, felt, </i>and acted to change the purchasing of gloves for the company, as well as taking a hard look at the purchasing procedures in general.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A spreadsheet with the various models of gloves and their corresponding prices would not have had the same impact. This was a leadership act, to get major change accomplished in the purchasing system.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I worked with a plant manager at an engine plant who was very effective. On his walk through the plant he would notice problems, and immediately have supervisors and employees see and feel the need for changes in practices. The plant had a positive atmospheric pressure to keep dust out of the engine machining and assembly areas. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">When a large door was left open, the effect of the positive pressure was not only diminished for a section of the plant, it could be reversed. When he saw an open door, he would search for the people who had or might have left it open. He would demonstrate with a strip of paper that air was coming into the plant, so that they could see it. He would then explain the critical importance of not allowing dust to get into the engine. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">He would never express anger. In this and other situations he would always try to show people on the spot why something was important, helping them see it and feel the importance. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Another plant manager, in another engine plant would frequently take his staff out to the plant and have them look at a problem, for example the combining of iron and aluminum machining chips, significantly reducing their recycling value. Chips that were made separately were then combined unnecessarily in the containers picked up by the recycler. He would ask them to <i>show</i> the supervisors and workers the problem as he had done it with them and explain the added cost to the company of doing this.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A leader in a company trying to become lean needs to help people see then need for a change. A forklift driver who finds it easiest never to get down from his driver’s seat, merely delivering large amounts of material, may need to be able to see the importance of breaking large batches into small batches replenished frequently in order for the value-adding operation to operate in a lean fashion. His feeling that it will just mean more work for him needs to be addressed.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A work group may fear (<i>feel</i>) that a change will permanently make their work more difficult. I have found it effective to have a leader who will say. <i>We are going to try some things to improve the way we work. Some will work better than others, and I am sure some will not work at all. In that case we need to step back and find an alternative. In the worst case, we will put things back the way they were before we started.<o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In the worst case we can put things back the way they were, but I have yet to find it necessary to do that. This resolves a lot of resistance. We are going to experiment. The kaizen approach gives priority to low-cost, no-cost changes that can be replaced if they do not work out. <o:p></o:p></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-49796427713082955122010-06-11T11:01:00.000-07:002010-06-11T11:01:36.335-07:00Go to Gemba<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />
</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I was facilitating a workshop in a large automobile assembly plant in Great Britain. The factory was a part of a large, western, multinational auto manufacturer. In my group, one of three or four, there were participants from several other parts of Europe and the United States. This was to be a big learning experience for the entire corporation.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Everyone had gone through a day of lecture and discussion about the principles, concepts and some of the methodologies used in kaizen. Finally, on day two, all of the participants were sent out to the factory to find ways to improve parts of the assembly line. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Each of the workshop groups was facilitatied by a consultant. My group was to focus on the installation of the headliners in cars that came down the line.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Every group was given a meeting room. Our group had about ten people. We gathered in our assigned meeting room and sat around a round table on which were piled a number of drawings of the shop floor and the section in which we would be working, as well as several stacks of printouts with data on throughput time, defect rates, line down-time, and probably several other trends which I do not remember.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Getting these managers out of the meeting room proved to be difficult. They wanted to “study the data.” I had to become more and more insistent that we go out to the section of the line we had been assigned to us. We needed to <i>go to gemba</i> (g<i>emba</i> means the “real place,” used in kaizen to refer to the place where value is added) to Identify waste, which we had learned about the day before. I told the team that after that, we could get away from the noise for a bit, back in the conference room and discuss possible improvements.</span><br />
<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I finally convinced a pissed group of managers to go out to look at the line and identify waste. We immediately saw that the installers had to travel significant distances to get the headliner that went with the next car coming down the line and get it installed. One cause of all the walking was that headliners were stored in large trays in a horizontal position, and as there were eight or ten different headliners, they almost always had to retrieve one from a tray that was far away. We designed a rack that could hold a small number of each model in a vertical position, and got the first version of it fabricated in a few hours. During the week it went through several design changes.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The workers also had to walk quite a distant to replace batteries on their electric screwdrivers. There was one charging station. We installed several charging stations at strategic locations. We increased the number of batteries so that they would have time to get a full charge and not need to be replaced as often. Working with the operators, we developed a visual system to identify the battery that had been in the charger the longest.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We actually spent relatively little time in the meeting room, once we got started. We used some tools such as spaghetti diagrams to document the amount of walking that operators had to do before and after the changes. We documented the percentage of each cycle during which they actually added value, as opposed to walking, transporting, over-processing, or waiting. The workers, who had been skeptical of these managers putting them under a magnifying glass, liked all the ways in which their jobs were being made easier. They did not have to hustle to catch up between one headliner and another.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Western manufacturing has a tendency to go into the conference room and brainstorm when there is a problem to be solved. The kaizen approach at Toyota and other Japanese companies is to <i>go to gemba. </i> I had the opportunity to apprentice under a talented and highly experience Japanese kaizen consultant, Chihiro Nakao. He had been an engineer and project manager under Taiichi Ohno, at Toyota. Mr. Nakao insisted that, the moment we arrived at the plant we go to gemba, the place where value-adding work was going on, and see how everything was going, particularly if there had been changes made the day before or overnight.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Nakao<i>san</i> described Mr. Ohno’s daily practice of looking in at the engineering offices, during the day. If he found anyone there he would go and stand behind the individual. When the engineer asked how he could help the company president, Mr. Ohno would ask what he was doing that required taking him away from gemba. Most of the time, Mr. Ohno found the engineering offices empty.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A participant in the workshop asked, “When did you get your paperwork done?’” Mr. Nakao replied, with a smile, that they would have to wait until Mr. Nakao had gone home. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Going to gemba with Nakao<i>san </i>was always educational. He would point out waste that the rest of us did not see. He would take us up to a mezzanine and have us look out over the floor, asking us, “Where is the flow?” In a lean plant the flow is obvious. You can see it without question. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I now want to see the gemba first, with any potential client, and I ask them to show me the flow. I ask to do it from the shipping dock backwards. Simply following the flow backwards often makes my guides see things that they had not been aware of before. I find that fewer steps get skipped, because I can ask how things got to be the way they are, as we work our way upstream. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Masaaki Imai describes in great detail the importance of going to gemba in <b>Gemba Kaizen. </b> Gemba is where the problem occurred or is occurring. It is the logical first place to go to understand the nature of the problem.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-56854163023709525772010-06-08T14:43:00.000-07:002010-06-08T14:43:01.204-07:00What Else Gets in the Way?<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />
</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Sometimes managers who are very enthusiastic about their kaizen experiences can be the obstacle to improvement in the kaizen way. At one factory the plant manager was one of the most enthusiastic people whom I had ever met. After a couple of successful workshops with gratifying results he was ready to have “a kaizen event a week.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">This became a problem for one of the reasons I have already mentioned. The support systems for the new, lean, one-piece-flow, work to takt time approach were not in place. The maintenance system could not respond when equipment went down. There was not a system of supplying materials in small amounts. Water-spiders from the early workshops would get drafted to do production work to cover for absenteeism. Many of the products were fairly low volume, but suppliers brought in huge amounts of components.<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I frequently found a need to stand in his path and try to hold him back. One of his favorite questions for me became, “Is this one of those too broad and not deep enough things?” My answer was usually “Yes.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Workers became demoralized because they had seen a better way to work, but had not been supported in the new way. This plant manager did not understand that the overall production system had to change. Logistics, purchasing, material handling, maintenance, scheduling, training, human resources management, the approach by supervision all had to become aligned with the lean approach being implemented in value-adding processes.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Workshops begin to show what is possible and, if close enough attention is paid, they also give us indications of how the support systems have to change. This plant manager did finally begin to understand and work on the support systems, after experiencing some setbacks, and we made some real progress. Then another problem came along.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The plant manager was made an attractive offer in another company, after barely a year of introducing kaizen. The president of the company had been actively supportive of the process of becoming lean. He was promoted to a higher position in the holding company at about the same time as the plant manager left the plant. Both of their replacements had long experiences in conventional operations, batch processing, just-in-case planning, plenty of safety stock on hand. Their habits were to plan for problems instead of eliminating problems. Gradually, many of the gains of the first year were lost.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">This underlines the critical need for leadership to accomplish kaizen habits and lean approaches. Leadership involves having a clear concept of the direction that the production process and the culture of the organization needs to take, and persistence in working with people on their habits, paradigms and understanding of the changes that are needed. Leadership must also stick around. Unfortunately, the success of good leaders often means they get promoted or attracted to new employers, before the changes have taken hold. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Effective leadership is no small task. When I worked at the Kaizen Institute, we made real efforts to work with and develop leaders. The results were mixed, not the least because some of our clients simply could not understand the importance of it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-85998423550414811102010-05-29T21:21:00.000-07:002010-05-29T21:21:19.664-07:00Read the Small Print<span style="font-size: x-small;"> This is from <i><a href="http://www.gembapantarei.com/">gemba panta rei</a>. </i>You want to become lean? Better read the fine print:</span><br />
<br />
<blockquote>So here again is my offer:<br />
<big><big><big><big>Lean Brings You Fast Results! Recognition, Pride and Prosperity Can All Be Yours with Lean! Try Lean Management Today! </big></big></big></big> <br />
<small><small>May require significant changes to leadership behavior. May require dismantling existing reporting structures, organizational boundaries or performance measurement schemes. Positive results due to employee empowerment may be accompanied sense of grief due to perceived loss of power, position or authority. May cause adverse interactions with existing accounting systems, ERP systems and vendor management systems. Results may be delayed due to resistance from key stakeholders. Side effects may not be reversible even if lean management is abandoned. Seeing bottom line results may depend on business growth or restructuring. Actual results may vary. Sustaining of results may require constant effort. Not applicable in industries and processes where waste does not exist. One per customer. Some restrictions apply. Offer void where prohibited by law.</small></small></blockquote>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-54650467005182619152010-05-28T09:34:00.000-07:002010-05-28T09:34:20.246-07:00What Get’s In the Way of Successful Kaizen?<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />
<o:p></o:p></span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A dirty little secret is that kaizen efforts often go nowhere, or don’t go very far. In too many cases I have seen very successful kaizen workshops or kaizen blitzes seem to be huge successes, only to have them fade within months or even weeks. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> What do I mean by successful workshops? A team focuses on a work group or operation. With the help of a facilitator they identify and figure out how to eliminate waste. The facilitator, who may or may not be an outside consultant, teaches how to look for waste and the strategies to accomplish its elimination. These include moving operations closer together, moving the operations into a U-shaped cell, doing away with batch processing and putting one-piece-flow in its place, and balancing the operation with takt time and cycle time studies, to name a few. The team figures how to accomplish these ideas in this particular case. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">At the end of the workshop, there is a dramatically different situation. Fewer people are required to produce the same amount. Throughput time is drastically reduced. Quality is documented to have substantially improved. Everyone agrees; this is better. This is great stuff. (Another example might be a SMED workshop that cuts changeover time from over two hours to forty five minutes.)<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I would always stress that there was still much work to be undertaken. The workshop’s creation requires infant care. It exists in an environment where organization’s support systems are organized to support the traditional way of working and no other work group is working in the new way. There are changes that will need to be made in the support systems. In the meantime, the “island of excellence” will need special care and feeding.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">One of the first things to go is often the water-spider. A water-spider is the name given to a person who has the responsibility of supplying the operation or cell with the necessary material, delivering it frequently, but in relatively small quantities. Eventually, one water-spider may serve several work cells. This person may also remove finished product to the next place it needs to go. The water-spider makes it possible for the employees who add value to do nothing else but add value.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Suddenly there is the need to fill a position on another line, where no changes have been made. The supervisor looks around for someone he can spare and spots the water-spider. So, for today, the water-spider is going to replace the absent worker. If the absent worker is missing tomorrow, the water-spider will again be pressed into service to cover for the absence.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The cell developed by the workshop team is designed to have a water-spider. The operations have been moved very close together. The inventories on the line are small and there is no real space for more. Now the operators on the line must get their own material, and do it a lot more frequently than before the workshop. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">This kaizen stuff sucks! I knew it would never work! </span></i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The operators are now frustrated, because they are still expected to produce just is much, with fewer people, and the one-piece-flow grinds to a stop, because someone has to go off and get missing material.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Sometimes an experienced facilitator can warn the team ahead of time about problems such as this one. Sometimes even though the facilitator makes the point forcefully, the water-spider gets drafted to fill another position.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A supervisor called me up the week following our workshop. He had gone from highly skeptical to enthusiastic about the changes during the workshop. Now he said, “Bob, kaizen doesn’t work.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I asked him why he said that.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“The line is not making its production.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Again I asked, why?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">They were having a quality problem with a purchased component.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I asked, was the quality problem something that had been caused by the kaizen workshop? The answer was that there had “always” been this quality problem with this component, but before the workshop there was a lot of inventory on the line, and they could open another box. I pointed out that the process was making a chronic problem visible. The question now was would we re-hide the problem in a lot of in-process inventory or would we address the problem with the supplier.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Having just-in-case inventory is very common in U.S. manufacturing. It is so common that it becomes conventional wisdom about how to operate effectively. In this instance, the supervisor understood the point. Highly visible, temporary measures were instituted while the problem with the supplier was solved. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">So, one obstacle to successful kaizen is the conventional wisdom about the best way to operate. Have just-in-case inventory. If you need to fill vacancies, draft people who are “just handling material.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Existing habits and ways of thinking are hard to change. I have returned to review the progress of a workshop after a month and find that a problem has been solved, not by figuring out how to keep one-piece-flow, but by moving a process off the line and reverting to batch production, because “that’s the way it has to be.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Getting lean in production is a lot like getting lean physically. It doesn’t happen overnight. It takes work and keeping at it. Sometimes a personal trainer will help, a facilitator who may be an outside consultant or someone in the organization who has that role. Most of us know of cases where, even with a personal trainer, efforts to take of pounds and become healthier get sidetracked. So it is with organizations trying to become lean.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-19979417510431042052010-05-24T15:34:00.004-07:002010-05-25T11:47:55.747-07:00An Important Form to Speak with Data<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">One of the most useful forms for recording and presenting data, for <i>speaking with data, </i>is the production control form. I am including a sample here. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">This form tells us how a production line, a production cell, or a single production operation is running hour-by-hour. When used to its greatest advantage, a manager or supervisor can walk through a department and tell very quickly what operations most require attention. The leaner the operation, the more critical this information can be. The information is recorded each hour by a production operator.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpQH6iOobPp53WJx5sGbzdCpiE21tO1pVklTvi6uQDFIDn_DVAwvR9WfMTU4Jd42r4R86XD-MyC9KZzrQe2St65I6ydY3iLViszMZR0-oL4GqDnyVCwyjEQCE0fvekhV6LbvKCNybaew/s1600/Sample+Production+Control+Chart.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="275" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpQH6iOobPp53WJx5sGbzdCpiE21tO1pVklTvi6uQDFIDn_DVAwvR9WfMTU4Jd42r4R86XD-MyC9KZzrQe2St65I6ydY3iLViszMZR0-oL4GqDnyVCwyjEQCE0fvekhV6LbvKCNybaew/s400/Sample+Production+Control+Chart.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In the example above, the first column divides the day into one hour blocks. In this case, we have started at 7 a.m. and carried it through 4 p.m. The information in this column can be modified depending on the start time and the length of the shift. For example a ten hour shift would have a couple more rows. The form can have extra rows to be used when the operation is running overtime. A chart for second or third shift would have appropriate time labels in the first column.</span><br />
<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The second column is based on <a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/04/takt-time.html"><i>takt time</i></a><i>, </i>the beat at which we produce to synchronize production to the customer’s demand. The example here is a takt time of 30 seconds. Two units every minute, thus 120 units in a full hour.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In the 8 – 9 hour there are only 50 minutes of productive time because there is a ten minute break. Only 100 units are planned for the hour. The 11 – 12 hour has a half hour break for lunch, so the planned production is only 60 units. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Widget production went very smoothly for the first two hours. We made seven widgets above plan. If we had made a lot widgets above plan in these two hours, we would need to question whether we have appropriately adjusted our cycle time to takt time. Do we have more people than we need on this operation? Is quality suffering because the operation is running too fast?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The chart shows us that we took a big hit in the fourth hour (10 – 11). We were 72 units below plan. In the notes column we see that there was aproblem with the crimping machine. Do we need to follow up on this? Has this failure been permenantly solved, or do we need to take steps to insure that it does not happen again? <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We also have an opportunity well before the end of the shift to evaluate possible consequences. We are not going to make our goal for the day of 920 widgets. How critical is that? Do we need to take steps to make sure we meet that goal and do not harm the customer (including downstream operations that might be shut down for lack of sufficient widgests)? Should we start planning to schedule overtime this afternoon now?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In this case, we decided to schedule overtime tomorrow. We had time to reach that decision well before the end of the shift. We did not discover that we were 86 widgets short at the last minute.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We lost another 20 widgets of production in the seventh hour (1-2). This was not as drastic as the loss in the fourth hour. We do have documentation and can ask similar questions to those we asked about the earlier downtime, to determine what we need to do to prevent recurrence.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">How do operators like using this form? Initially, there may be resistance. Operators may fear that the form is going to be used to judge them, blame them, and control them. The form’s purpose is to track how the production <i>system</i> is working. People are one part of the system, but we also can get timely information about problems with equipment, materials, production methods, and communication of information.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">If the organization has a tendency to blame operators for every problem and to try to overcome each problem by demanding that they work harder and faster, it will be difficult to persuade workers to provide accurate and precise information on this form. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">For some organizations, lean thinking is radically different from the present way of thinking about production. We do not ask workers to produce as much as they can. We as them to produce just-in-time, exactly what is needed, when it is needed. <a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/04/takt-time.html">Takt time</a> is a tool to help us do this. The Production Control Chart is a tool to help us do this and to solve problems in the work system with data, rather than hunches. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The application of tools and techniques does not lead to lean, world class operations by itself. Lean production requires lean thinking. Lean thinking is non-blaming. The workers in the core process, where value is added to the product are to be supported. They are not expected to do the best they can. They are provided the means and assistance to do their work better. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-12416463531804424902010-05-19T05:22:00.000-07:002010-05-19T05:22:39.421-07:00Good Signs, Bad Signs<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14pt;"><br />
</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I see a lot of signs posted on factory walls that make very little sense to me. Some are clearly useful: exit signs, signs indicating where the fire extinguishers are, labels that tell you what should be stored in a given spot (a section of floor, a rack, or a bin on a shelf). The signs to which I object are those that seem slightly insulting, admonishing you, but not making it clear what you are expected to do.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Quality is everyone’s responsibility.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Quality starts with you.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Safety first.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“A safe factory is a happy factory.” “A clean factory is a safe factory.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Keep this area clean.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Signs such as these are from a paternal the company telling us to be good, in a very general way. In no case are they telling us what is expected of us. What do you want me to do? What do you want me to not do? What precautions do you want me to take?<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“No smoking allowed.” This makes sense. If I should not smoke here, for whatever reason, I should be told. This is one way of telling me.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Hard Hat Area” “Safety Glasses Required” These let me know and remind me to wear my hard hat and my safety glasses. Similar signs could apply to shoes and hearing protection.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Record production data every hour.” I am being told what is expected of me. Every hour I should pause and record data about my production. “Measure and record the OD on five pieces every fifteen minutes. Enter results on the Control Sheet.” This tells me precisely what I need to do, as does, “Go through start-up check list before running machine.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Caution – Forklift Traffic.” “Caution – High Voltage” “Caution – Very Hot.” These warn me to take precautions.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Signs that are often missing, but provide useful information to the operators inform them what the operating range should be on gages and digital readouts, and what to do if the indictor is above or below the operating range.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Some of the most insulting signs I have seen have been in factory restrooms that are not cleaned with enough regularity and have toilets and basins that don’t work. “Keep this restroom clean,” makes no sense at all, if it is already a mess. A sign telling me who to inform if restroom conditions are unsatisfactory is another thing completely, <i>if</i> informing leads to correcting such conditions.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Tell me what you expect me, <i>specifically</i>, to do or not do.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Give me information and concrete instructions for my own and other’s safety. Where do I need to take extra precautions?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Quality and safety do not come from generalized signs. They come from systems that are led by managers. The systems may require certain behaviors or precautions to be followed consistently, and signs are one way to let people know this.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
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</div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-87273960975140811452010-05-15T09:33:00.000-07:002010-05-15T09:33:11.196-07:00Speak With Data<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14pt;"><br />
</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I worked with a group of ten women who worked on an assembly line and had been given the opportunity to meet weekly to discuss, with their supervisor, what could be done to improve their assembly line.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The product that they assembled was a model of a remotely controllable, outside rear view mirror. The control was a mechanical device in which three wires moved the mirror when a knob was rotated. The ends of the wires had ferrules that were crimped into the knob assembly by a crimping machine.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">There was a consensus about the biggest problem. The crimping machine often broke down, bringing the line to a halt, sometimes several times a day. When the line stopped there was a wait for maintenance to arrive and tinker with the machine. The team took pride in reaching its production targets, and this machine interfered with that goal far too often.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The supervisor agreed that this was a problem. He too was frustrated that the fix was never permanent. He had complained up the line with no results. </span><br />
<a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We considered how we might get management’s attention. I proposed that the operators document their down time. The team was enthusiastic. A member volunteered to be the recorder. Every time the line went down the date, time, duration of the delay and the reason the line had stopped would be recorded. The record was kept for a month.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The data demonstrated what the team already knew. The crimping machine was the biggest source of downtime. The data also showed the line had lost several person days of productive work in the recorded month. I helped the line tabulate and summarize the data on a single page.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">At lunch, I was sitting next to the Plant Manager when a volunteer from the line suddenly appeared behind him and dropped the report of their downtime over his shoulder. Almost shouting she said, “That’s what we mean!” The report very nearly landed in his soup.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The Plant Manager picked up the sheet of paper and examined it. He thanked the team member and promised to take a careful look at it. At his staff meeting the following morning he shared the report with everyone, and asked a manufacturing engineer to see what needed to be done to eliminate the problem. A brand new crimping machine was installed on the line within a week. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">There is no guarantee that a data collecting initiative such as this one will lead to similar results, but the probability of getting action will increase. Curiously, months earlier, a manager had put a log card at the end of each line, in which he asked that all downtime be recorded. The assembly workers complied for a time, and then gradually abandoned the effort. There were no benefits to filling out the cards and no consequences for not doing so.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Speaking with data </span></i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">is not the same as collecting data. Speaking with data is a way to get the process to tell us what we need to know. In this example, the workers already knew where the major problem was, but management needed to know–to understand—the importance of the problem and what it was costing. Simply complaining about the machine going down did not accomplish this.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Speaking with data makes the invisible visible. This is not to say that we should not examine data critically. Kaoru Ishikawa, a Japanese quality guru is quoted as saying, “When you see data, doubt it!” Sometimes data is collected to please someone (or to get them off our backs), and the data collected loses its meaning. Statistical process control sheets, with data collected and recorded by operators sometimes contains what the operator thinks management, or the quality department, wants, rather than showing the real variation in the process. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Deming mentions an organization that had not had any injuries in an entire year, yet people on the shop floor had casts, bandages and other evidence of accidents. It turned out that a bonus was paid for a year without accidents. Reporting accidents would eliminate the bonus. There were accidents, but none had been reported.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I had the opportunity to be one of the hosts to a visit from Hino, a Japanese truck manufacturer, when I worked at Cummins Engine. Over lunch the first day, the Cummins Plant Manager asked the visitors, through an interpreter, for their outstanding impressions after the morning tour of the engine plant.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The visitors huddled and reported that one of their impressions was that at Cummins we measured everything. All sorts of data was collected. The visitors were even struck by the fact that there were many barrels throughout the plant into which the data was thrown away. (The computer printouts were deposited in the barrels for recycling.)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We do not measure everything, the Hino visitors told us. We take measurements, when we have a problem to solve. When the problem is solved, we stop taking measurements. We go and solve another problem.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Our visitors where using data to have the process speak to them. While there are certain data that it makes sense to collect and examine on a regular basis, we often collect and record far more than we can use. Fortunately, we no longer have to put all of it on paper to dispose of in large recycling barrels, as it can now be accessed on a terminal.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Data can help us communicate effectively with the people who can make things happen. Data can help us understand what is going on in our processes, to make the invisible visible. Data can be misleading. When we see data, we should doubt them.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Notes:<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The guote of Kaoru Ishikawa is in Maasaki Imai, </span></i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Gemba-Kaizen-Commonsense-Low-Cost-Management/dp/0070314462"><span style="color: blue; font-family: Calibri;">Gemba Kaizen</span></a><span style="font-family: Calibri;">, p. 29<i>. I am almost certain that Deming’s story is in </i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/New-Economics-Industry-Government-Education/dp/0262541165/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1273873122&sr=1-2"><span style="color: blue;">The New Economics</span>,</a> <i>but I have not located it yet. I will post an up-date when I find it.<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-43336153383343836712010-05-14T12:16:00.000-07:002010-05-14T12:16:54.942-07:00A Look Back<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14pt;"><br />
<o:p></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">These are the postings that I have made to this blog so far.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/05/not-common-sense-or-common-practice.html"><span style="color: blue;">Not Common Sense or Common Practice</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Some people say that to improve the workplace all we have to do is follow common sense. I suggest that what is presently considered common sense can sometimes be the obstacle to making things better.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/04/quality-process-and-quality-results.html"><span style="color: blue;">Quality Process and Quality Results</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">All results come from processes. If we want to improve results, we need to examine what in the process is leading to the current results. Inspection as an approach to quality is sometimes the best we can do, but will be an unreliable way of preventing defects to reach the customer.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/04/two-extremes.html"><span style="color: blue;">Two Extremes</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Organizations lie on a continuum between <i>Fire-Fighting</i> and <i>World Class</i>. Understanding the characteristics of each extreme can help the leaders of an organization understand what needs to change to move towards world class.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/04/why-not-manufacture-in-easy-batches.html"><span style="color: blue;">Why Not Manufacture in Easy Batches?</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Lean Manufacturing involves eliminating batch processing as much as possible. Making batches often seems easier. Why is it important to move toward one-piece-flow? <i>[thirteen more topics below the fold]<a name='more'></a></i><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/04/performance-appraisal-merit-pay-bonuses.html"><span style="color: blue;">Performance Appraisal, Merit Pay, Bonuses</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The ways in which we evaluate and compensate employees often has a different result that what is intended. Edwards Deming has a lot to say about this. This subject is worth re-thinking.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/04/takt-time.html"><span style="color: blue;">Takt Time</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Takt Time is the beat at which we add value to or produce a product to be synchronized with the needs of the customer. We explain the way takt time is calculated and consider some implications for using this tool.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/03/no-right-way.html"><span style="color: blue;">No Right Way</span></a> <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Three approaches to thinking about the way we work are: There is no right way; the word is not the thing; and we make it all up.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/03/keeping-it-simple.html"><span style="color: blue;">Keeping it Simple</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We often make processes more complex than they need to be, including applying technology that can break down when very simple manual procedures would be adequate and less expensive.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/03/management-gets-more-than-it-deserves.html"><span style="color: blue;">Management Gets More Than It Deserves</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">An important role of management is to provide the support needed for production workers to get their jobs done. There are many examples of workers who struggle to do the best they can when management fails to support them, sometimes in rather simple ways.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/03/treating-people-as-if-they-were-robots.html"><span style="color: blue;">Treating People As If They Were Robots</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">If organizations treated their people they way they treat their robots, they would get more productivity out of people.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/03/resistance-to-change.html"><span style="color: blue;">Resistance to Change</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Some resistance to change is a good thing and makes a lot of sense. Some resistance is rooted in differences among people. Understanding the sources can help us overcome resistance.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/03/balance-work-and-free-up-workers.html"><span style="color: blue;">Balance the Work and Free Up Workers</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Work that is not balanced means that some people have to either wait or do things to keep looking and feeling busy. This activity is wasteful and costly. The alternative is to balance the work so that everyone is spending very close to the same amount of time to do a cycle of work. When this happens we find that we free up workers who are no longer needed in the process.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/02/one-place-to-get-started.html"><span style="color: blue;">One Place to Get Started</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">There is not a “right way” to get started improving work to bring out the best in people. Two things that any leader can do are: go to the workplace and look at the activity there with new eyes, and move consecutive workstations closer together.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/02/layoffs-can-be-costly.html"><span style="color: blue;">Layoffs Can Be Costly</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The justification for layoffs is usually that we cannot afford to keep so many people on the payroll. Layoffs can be costly in a number of ways.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/02/uneven-unemployment.html"><span style="color: blue;">Uneven Unemployment</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Bringing out the best in employees is affected by economic factors outside the workplace. Overall, national unemployment does not affect all segments of society the same. Working class people have much higher rates of unemployment that people in managerial positions. These are factors to consider in bringing out the best in people at work.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/02/getting-started-undercover-boss.html"><span style="color: blue;">The Undercover Boss</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The first of a series of television programs on bosses going “undercover” to see how their organizations function leads to some eye-opening experiences. There is valid learning here, but it is not necessary to go among workers secretly. Spending time at in the workplace and even participating in the value-adding work can provide just is much insight or more.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-46032403685651390862010-05-06T11:53:00.000-07:002010-05-06T11:53:31.399-07:00Not Common Sense or Common Practice<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masaaki_Imai"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Maasaki Imai</span></a><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">, </span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">founder of the <a href="http://www.kaizen.com/">Kaizen Institute</a> and author of two <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Gemba-Kaizen-Commonsense-Low-Cost-Management/dp/0070314462">bestselling</a> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Kaizen-Key-Japans-Competitive-Success/dp/007554332X">books </a>on<b> </b>Kaizen, has often said that the Kaizen approach and Lean Manufacturing are common sense approaches. If they were common sense, why are they not common practice?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Imaisan is one of my teachers, from whom I have learned a great deal. I differ with him on Kaizen approaches being common sense. People differ widely in what they consider common sense. A supervisor told me that he had always been told that assembly lines should be laid out in one long straight line. To him, <i>that </i>was common sense. He also felt it was common sense to have plenty of material near the line, in case there was a problem with some component, we could always open another box.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I have met managers and company owners who tell me that they do not need to apply Kaizen. If subordinates only did what they were told and used common sense, they would have no problems. I some cases we agree on what it would be better for people to do. What we differ on is whether it is actually common sense.<a name='more'></a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">We all think we know what common sense is, but when we are trying to understand Kaizen and Lean Manufacturing the common way of thinking is exactly what gets in our way. An assembly line that is in laid out in a straight line with lots of material around it "just-in-case" is not conducive to eliminating waste and becoming lean. If we have problems with material, instead of compensating for it by having extra material lying around, we need to deal with the problem. If the material is purchased from a supplier, we need to work with the supplier to insure material that is always reliable. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;"> A straight line assembly line has a number of problems. If there is any kind of carrier on which the assembly must travel, when it reaches the end of the line it must be transported back to the head of the line. If the line has a U-shape, when the carrier reaches the end of the line it is at the head of the line. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Value-adding workers working on the inside of a U-shaped line can easily re-distribute the work their share of the work to balance it, not only by taking or passing work to up and down-stream work stations, but the have the option to turn and do work on the other side of the U, directly behind them.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">U-shaped lines are not "common sense" in many operations. The option to form lines this way must be learned.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Common sense often means adding operations that do not add value, creating more waste instead of eliminating waste. In a plant that made circuit breakers, data had to be printed on every unit, including the date code for the date the work was completed. I came across a line that was idle, and I asked why the line was stopped. "We're glad you're here, Bob. Maybe you can get management's attention. We need an additional machine to engrave the plates from which we print the labels on each breaker." </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">I asked why they did not have a plate on this line. The told me that they did have one, but the date code was yesterday's. The breaker must have the date code of the day it was made. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Why does it not have today's date code? I asked. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">It has yesterday's code because the line was scheduled to run yesterday but did not.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Why did it not run yesterday? </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">It did initially, but we ran into a quality problem where we had to reject a third of a sub-assembly that came from a supplier.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">If the sub-assemblies had been to specification, the breaker would have run yesterday. The printing plate would have the correct date code. We would not be waiting around for the correct plate, and we would not need additional plate-making capacity. Thus, another expensive plate-making machine was <i>not</i> needed. What was needed was to work with the supplier to make their sub-assemblies reliable. Buying another plate-making machine compensates for waste we already have by adding waste in the form of capacity that we do not really need.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Common sense of the floor of that factory was that to keep everyone working and the lines working the plate-making capacity had to be expanded.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Applying Lean Manufacturing involves changing the way we think about things. We could say that it involves <i>changing </i>our common sense. We want to always avoid non-value-adding work as much as possible. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Some people think that avoiding non-value-adding work means reducing "indirect" labor. One example of indirect labor is material handling. One kind of common sense says, get rid of material handlers and have production people handle their own material. This tends to increase the amount of waste, not decrease it, because it is very inefficient for people who are adding value all stop and go get material, or move it down-stream. It can be made efficient for one person to support several people who are adding value.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://bobduckles.blogspot.com/2010/03/treating-people-as-if-they-were-robots.html">In Treating People As If They Were Robots</a> (March 15, 2010 in this blog) I cite the example of highly skilled assemblers who improved their collective and individual productivity by adding a person to do all the non-value-adding prep work to assembling hydraulic cylinders. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Being successful at pursuing world class and becoming lean involves more than applying a series of techniques. The entire organization needs to think about things differently. The organizations leaders must lead this effort. A leader at a local level can accomplish some changes in thinking, but to change the organization requires leading the thinking of the entire organization in new directions. </span><br />
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</o:p></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-5495322832316473072010-04-27T12:20:00.000-07:002010-04-27T12:20:08.517-07:00Quality Process and Quality Results<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14pt;"><br />
</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">How do we assure that our customers receive the highest possible quality in our products? The first thing that comes to many people’s minds is that we need to have plenty of inspection. Defective products will get made and we need to catch them before they get to the customer.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Unfortunately, inspection (as well as various kinds of testing) does not catch every defect. No inspection process catches every defect. Many let 20%, 30% and more escape. Inspections can also catch products that turn out not to be defective. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In workshops, we demonstrate the unreliability of inspection by having each participant independently count the number of a certain letter (for example, “e”) that can be found in a text. All counters do not come up with the same number. If the letter were a defect, some would not be caught in the inspection process.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Inspection does not add value. It only catches some of the defective products and leads us to other work that does not add value either, but does add cost.</span><br />
<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Let us suppose that we have an inspection station that catches 80% of the defective products. Twenty percent will escape and go to the customer; either an outside customer, or the next step in the manufacturing process, an internal customer. Those defects could cause costly problems. Defects that get to the final user can increase warranty costs.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Let us consider the defects that do get caught. If they are not repairable, the material, equipment usage and labor that have gone into the product are waste. To find out if a defect is repairable an analysis may be required. This takes labor, equipment, and floor space. These are costs. If a defect is repairable there may be additional analysis to determine how to repair it, costing more labor, more equipment, and more floor space. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The repair itself uses resources, people and equipment to do the repair and often additional material. Once repaired, the product must be re-inspected, meaning that the inspection facility must have a capacity to inspect everything produced (100%) plus everything found to be defective and then repaired. This typically also takes labor, equipment, and floor space. It may not be possible to re-inspect the unit that has been repaired immediately, nor is it always possible to repair a unit that has been kicked out by inspection immediately. Thus, we must have space to store the units that are waiting. We must keep track of them, so that we know what has and has not been repaired and what has to be scrapped. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">All of this is cost without adding value. What does not add value is waste. Inspection and repair do not add value. In pursuit of world class and lean operations we must figure out how to eliminate inspection and repair.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I am not suggesting that we should simply stop inspecting. We do need to figure out how to improve our process wherever we can, so that inspection becomes irrelevant. It is easier to do in some cases than in others, but the strategy is the same in the easier and the more difficult cases.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We apply statistical and non-statistical process controls to our process. Statistical process controls are most useful where we can measure variables of equipment and materials. Statistical process controls permit us to reliably monitor and take action when the process goes out of control. Non-statistical process controls have to do with creating standardized procedures for (and with) the people who do the work, monitoring the standard procedures, and continuously improving them.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In both statistical and non-statistical process controls, the goal is to minimize variation. Variation in the process is what causes variation in the product. The variation can come from the equipment and tooling, the environment in which it operates (temperature, humidity and contamination), variation in the material (with regard to all of the specifications) and people and the methods that they use. The last source of variables often offers tremendous opportunities for improvement. Standard procedures that are followed consistently help make visible the variables that most affect our results.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A third part of the strategy is to use the information that we are currently getting from the repair process. All too often we do little nothing to document our repairs. We can accomplish a great deal with simple check sheets to tally the types of defects we find. Instead, we fix it and throw it back on the line be re-inspected. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In a plant making automatic braking system components a machine inserted two rubber grommets into holes in a casting. Some grommets would go in too far. Others would not go in far enough. From time to time the line would be stopped and the grommet-inserting machine would be tweaked. The tweaking did not improve things. Most of the time an extra operator had to stand at the machine and manually repair each unit that was defective—having grommets inserted too far in or not in far enough. Once repaired the product would then be put back on the line. This was non-value-adding repair work.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We had that operator remove every defective unit, put a tag on it indicating the time and sequence at which the defect occurred, and put it on a cart, without making any repairs to it. We accumulated a lot of units fairly rapidly. We conducted what we called an autopsy of all the units, recording the data on the tag, along with observations and measurements of anything we thought might be relevant to the problem.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The first thing that we found was that we had a problem of considerable magnitude. A high proportion of the units were defective. We were also able to discover that the cause of the problem was variations in the holes into which the grommets were inserted. The inside diameter of the holes was out of spec on both the high and the low side. Many of the holes also had flash that could hang up the grommet. The problem needed to be corrected where the casting was milled. The grommet insertion machine was not the problem.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The fourth part of the strategy is to have and instill in everyone a mentality that variation must be continually reduced. As long as we are satisfied with variation being within spec, there are two many opportunities for the variation to slip out of spec. Our goal should be to keep variables centered on the nominal, with as little variation as possible, when it comes to the product in process or the variables that go into the process. These can be kept in statistical control, using statistical process control methods. Manual processes, or processes where an operator is involved, should be always done the same (standardized) way until we find a better way. When we find a better way we standardize on that. We will discuss process standardization again in a future post. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 12pt;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Notes: </span></i><span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.sixsigmaspc.com/six-sigma-spc-articles/100-percent-inspection.html%20%20"><i><span style="font-family: Arial;">Jim Winings</span></i></a></span> <i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">provides one example of discussions about the effectiveness of 100% inspection. </span></i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Edwards_Deming"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Dr. Edwards Deming</span></a><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></b><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">has influenced my thinking on process quality. See for example, </span></i><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0262541165/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_2?pf_rd_p=486539851&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=0399550003&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=194FHYM5182MB0A2BFRM">The New Economics for Industry, Government, Education</a></span><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></b><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">and<a href="http://www.blogger.com/goog_258057806"> </a></span></i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0671746219/ref=s9_k2as_se_ir06?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=auto-no-results-center-1&pf_rd_r=1KMK8BE69G91X0E866AG&pf_rd_t=301&pf_rd_p=480051571&pf_rd_i=arquayo"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Dr. Deming, The American Who Taught the Japanese About Quality</span></a><b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">, </span></b><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">by Rafael Arguayo.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-69221088876107970692010-04-23T14:10:00.000-07:002010-04-23T14:10:13.658-07:00Two Extremes<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">There are two extreme types of organization. Most lie somewhere between the extremes. At one end we have the <i>World Class </i>organization<i>. </i> At the opposite end we have the <i>Fire-fighting </i>organization<i>.<o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The obvious difference between the extremes is how smoothly they appear to run. The <i>World Class </i>organization has few crises. Things seem to run smoothly. Problems arise, but they are quickly contained and soon prevented from happening again. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The <i>Fire-fighting </i>organization is continuously fighting fires, rushing from one crisis to the next. The same problems recur. Prevention is poor. The <i>World Class </i>organization has a calm, laid-back feel to it. The <i>Fire-fighting </i>organization has a frantic feel.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">There are some less obvious characteristics that distinguish the two extremes. In <i>Fire- fighting</i> organizations there is a lot of blaming. Any problem will lead to fixing blame, or to wanting to fix blame. In the <i>World Class </i>organization rather than asking who is to blame, we want to know what happened. Sometimes the blaming or the desire to fix blame is personal. It will also be focused on functions. Production blames maintenance for not maintaining or fixing equipment. Maintenance blames production for misusing the equipment and breaking it. Production blames the quality organization for interfering with their ability to meet production goals. Quality blames production for making “garbage.” There is always someone else who bears the brunt of the responsibility. <span style="color: blue;"><a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">This is related to another contrast. In the <i>Fire-fighting</i> organization everyone tends to be narrowly focused on the particular job or function to which they are assigned. “That’s not my job,” is a frequent statement. “That’s not your job,” is said to the person who shows an interest in what happens in another function. This separation lends itself to passing the buck to another function when there is a problem.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In a <i>World Class </i>organization everyone is expected to be interested in and aware of aspects of the organization that are outside of one’s expertise. A lot of work gets done through cross-function cooperation and effort. There is a greater understanding of the overall system, of how things go together and affect each other. Problems tend to be viewed as systemic. We ask how equipment, information, methods, materials, and people each contribute to the problem and to its solution.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The <i>Fire-fighting </i>organization will focus on results and react to them. Quality problems lead to implementing new tests or inspection procedures to filter out the defects. The <i>World Class </i>organization is very aware that all results, good and bad, are the product of processes. If we are getting good results, we should understand what in the process is getting us those good results and capture it. We implement standard procedures to insure that we consistently get the same results. If we are getting results that are not desirable, we ask what needs to change in the process to improve the results. If we have standard procedures, what needs to be modified? If we do not have standard procedures, what needs to be standardized?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In <i>Fire-fighting</i> organizations everyone spends a lot of time hanging on and doing the best they can. The top levels of the organization hunt for solutions to on-going problems, often exploring alternatives that require significant capital or expense: New computer systems, new equipment and fixtures, hiring new people. In the <i>World Class </i>organization, there is still a need for applying capital, but along with that everyone is also focused on continuous improvement on things that cost very little or nothing at all. There is a culture of finding opportunities to improve and acting upon them immediately.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The dichotomy of two extremes is somewhat artificial. Very few organizations lie at either extreme, but many are closer to, or moving toward, one extreme or the other. It is not important for an organization to fix it’s precise location between the extremes, but it can be useful to have an idea of where your organization is located, thus what to improve and build upon and what to try to avoid, if you are trying to move in the <i>World Class </i>direction.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Avoid fixing blame and keeping people isolated from all but a small corner of the organization. Avoid over-specialization. Create cross-functional work. Keep people informed about the overall system, what is being planned, new marketing, new business, and how we are doing. Encourage teamwork for working on low-cost/no-cost improvements. Support this kind of teamwork by providing time and resources to do it. When we start to react to results, remind everyone to consider what in the process led to results, not only when there is a problem, but also when things are going well. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In summary, the three dimensions to examine are:<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Non-blaming versus finding blame.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Focus on the overall system versus focus on narrow functions.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Focus on process and results versus focus on results only.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Notes: I was introduced to this model in my work with the </span></i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">KAIZEN Institute of America (now a part of <a href="http://www.kaizen.com/">KAIZEN Institute International</a>), <i>starting in the 1980s. I had occasion to teach it in many Institute workshops over the years and to observe its validity in organization after organization.<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3290910928716780929.post-18558355517307599562010-04-16T12:14:00.000-07:002010-04-16T12:14:43.915-07:00Why Not Manufacture in Easy Batches?<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">During a workshop, a manager resisted the idea that batches are always to be avoided if possible. He used the example of paying his bills by check (this was before the days of online bill-paying). It was easiest for him, he said, to sit down at the kitchen table, open all the bills and take them out, write all the checks, stuff all the envelopes, put stamps on all the envelopes and drop them in the mail.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I asked the group if there was anyone present who had ever sent the wrong check to a payee. A couple of people admitted that it had happened to them. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">If you practice one-piece-flow, processing one unit at a time – in this case one bill—you practically eliminate that particular mistake. You open one envelope, read the bill, write the check, put it in the envelope with the bill stub, seal the envelope and put a stamp on it. If you wait to put stamps on the envelopes until all have been sealed and stacked, there is more of a chance of skipping an envelope and mailing it without a stamp.</span><br />
<a name='more'></a><o:p></o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The manager still protested that it would take less time to process his bills in batches. That may be the case, but the extra time can be minimized if you organize the work station for one-at-a-time. What would that take? To begin, a place for everything and everything in its place: the checkbook, the stack of bills, the letter opener, the stamps. In the factory one of the sources of waste is having to hunt for and go get what you need, stopping your value-adding activity while you do it.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In an auto industry factory, the product required a length of rubber hose about six inches long. There was an elegant machine that chopped the lengths of hose from a large roll. I watched it working very fast, spitting out short lengths of hose in less than a second a piece. These fell into a large barrel. The machine did not require an operator, unless it stopped automatically due to a problem, or when the current barrel was nearly full and an operator had to stand ready to shut it off and the full barrel with an empty one.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">There were two barrels beside the machine that had large reject tags on them. I asked why. Either through human error or a mechanical problem, the machine had cut the lengths too short. There was no way they would work. If they had been too long, they could at least be reworked, buy trimming off the excess. These hoses would have to be scrapped.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I asked what they had done to keep this problem from happening again. The answer: more frequent inspections. Inspections are an activity that does not add value and are therefore wasteful. We gathered the improvement team that was involved in the workshop and I gave them a challenge. How could we cut the length of hose each time we needed it?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The team experimented with various cutting devices and improvised a tree-trimming lopper as a guillotine, through which the hose could be threaded. A stop at exactly the right distance made it possible to cut a single piece to the exact size when it was needed in less than a second. There were details to be worked out so that this could be done at several assembly stations. This included receiving smaller rolls of hose from the supplier to make it easy to mount this operation at each place in the factory where the short length of hose was needed.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">When making changes of this type we often run into the question of whether the supplier will cooperate without charging more. Sometimes some negotiation is required, but there have been many times when the supplier sees the point and is happy to oblige, even seeing advantages for himself.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">At another client, a specialized hydraulic pump was being assembled to fill orders in quantities of four to seven units per day. Each pump was shipped bolted to a wooden pallet measuring two feet by two feet. While I was in the factory a delivery of pallets arrived and took up a space along a wall that was two feet wide, several yards long, and ten feet high. The plant was receiving a supply of pallets that would last approximately two months.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">When the improvement team asked the purchaser to see if the supplier would deliver small quantities more frequently, the purchaser was sure that the supplier, a local sole proprietor with a pallet making business, would not want to change his practice. Grudgingly he agreed to invite the supplier in to meet with the team.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">We showed the pallet maker the space that all his pallets took up under the current arrangement. He recognized it, as he had had to fill a space of equal size at his shop. When we said that we wanted to have much smaller delivers more frequently, he suggested daily deliveries. What was more, he said, he drove by the plant every day. He would put the seven needed for a day in the back of his pickup and drop them off. We would eliminate the requirement and cost of transporting them by the trailer load.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">All we had to do was ask.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Batches hide errors and quality problems, sometimes in large numbers. They have to be tracked, managed, counted and recounted. They take up space. The can become obsolete. They sit there with all the expense so far tied up and no further value being added. When batch processing seems easy, the hidden costs should be remembered.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Notes: For more on manufacturing in batches, see the post, “</span></i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Keeping it Simple,” <i>in this blog (March 25, 2010).<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>Bob Duckleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15264430662044348345noreply@blogger.com0