News page

FEATURED ANSWERS:

April 2004

Comments from WCM in Europe Workshop (Newsletter April 2004)
What is a Product-Process matrix? (Newsletter April 2004)
Does Lean Manufacturing result in poor ergonomics? (Newsletter June 2003)
Why is Six Sigma more widely recognized than Lean? (Newsletter June 2003)

Comments from WCM in Europe Workshop (Newsletter April 2004)

The WCM in Europe Workshop was hosted in Dublin during March by Enterprise Ireland and the EU-Japan Centre for Industrial Cooperation. Over 400 delegates from Irish industry, existing EU member states and new accession states attended this 2-day workshop.

We heard some terrific stories of ongoing and relentless improvement from indigenous Irish companies, such as Keenan's of Borris, to multi-nationals such as IBM Bosch and FIAT, to Iskra Autoelectrica of Slovenia. The message is the same; our competitiveness must constantly improve; the tools of WCM, Lean Enterprise and Six Sigma are the same the world over; continuous improvement is hard and requires management leadership. More.

If you are interested in participating in a visit to Japan to see world-class-manufacturing at first hand, or if you are interested in hosting a Japanese final-year scientific, engineering or technical student for 8 months, then contact the EU-Japan Centre at www.eujapan.com

What is a Product-Process matrix? (Newsletter April 2004)

You are in a medium volume business. You do not have dedicated high-volume lines for each product. You have a mix of products that go through different processes within your factory and sometimes in different sequence. Your production people chase product through the various operations, constantly adjusting schedules and priorities to get the job done. How do you get flow? How do you make the flow more visible?

The Product Process matrix is a great tool to get some better visibility on how things could be re-aligned. List all product families down the left-hand side. List the processes across the top. Go across each product line and put an X under each process that it passes through.

	Proc A	Proc B	Proc C	Proc D	Proc E
Prod 1		X	X		X
Prod 2	X		X
Prod 3		X		X
Prod 4	X		X		X
Prod 5		X		X

Now re-order the rows and columns to move each X closer to the diagonal. Keep re-ordering until you separate both the products and processes into two or more separate groups. You may have to make some choices e.g. find a duplicate or smaller version of one process so it is not shared, or move one product from one process to another.

You have now identified at least two cells, each with a much smaller product range and with a much greater chance of establishing visible flow in each. In the example below, we have created two independent cells if we can find a way of avoiding Process B on Prod 1 and replacing it with C, E or A, or else getting a second machine to perform Process B.

	Proc C	Proc E	Proc A	Proc B	Proc D
Prod 4	X	X	X
Prod 2	X		X
Prod 1	X	X		X
Prod 3				X	X
Prod 5				X	X

The Product-Process Matrix is just one of many useful tools covered in detail on Manufacturing Excellence's certified Lean Greenbelt course. For more information, see www.manufacturing-excellence.ie/courses

Does Lean Manufacturing result in poor ergonomics? (Newsletter June 2003)

Absolutely not! When the principles and examples of lean manufacturing are first outlined, there is often a fear that this will result in harder or more difficult work for employees. This is not the case and many of the principles of good ergonomics are brought to the fore in a good Lean transition.

A textbook definition is that "Ergonomics aims to ensure that human needs for safe and efficient working are met in the design of worksystems". Lean manufacturing aims to eliminate the waste both of unnecessary human motion and unnecessary human waiting.

Some resistance to a leaner method is encountered when employees are requested to work standing-up/moving rather than seated all day. In fact a combination of standing and regular movement between machines is ergonomically better than constant sitting in one location.

Kaizen events, 5S activities or other regular improvement activities should always strive to improve the ergonomics of the work area. Any so-called "improvement" that results in poorer ergonomics has simply traded-off one waste for another.

Why is Six Sigma more widely recognized than Lean? (Newsletter June 2003)

Many people have commented that Six Sigma is far more widely recognized, as an improvement methodology, than is Lean Enterprise, and some therefore assume that Six Sigma is the more successful approach. Bill Lareau of Kaufman Consulting Group has written a very comprehensive analysis comparing both methodologies. He attributes the greater visibility of Six Sigma programs to the fact that they have "heroes", namely Blackbelts who head-up specific projects. Lean Enterprise, while having its own experts, relies upon, and in fact encourages, a more dispersed culture of improvement. He summarises the differences with a powerful analogy:

"A black belt applying six sigma is analogous to a surgeon and his/her surgical team working within a third-world country to heal as many people as possible, one surgery at a time. Every surgery is a work of art and the people of the villages and towns rejoice and celebrate the skill of the surgeon. One day a person is near death, and a few days later the patient is up and around.

A team applying lean, on the other hand, is analogous to a public health specialist and/or an agronomist travelling to poor towns and villages and showing the people how to keep their drinking water clean, dig latrines, properly care for infants and increase their crop yields. Everybody benefits a little, but it is hard to see a dramatic change between one day and the next in any one person or the entire village. However, a year later, the changes will be marked, and three to four years later, quite dramatic."

The above analogy describes opposite ends of a spectrum and probably does not do justice to the significant breakthrough improvements that are made in a Lean transition when equipment layout is altered or set-up times significantly reduced.

The full text of this article, "Integrating Lean and Six Sigma", can be found at Kaufman Consulting Group or in the December 2002 edition of Superfactory at www.superfactory.com

Manufacturing Excellence Consultancy & Training

For more information on Manufacturing Excellence consultancy and training in Ireland:

- call (051)-870270

- email info@manufacturing-excellence.ie

- visit www.manufacturing-excellence.ie