In his blog post "Implementing lean manufacturing principles on the the plant floor: a case study," Apex International CEO David Goldberg reveals how he made his manufacturing company more efficient.
Goldberg and his team identified key areas for improvement:
- Growing past due orders
- Decreased customer confidence/satisfaction
- High employee frustration
- High waste costs
- Inadequate process execution
- Poor asset utilization
- High overhead costs
- Long cycle times
They also setup goals including:
- Increase sales by 10 percent
- Reduce overhead per unit costs by 50 percent
- Cut cycle times in half
- Achieve 100 percent on-time delivery
- Achieve record-high customer and employee satisfaction
How they eliminated waste
- Reduced changeover times
- Held monthly events for rapid improvement
- Arranged equipment, supplies, and employees in cells for continuous flow
- Value stream mapped current states of production to identify waste
Results
- Delivery and productivity improvements
- Fewer documentation errors
- 60 percent less inventory, which opened up room for growth
- Higher employee morale and customer happiness