Written by: Eric Whitley

Lean manufacturing combines innovative strategies and tools for improving internal processes, managing customer expectations, and driving radical organizational changes. Companies use Lean manufacturing to achieve different business goals, such as:

  • Improving the quality of products and services
  • Minimizing operational costs
  • Streamlining plant floor performance
  • Reducing response time to disruptions

Lean manufacturing is vital for eliminating waste that impedes productivity on the plant floor. The Lean philosophy has different operating principles which help maximize its relevance:

  • Identifying value (of a product or service)
  • Mapping the value stream (removing non-value-adding processes)
  • Creating a continuous value flow
  • Establishing a pull system
  • Pursuing perfection

Which Lean strategies can manufacturers implement, and how do they revolutionize routine shop floor operations?

Continuous Improvement

Kaizen, or continuous improvement, is a vital pillar of Lean manufacturing. This approach requires proactive coordination between employees to implement incremental process improvements, which enhance work output and simplify routine workflows.

The employees continuously monitor manufacturing processes and equipment to identify bottlenecks, defects, and waste that’s affecting productivity. The team combines different work tools to drive a cultural change across the organization and encourages proactive responsiveness to plant floor challenges.

Kaizen principles enable employees to identify work patterns that strain asset productivity, and behaviors that slow down production processes. The same principles also help identify recurring equipment defects and low-impact workflows.

These insights assist plant managers in devising better work schedules and staff empowerment programs. The end goal is to strengthen proactive improvement initiatives: when using the Kaizen strategy, every employee takes part in process optimization. It builds their technical skills and enables companies to maximize both their talent and resources to achieve business goals.

Companies use Kaizen principles to conduct root cause analysis when combating equipment breakdowns. They identify common failures and devise strategies to resolve them — optimizing the availability and reliability of critical production assets. It ensures the company meets its production goals at competitive rates without compromising product quality and customer satisfaction.

Waste Reduction

Small manufacturing wastes can significantly impact plant performance and productivity. The different sources of manufacturing waste include:

  • Production defects
  • Unnecessary motion
  • Overproduction
  • Unnecessary transportation of inventory
  • Underutilized talent
  • Existence of non-value-adding activities (over-processing)
  • Production stops or waiting due to stalled processes or equipment
  • Excessive inventory

If process wastes are a part of the equation, manufacturers can struggle to meet production targets. They can even end up spending more resources to rectify product defects and faulty machinery. The company then faces financial risk from overproduction levels that exceed customer demands by producing more than is required in hopes of avoiding these issues

These risks increase if the company experiences frequent production stops because of failing equipment, resulting in low-quality products and an uneven utilization of raw materials. Manufacturers can use continuous improvement tools to identify wasteful production activities and establish measures for gradually eliminating them.

Waste reduction prepares the company for a just-in-time manufacturing approach: the company manufactures enough products to meet current market demands, using optimized production assets, streamlined processes, and an appropriate number of talented employees.

5S Strategy

5S is a vital Lean philosophy aiming to maximize visual shop floor management, promote cleanliness, and enhance the efficiency of both employees and processes. The 5S strategy includes different organizational activities which ensure the shop floor is well-organized and devoid of waste.

The five practices include:

  • Sorting: identifying tools and resources required for optimal productivity and asset management, and removing other, non-essential resources from the shop floor or storage facilities.
  • Set in order: organizing essential production resources logically, ensuring they improve workflows, and limiting unnecessary motion on the plant floor.
  • Shine: keeping the shop floor clean; includes the likes of mopping, equipment dusting, and maintenance.
  • Standardize: establishing the rules for performing the first three tasks; includes timelines and methods for the activities.
  • Sustain: encouraging employee discipline and adherence to shop floor organization practices.

Employees know where to source critical production resources if the shop floor is well-organized, with clearly labeled resources. That way, they avoid unnecessary motion, mixing work tools up, etc.

One welcome effect is a reduced number of safety incidents since production assets are arranged logically, and work tools are at easily accessible locations.

Machine Monitoring

The manufacturing shop floor features several production assets with varying maintenance requirements. The failure of a particular piece of machinery, or individual components, affects the consistency and quality of production.

Companies employ various machine monitoring technologies to enhance overall equipment effectiveness and to complement their continuous improvement initiatives. Machine monitoring involves real-time performance tracking, which helps identify production patterns — and these point to underlying machine defects, potential quality issues, or erratic operator performance.

Manufacturers use their machine-monitoring data to establish strategies for improving asset productivity and maximizing overall equipment effectiveness (OEE). An added benefit is the insight into equipment downtime, the number of production rejects, the recurrence of slow cycles, and the potency of existing maintenance activities.

Access to real-time equipment performance data empowers the company to implement corrective measures, eliminate process wastes, maximize asset availability, and increase overall plant performance.

Conclusion

Implementing a Lean manufacturing strategy has several benefits, ranging from customer satisfaction, workplace safety, improved profitability, to employee satisfaction and process visibility. These strategies help companies bridge gaps in manufacturing and focus on activities that optimize the value streams.

Use the existing performance data to establish Lean objectives and to define key performance indicators. If you want to promote cultural change and the adoption of new work techniques and tools, ensure the implementation process is consultative and involves employees at all levels.

Bio: 

For over 30 years, Eric Whitley has been a noteworthy leader in the Manufacturing space. In addition to the many publications and articles Eric has written on various manufacturing topics, you may know him from his efforts leading the Total Productive Maintenance effort at Autoliv ASP or from his involvement in the Management Certification programs at The Ohio State University, where he served as an adjunct faculty member.  

After an extensive career as a reliability and business improvement consultant, Eric joined L2L, where he currently serves as the Director of Smart Manufacturing. His role in this position is to help clients learn and implement L2L’s pragmatic and simple approach to corporate digital transformation.   

Eric lives with his wife of 35 years in Northern Utah. When Eric is not working, he can usually be found on the water with a fishing rod in his hands.