jav, auteur op AQM International Consulting

Case: “continue the pre-Assembly or outsource it?”

Continue the pre-Assembly or outsource it

STARTING SITUATION:

The producer was faced with the choice: continue the pre-assembly activity or outsource this work. The factory had been pre-assembling itself for years. The employees themselves had already taken measures more often in order to become more productive. In order to maintain the work in the plant, a study was needed to increase workplace optimisation. The basic question also revealed that the MTM standard times also needed to be revised. Now, a better combination does not exist. Because every change is immediately measurable. Areas, number of employees and savings follow from the analysis.

CHOSEN APPROACH:

Firstly all the existing standard times were updated. In parallel, the layout of the departments, tools, and the supply and goods delivery were examined. Paths are shown by spaghetti-diagrams. By classifying potential improvements in a short, medium and long term, the benefit per phase became

Case: “increase output by 40%”

Increase output. If the planning can only be met by regular overtime, either planting times are wrong or the capacity is not used properly. In this case there was still enough room for an output increase.

Increase output by 40%

STARTING SITUATION

The planning was 10 machines per week. Due to regular overtime, they succeeded to assemble this desired number. In the existing situation was no evenly and continuous flow. Given the market demand, the management wanted at least 30% more production output. The wish was therefore to make better use of the existing capacity. In other words: Increase the output in a normal working week of 40 hours, without overtime. To be achieved by a better flow of materials and products.

CHOSEN APPROACH

My heroes and examples (6)

Production systems and their founding fathers: Taiichi Ohno (1912 – 1990)

Taiichi Ohno was born in Manchuria, China in 1912. He was a Japanese Industrial engineer and businessman. Ohno graduated at the Nagoya Technical High School (Japan). He joined the Toyoda family: Toyoda Spinning upon graduation in 1932. This was during the Great Depression. Thanks to the relation of his father with Kiichiro Toyoda, son of Toyota’s founding father (Mr. Sakichi Toyoda). In twenty years he made a career at Toyoda Spinning.

He moved to the Toyota motor company in 1943 where he worked as an assembly manager at the engine manufacturing shop of the plant. He gradually rose through the ranks to eventually become Executive Vice President.

At an early stage, he already used his entrepreneurial and organizational skills. He was looking for ways to solve the better