Jan 11 2016

A critical look on Industry 4.0 | Christoph Roser

One of the hottest buzzwords right now (at least in Germany) is Industry 4.0. However, it’s a bit fuzzy what Industry 4.0 is, exactly. In this post I would like to talk about Industry 4.0. This includes very little about all the promises of a wonderful future – you can read that elsewhere. Instead, I will try to give you the big picture. I will talk about how Industry 4.0 came into existence, why it is so popular, what the true current benefit of Industry 4.0 is, and why you should pay attention to clothes.

Sourced through Scoop.it from: www.allaboutlean.com

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Dec 21 2015

How Can I Speed Up My Team’s Lean Learning?

“How can I speed up my team’s lean learning?” is a question found on the web, with no context given: we don’t know whether it is team of managers, engineers, or operators, or whether it works in manufacturing, finance, or health care… We can infer from the tone of the question that its author is a leader frustrated with the pace of a team’s progress. I will further make the assumption that the concern is not just about skills but also about principles. It’s not just about know-how but also know-why, as it is essential to address new challenges.

Then we also need to make a distinction between learning as a team and learning by team members. You hear leaders say “as a team, we have learned to change over a lathe in 7 minutes,” or “as a team, we have learned to introduce a new product on this line in 3 weeks.” If such a team replaces one of its members, it can bring the newcomer up to speed and retain the skills and the knowledge; if, on the other hand, it replaces half its members, it has to relearn. A team  is more than the collection of its members, but it builds on the expertise of its members, which means that their individual expertise also needs to be nurtured. This means that individual learning by team members also is a topic that must be addressed.

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Lean Coffee

Dec 17 2015

Lean Coffee in Palo Alto

The first Palo Alto Lean Coffee happened this morning, as planned, at the Palo Alto Cafe, with Paul Zhao and me. We didn’t know each other, and connected through Meetup. Paul is involved with a startup company aiming to be “Uber for 3D printing,” connecting users who have designs with shop that have 3D printers. Our discussion was centered on manufacturing strategies for startups with hardware products, a topic I expect to come up again in Palo Alto.

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Palo Alto Cafe Front at Night

Dec 9 2015

Inaugural Lean Coffee on 12/17 7:30 AM at Palo Alto Cafe

David Veech last week suggested I start a Lean Coffee in Palo Alto. It seems like an attractive format, and I hope you find it useful.

It is scheduled early in the day to minimize interference with work. You don’t have to prepare anything. You come as you are, and I will provide Post-It notes for us to set an agenda when we start. Then we will discuss all the items agreed on, each participant contributing on the fly from his or her experience. It’s at the Palo Alto Cafe, and we can each enjoy coffee, bagels, muffins, or croissant-egg scrambles while letting others talk.

RSVP if interested.

 

 

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Dec 6 2015

Industry 4.0: Without Stable Processes, Nothing Works | Wiegand’s Watch

This is a translation of Bodo Wiegand’s latest newsletter, about Lean in Germany, followed by my comments:

This week I was with a company that is on its way to implement industry 4.0. All machines were networked. The manager could see from his desk which machines were running and which were not. All data were collected centrally and also shown locally to the machine operator. The trend was easy to see. One third of the machines had a malfunction. With an average OEE of 62%, the machines do not always run.

“As long as we buy new machines, we have to live with this,” was his answer to my question.

But, it was not only the newest, but also the older machines that don’t need to be smeared with oil and dirty, even even while generating chips. Provided on request, the Fire-Fighting-factor reported to us by the maintenance technicians was above 75%. The chief knew exactly: 76.6%. An OEE of 62% and 76.6% Firefighting means in plain language: In this business, there is no stable processes.

But what drives intelligent managers then to link his whole company, only to find that the processes are unstable? With some thought they could have discovered this without networking and invested first in stabilizing the processes. Introducing Industry 4.0 For industry on unstable processes will fail. The crucial question: how I manage to stabilize the processes and avoid unplanned shutdowns?

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Nov 30 2015

What Poka-Yoke Are And Are Not, And How To Sustain Them

Chet Marchwinski recently exhumed a 2011 discussion about Poka-Yoke that had been started by the following question:

I’m a manufacturing engineer and since I have started participating in kaizen workshops, I have noticed that production supervisors tend to disconnect some of the poka-yokes we’ve put in place in the machines. When I challenge them about this they argue that operators can’t run production and cope with the complexity of our machines. I am perplexed by this and wondered whether you’d have a comment.

In short, I can think of two reasons for production supervisors to disconnect Poka-Yoke:

  1. No production supervisor in his right mind would disconnect devices that make the work easier for operators. If they do disconnect them, the most likely explanation is that the devices described as “Poka-Yoke” actually add work for the operator. If you have to pick a part from one of ten open bins in front of you, you will spend precious seconds finding the right one; if all bins are covered with lids except the right one, not only are you physically prevented from picking the wrong one but you don’t have to look for it. It makes your job easier. On the other hand, if you have to scan a bar code on the part to validate the pick, it adds to your work load and your supervisor will pull the plug on the next production rush.
  2. The manufacturing process is not ready for Poka-Yoke. A production supervisor is quoted in the question as saying “operators can’t run production and cope with the complexity of our machines.” This suggests that the line has process capability issues that must be addressed before implementing Poka-Yoke.

The following paragraphs elaborate on these points.

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