Category Archives: Manufacturing

Problems with Lean Manufacturing Awards

Posted on November 17, 2005 by John Hunter

Dangers in Lean Manufacturing Awards from the Got Boondogle blog: My simple understanding of lean principles is to focus on the pursuit of company survival for eternity with the elimination of waste while adding value for customers, enhancing quality of life for employees and contributing to society. The pursuit of lean manufacturing awards is not on the list of objectives. Another good post from an excellent blog that is well worth reading. Much can go wrong when pursuing an award. … Continue reading →

Posted in Lean thinking, Management, Manufacturing, Systems thinking

The Power of Why

Posted on October 31, 2005 by John Hunter

NUMMI Tour Tale #3: The Power of Why by Mark Graban: Again, another “wow” moment. For one, NUMMI put the situation in customer terms. Do not use these parts, because there would be a negative impact on the customer. It didn’t say “do not use the parts because I say so (and you wouldn’t understand the reason anyway)”. … Why are we doing lean? Why is it necessary to standardize our workbenches? Why is it important to get these parts … Continue reading →

Posted in Lean thinking, Management, Manufacturing

Manufacturing and the Economy

Posted on October 30, 2005 by John Hunter

In Global Market, Iowa Manufacturers Fight for Survival: The conventional wisdom has been that expanded trade would result in the United States losing low-pay, low-skilled manufacturing jobs, said David Swenson, an economic scientist at Iowa State University. But “a lot of the jobs that we have traditionally thought of as high value, high quality, high benefits are in trouble, too.” The conventional wisdom was that the rest of the world would not be able to compete with the United States … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, Economics, Management, Manufacturing, Popular, quote | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Toyota Manufactures More Itself

Posted on October 27, 2005 by John Hunter

Bucking the trend, Toyota controls quality, cost by making many parts in house [the broken link was removed], AutoWeek via Lean Manufacturing Blog: On one hand, the company sees parts making as a critical piece of its overall quality-control program. Toyota argues that keeping some parts in-house actually makes it more efficient. Outsourcing parts simply to meet the changing industry norm is viewed warily by Toyota executives. “I don’t believe we can outsource our responsibility to the customer,” Seizo Okamoto

Posted in Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, Manufacturing, Systems thinking, Toyota Production System (TPS) | 1 Comment

2005 Deming Prize

Posted on October 20, 2005 by John Hunter

2005 the Deming Prize Winners Announced: The Deming Application Prize (alphabetical order) Hosei Brake Industry Co., Limited(Japan) – web site Krishna Maruti Limited, Seat Division(India) Rane Engine Valves Limited(India) – web site Rane TRW Steering Systems Limited, Steering Gear Division(India) – web site Once again India has dominated the prize. From our 2004 Deming Prize post: “In recent years, Thailand and India have been the home to nearly all awardees: 6 of 7 in 2003, 2 of 2 in 2002 … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, India, Management, Manufacturing | 3 Comments

Eliminating Complexity from Work

Posted on October 20, 2005 by John Hunter

Eliminating Complexity from Work: Improving Productivity by Enhancing Quality [broken link replaced with link from the Internet Archive] by F. Timothy Fuller. National Productivity Review, Autumn, 1985. A case study of a process improvement from 1985. as much as half of the activities of about sixty people had been to set up and take down jobs, expedite, move material, count material, and do other tasks that were unnecessary in the new process. Related: productivity improvement articles and links

Posted in Lean thinking, Management, Manufacturing, Process improvement | Tagged ,

The Best Factory in the World

Posted on October 17, 2005 by John Hunter

The Best Factory in the World (site broke link so I removed it) by Norman Bodek (from his book, Kaikaku): This is a story about a time when Bodek asked Shigeo Shingo to take him to the “very best factory in all of Japan.” … Pictures of areas of the factory or the office hung throughout the plant. Workers were encouraged to look at the pictures and talk about them together, then to make improvements. … After the visit, I … Continue reading →

Posted in Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, Manufacturing

Ford and Managing the Supplier Relationship

Posted on October 1, 2005 by John Hunter

There have a been a number of articles (Ford to slash vendors of key parts [the broken link was removed] – Ford Rethinks Supply Strategy and posts (A “Kinder and Gentler” Lean Supply Base? – Ford Adopts Toyota-style Supplier Strategy [the broken link was removed]) about supplier management, many springing from Ford’s announcement [the broken link was removed]. My first thought on reading the stories about the press release was, didn’t Ford already say they were going to do this … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Management, Manufacturing, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , , | 9 Comments

Solectron IndustryWeek Best Plant

Posted on September 15, 2005 by John Hunter

Solectron Corp: IW Best Plants [the broken link was removed] by John Teresko To empower its employee strategy, Columbia (and the rest of Solectron) is dedicated to an ongoing journey of Six Sigma and lean manufacturing, says Petta. For example, several times a year it is not unusual to encounter kaizen events on the plant floor … before lean arrived at Columbia, WIP typically was five days. After implementation of lean, WIP has been reduced to a half-day to one … Continue reading →

Posted in Management Articles, Manufacturing

Lean Manufacturing at Castcon-Stone

Posted on August 29, 2005 by John Hunter

Lean manufacturing transforms operations at Saxonburg company: Kerckhoff said redoing certain portions of products accounted for about 12 percent of the company’s volume of work last year. However, after implementing the new lean manufacturing initiative, the number is now down to about 4 percent, and most of the rework is so minor that the company would not have tracked it in the past.

Posted in Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, Manufacturing

Statistics for Experimenters – Second Edition

Posted on March 8, 2005 by John Hunter

The classic Statistics for Experimenters has been updated by George Box and Stu Hunter, two of the three original authors. Bill Hunter, who was my father, and the other author, died in 1986. Order online: Statistics for Experimenters: Design, Innovation, and Discovery , 2nd Edition by George E. P. Box, J. Stuart Hunter, William G. Hunter. I happen to agree with those who call this book a classic, however, I am obviously biased. Google Scholar citations for the first edition … Continue reading →

Posted in Books, Data, Design of Experiments, Innovation, Management, Manufacturing, Six sigma, Statistics | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Operational Excellence

Posted on January 15, 2005 by John Hunter

In, the post Is Operational Excellence Dead? the argument is made that operational excellence is dead as a differentiator of companies. “All of the emphasis on outsourcing to low labor cost countries seems to imply that organizations no longer consider their operations strategic.” I would state that, in fact, the opposite is true. Leading companies, for years, have focused on continual improvement. Toyota is the best known example. They drove the adoption of just in time inventory and then other … Continue reading →

Posted in Management, Manufacturing, Process improvement, quote | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment