MFG Day Dispels Common Manufacturing Misconceptions

The second annual MFG Day event, is just around the corner.  Scheduled for October 4, 2013, the event aims to address common misconceptions about manufacturing through coordinated open houses across the United States. MFG Day is designed to address the skilled labor shortage and connect with future generations while simultaneously improving the public image of manufacturing.

Recent global surveys reflect the widespread industry challenge. A 2012 McKinsey & Company report revealed that while most of the young people surveyed (70 percent), admitted that they believe vocational schools are more helpful in getting a job than an academic track, two-thirds also said that vocational education is “less valued” in society than other academic paths. And only 30 percent of parents encourage their children to consider manufacturing careers.

MFG Day is an important part of efforts to support the future of manufacturing here in the US. As manufacturers today, we know that negative, untrue stereotypes plague our sector and drive young people away.  We know that we have to overcome the perception that manufacturing jobs are dirty, dangerous dead ends.  We know that we must spread the word that manufacturing has gone high tech, with modern, clean facilities, computers, robot, and automation.  We know that counteracting outdated, negative images with current, positive ones is the best way to fight problems like the skills gap that threaten the American manufacturing sector's recent boom.

And MFG Day is just the way to do what we know we must. MFG Day gives manufacturers around the country the opportunity to open their doors to local school kids, parents, community college students,  job seekers and members of the media so that they can see firsthand the safe, high-tech and innovative work environments that await the best and brightest who pursue careers in manufacturing.

To learn more about how you can get involved, visit the Manufacturing Day website.

Lean Quote: The Only Cure for Inactivity is Action

On Fridays I will post a Lean related Quote. Throughout our lifetimes many people touch our lives and leave us with words of wisdom. These can both be a source of new learning and also a point to pause and reflect upon lessons we have learned. Within Lean active learning is an important aspect on this journey because without learning we can not improve.

"Regret for wasted time is more wasted time." — Mason Cooley, O Magazine, April 2004

Often managers spot a chance to do something valuable for their company, but for some reason, they cannot get started. Even if they begin the project, they give up when they see the first big hurdle. The inability to take purposeful action seems to be pervasive across companies. Managers tend to ignore or postpone dealing with crucial issues which require reflection, systematic planning, creative thinking, and above all, time.

If you do nothing, nothing changes. Things at rest have a tendency to remain at rest. Be aware of items that stall your action. It's better to have a 50-percent improvement right away than it is to take no action and hope for a 100-percent improvement sometime in the future.

The above quote comes from aphorist Mason Cooley, who reminds us that the only cure for inactivity is action. That’s why the first step in creating a successful culture of execution is creating a bias toward action. People who make things happen need to be praised and rewarded. People who don’t should be coached to change, or weeded out. Failure cannot be unduly punished. Unless people feel free to make mistakes, they will not feel free to take bold actions.

A key to creating a bias for action is to encourage relentless experimentation. Rather than analyze a new product or service to death, look for ways to test it at relatively low cost. Learn from your tries.

 

What is Culture and Why Is It Important?

Corporate culture, safety culture, quality culture, lean culture, … We talk about culture all the time but what is it?

Culture is the environment in which you work all of the time. Culture is a powerful element that shapes your work enjoyment, your work relationships, and your work processes. But, culture is something that you cannot actually see, except through its physical manifestations in your work place.

Culture is like personality. In a person, the personality is made up of the values, beliefs, underlying assumptions, interests, experiences, upbringing, and habits that create a person's behavior.

Culture is made up of the values, beliefs, underlying assumptions, attitudes, and behaviors shared by a group of people. Culture is the behavior that results when a group arrives at a set of - generally unspoken and unwritten - rules for working together.

In a healthy business culture, what's good for the company and for customers comes together and becomes the driving force behind what everyone does. Culture determines what is acceptable or unacceptable, important or unimportant, right or wrong, workable or unworkable. It encompasses all learned and shared, explicit or tacit, assumptions, beliefs, knowledge, norms, and values, as well as attitudes, behavior, dress, and language.

An organizations culture shown in

(1) the ways the organization conducts its business, treats its employees, customers, and the wider community,

(2) the extent to which freedom is allowed in decision making, developing new ideas, and personal expression,

(3) how power and information flow through its hierarchy, and

(4) how committed employees are towards collective objectives.

Company culture is important because it can make or break your company. Companies with an adaptive culture that is aligned to their business goals routinely outperform their competitors.

It affects the organization's productivity and performance, and provides guidelines on customer care and service, product quality and safety, attendance and punctuality, and concern for the environment. It also extends to production-methods, marketing and advertising practices, and to new product creation. Organizational culture is unique for every organization and one of the hardest things to change.

No two organizations can have the same work culture. It is the culture of an organization which makes it distinct from others. The work culture goes a long way in creating the brand image of the organization. The work culture gives an identity to the organization. In other words, an organization is known by its culture.

Teamwork Breeds Successful Improvement

We all have roles in our organizations but it is the power of teamwork that makes our endeavors successful. It takes everyone working together on a common goal to be successful in Lean.

A team of people can achieve far more than the sum of the total of the individuals skills alone. In business teams can achieve:

They can generate a wider range of ideas and innovation than individuals;

They are able to motivate themselves;

They can bounce ideas off each team member;

They often take more risks than individuals;

They have a range of personalities such as workers, thinkers, leaders who contribute the right balance of skills necessary to achieve high performance;

They support each other and are not just task-orientated;

They can be a support mechanism which provide mentoring and allow others to grow in self-confidence.

Teamwork is important to the success of an organization, but as the saying goes: “it’s like getting rich or falling in love, you cannot simply will it to happen.” Teamwork is a practice. Teamwork is an outcome. And teamwork leverages the individual skills of every team member.

To create effective teamwork across your organization, you need to break down any departmental barriers to collaboration so that you can draw on the best people. You need to set clear objectives and define working relationships so that members can work as a cohesive team, and you must provide tools that support efficient collaboration.

Most people respond well to being a valued member of a team by putting forth their best efforts. Human beings are hard wired to work cooperatively with one another to achieve common goals, so remember that not all performance rewards need to go to individuals. Incentives can be provided to the team as a whole for working efficiently together to reach goals.

Collaboration and team work create an environment that allows the collective knowledge, resources and skills of each team member to flourish. When people work together they can complete tasks faster by dividing the work to people of different abilities and knowledge. Teamwork can lead to better decisions, products, or services.

Do you agree that teamwork breed successful improvement?

Lean Quote: Focus Drives Performance

On Fridays I will post a Lean related Quote. Throughout our lifetimes many people touch our lives and leave us with words of wisdom. These can both be a source of new learning and also a point to pause and reflect upon lessons we have learned. Within Lean active learning is an important aspect on this journey because without learning we can not improve.

"Nothing is Less Productive Than Doing What Should Not Be Done at All." — Peter Drucker

It's easy to get bogged down in doing things faster, better, and more efficiently. However, it's all for nothing if the thing we're trying to accomplish isn't going to provide any real benefit in the long run.

People often confuse efficiency and effectiveness, two very different concepts. Efficiency commonly means doing a job quickly. Effectiveness means doing the right tasks and doing them in priority order. Efficiency is doing things right. Effectiveness is doing the right things.

Most people manage time by looking for more time. This is not possible. The only way to make more time is to manage what we do with the time we have.

The 80/20 principle is key to increased productivity. 80% of our results are typically achieved from 20% of our activities. These high payoff activities have the most impact on our success now and in the future. The other 20% of our results, our low payoff activities, come from 80% of our work effort.

Many of us work in what I call “crisis management”. We are always doing. We manage second and communicate third. If we have time, we may plan and set goals. What does crisis management accomplish? People don't work together. Tasks don't get accomplished on time. Quality may be compromised. People get stressed and harried. The list goes on.

What if we could work in proactive way where we plan and set goals first, where we communicate and schedule priorities then track and measure results? Our results would be very different. Tasks would be finished on time with less waste, turnover and better quality, creating a positive work environment.

The key to increasing productivity while not working harder is to work on the right things.

High payoff activities drives focus. Focus drives performance. Performance drives results. Focus is key to developing success. Unified focus across an organization is one key to developing competitive advantage in your marketplace.

 

Visual Management, A Status At A Glance

In the game of baseball why do fans repeatedly look at the scoreboard when the action is clearly on the field? The scoreboard answers important questions about the status of the game. It tells us how our team is doing in relation to the goal, to win the game! Visual management is the scoreboard for our business.

Visual management provides a clear and common understanding of goals and measures of the business. With this information employees are able to align their actions and decisions with the overall strategic direction of the company. It is also an open window to factory performance, and it provides the same unbiased information to everyone, whether owner, manager, operator, or visitor.

The goal in Visual management is to create a “status at a glance” in the workplace. This refers to an operating environment where anyone can enter the workplace and:

See the current situation (Self-explaining)

See the work process (Self-ordering)

See if you are ahead, behind or on schedule (Self-regulating) and

See when there is an abnormality (Self-improving)

Visual management is the language of the Lean production system. The Gemba is about observation and our observation is greatly enhanced by the ability to see the “status at a glance.” Without it we can’t see the wastes in our factory, which are the greatest source of potential improvements in customer service and business performance. Visuals ensure that what is supposed to happen happens on time, every time by everyone involved.

The key objectives of visual management are:

Give the status (Indicator Lights)

Direct and locate things (Road signs)

Indicate actions (Traffic Lights)

Show what is right or wrong (Lines in parking lots)

Although each tool has a different objective, the goal of all visual management tools is the same:  Status at a Glance.  For a leader, especially a leader in an organization that is on the pathway to a Lean transformation, visual management is one of the most fundamental and necessary elements to success. 

There is irrefutable evidence that a “shared vision” is critical to the success of today’s businesses. Visual management communicates the “shared vision” along with an understanding of how each individual should contribute toward that success. It’s a company-wide “nervous system” that allows all employees to understand how they affect the factory’s overall performance. 

Happy Labor Day!

Happy Labor Day to all my American readers! For a lot of people, Labor Day means two things: a day off and the end of summer. However, Labor Day is a day set aside to pay tribute to working men and women and acknowledges the value and dignity of work and its role in American life.

Here are ten interesting facts that you might not know about regarding Labor Day:

1. Labor Day originates from our neighbors to the north

Most Americans consider Labor Day a uniquely American experience, but in all reality, Labor Day has it’s origins in Canada. Stemming from 1870’s labor disputes in Toronto, in 1872 a parade was held in support of a strike against the 58 hour workweek. As a result, 24 union leaders who were responsible for organizing the event were arrested under anti-union laws.

2. First US Labor Day observance was in the form of a parade

The first US observance of Labor Day came in the form of a parade. Sponsored by the Central Labor Union, On September 5th, 1882 ten thousand workers paraded through New York City. This is commonly considered the first observance of Labor Day in America.

3. The 12 hour work day norm

What’s outrageous enough to spur ten thousand people to parade through NYC? A 12 hour workweek! In the late 19th century, the average working day consisted of 12 hours. Held on a Tuesday, the first Labor Day rally was held in order to gain support for the 8 hour workday.

4. Oregon first to declare Labor Day an official holiday

In February of 1887, the great state of Oregon was the first in the Union to pass law making Labor Day and officially recognized holiday.

5. Grover Cleveland makes Labor Day a national holiday

Making Labor Day an official national holiday as part of his political campaign, in 1894, President Grover Cleveland made good on his promise, and signed a law making Labor Day an officially recognized US holiday.

6. Not just in the US

Although Labor Day hails from Canada and the US, a large number of industrialized nations around the world celebrate Labor Day as a time to respect and reflect upon workers around the world. While not all celebrate it at the beginning of summer, the concept is similar, and is sometimes celebrated in combination of May Day.

7. First Waffle House opens on Labor Day

In 1955, in Avondale Estates, Georgia, the very first Waffle House opened it’s doors to the public. 25 states and 50 years later, Waffle House now counts over 1500 establishments. Yay waffles!

8. The White border

Labor Day has been traditionally the unofficial “pack up the whites” border, and was often considered a fashion faux pas, if worn post-Labor Day. This tradition has been steadily decreasing over the past decade(s), and is often now just remembered as the “something that once was.”

9. 150 million working Americans

As of 2008, there were 154.4 million people over the age of 16 in the US with jobs. Around ¾ of these workers receive paid vacation time, but an extra day off is certainly nothing to sneeze at.

10. Unofficial NFL season kickoff

99.44 percent of the time, the NFL plays it’s first official season game the Thursday after Labor Day.

So there you have it. Perhaps a few things you already knew about Labor Day, but hopefully a few that you didn’t.

We celebrate Labor Day because we are all in this world of work together. Let’s enjoy the fruits of our labor and the solidarity of workers, the work we do, and the nation and economy we and our parents and their parents have built. Happy Labor Day!