“What is the throughput in your plant?” asked Gole Saab during a discussion on business process re-engineering. This simple and important question made a big difference; it triggered action in this area. Looking back a few months, it was a little difficult to answer. There was no measurement to determine the amount and nature of our ‘throughput’.
Automatic paste printing (APP) to finished goods inventory (FGI). Before we took up the measurement project, there was a continuous flow of jobs within production. We did not keep track of when a job was placed and how much time it should take to get into FGI. In October, my team started with the measurement activities. We thought we would do this over a period of two months. During these two months, we realised that measurement is a foundation for continuous improvement. A structured project was started, under the guidance of Dr Nyati, to achieve the throughput improvement objectives. It was aligned with achieving operations excellence and our strategic objectives – first time right (FTR) and the creation of an effective supply chain.
A cross-functional project team was formed that included key members from Production, Quality, Production Process Engineering (PPE), Materials and Planning. The project commenced in December 2014 with action plans in hand. These were developed from the output of a series of brainstorming sessions and were followed by the performance evaluation of the practices. Every team member took responsibility, and the team as a whole committed to meeting the agreed timelines. We focused on several key areas, from the Master Production Schedule (MPS) to the closure of non-conformance notes (NC) from FQA.
The team scanned every process involved in the production of products that constitute 95 per cent of production at BIA: GBSM, Liberty, Sprint, Premier and i-Credit family. There was some stock mismatch every time material requirements were raised; however, this was resolved by the materials team, and now we always have one week’s stock for class A items, i.e. those products that are a priority. The stock list is circulated to all concerned. This has resulted in zero mismatches. Now, there are no delays in the batch preparation as MPS is available with all functions involved. Having a plan in hand, our PPE team is ready with the batch exactly as required.
Additionally, some Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) are now defined for 17025 labs to ensure a smooth flow towards FGI. Pre-planning the jobs in queue for Final Quality Assurance (FQA) and measuring the turnaround time (TAT) has helped regularise the process, and hence, this does not result in delays to building FGI. During this project, a concept called Gemba was introduced. Gemba basically means the physical presence of a person at the production site to observe and understand the processes.
The collaborative approach has brought great success. As a result, we have achieved our phase I target, which was 85 per cent of the jobs to be finished in three days or less (PTH to FGI). We are at the end of phase II, where the target was 75 per cent of the jobs to be completed in three days or less (APP to FGI), and we have achieved our goal.
‘What you do today can improve all your tomorrows.’- Ralph Marston
We are glad to see the improvements for a better tomorrow. The project, being aligned with strategic objectives, has helped in achieving an OTIF of more than 90 per cent. We have better visibility of inventory.
When we undertake such improvement drives, a treasure trove of learning follows. The team as a whole, besides learning technical skills, learnt the importance of taking initiative, the power of cross-functional teams, time management, the law of two hands and experienced the power of the trim tab. They experienced a disciplined way to execute projects too.
With this, our internal customer (Anuj Kumar Srivastava), whose strategic goal and greatest challenge was to keep raw material inventory under control, felt we were supporting him. He could predict our requirements with greater accuracy as well.
Keeping up the good work leading to ‘joyful effectiveness’ is the aim of all of my team members, and we, as a team, are ready for the upcoming challenges.
-Vijay Horane