Consultant of Lean Manufacturing

Companies of all sizes are now implementing lean manufacturing. Businesses as small as a dentist office are blogging about using lean manufacturing techniques to improve the process and lower costs.

If a company is contemplating hiring a lean manufacturing consultant, they probably need one. If the expertise does not exist within the corporation, valuable time will be lost and money spent unnecessarily until the lean manufacturing consultant is hired.

If the company has lean manufacturing expertise in-house, the question then becomes one of execution and implementation. Can the in-house expert execute the lean implementation plan within the required time frame and budget? Additionally, will the expert receive the required management commitment to implement lean manufacturing?

It is common to see organizations hire a consultant and commit the resources that otherwise not be committed. Is that fair to the in-house consultant? No, but as they say, “it is what it is”. If it takes an outside lean manufacturing consultant to launch a system of massive waste elimination and value creation, does it really matter in the long run?

From a corporate view, all that matters is that the waste elimination occurs and value is created.

Lean manufacturing consultants are often good at motivating the organization into action. Sure, one reason is the corporation is paying for services so it is more compelled to make the most of it. Also, unless the lean manufacturing consultant is going to be paid to wander around, the corporation will probably make a concerted effort to implementation.

If the organization has an in-house lean manufacturing expert and top management commitment, the only reason to hire an outside lean manufacturing consultant would be for additional resources or ideas. A good outside consultant has seen many improvements in various types of organizations with different products. The consultant has undoubtedly witnessed or been involved with a few failures, and thus has the experience and knowledge to prevent or minimize it.

The first step in determining the need for a lean manufacturing consultant is an operational analysis. All areas of the organization should be assessed, including manufacturing, maintenance, engineering, shipping, purchasing, administration, and sales. The magnitude of the waste should be quantified.

Upon completion of the assessment, the need for a lean manufacturing consultant will become transparent.

It is critical for the organization and managers to keep an open mind. This cannot be mandated, but encouraged through written examples, benchmarking visits to and from other companies with successful lean manufacturing implementations.

It is not uncommon for a good lean manufacturing consultant to reduce cost of good sold by 10%. This extremely large number should not be shown to the entire organization up front. It shouldn’t be hidden, but any large number would initially bring fear into the organization.

All lean manufacturing implementations should be preceded with a promise of no job loss as a result. The company should be up front and hones about waste elimination, job combinations, and position elimination, but should also commit to keeping all employees through the process.

Obviously, potential outside circumstances would not permit a guarantee, but if a corporation wants total involvement and maximum success, they will not put people out of work as a result of a lean manufacturing initiative.

When positions are eliminated through lean manufacturing tools, those employees should become part of the 5S or kaizen teams. This only increases the resources and focus enabling more waste elimination.

Almost all successful lean implementations will lead to business growth, enabling the displaced workers to again become direct labor.

When companies “do the right thing”, they are almost always rewarded. The excellent morale and pervasive commitment will fuel additional business, products, or markets.

Manufacturing Software

The fenestration industry refers to those involved in the design and production of windows and doors. In the manufacture and production of products from the fenestration industry, as in many other industries, it requires cost effective processes that are able to adjust to varying consumer demands, productive capacities and inputs, as well as challenges in the supply chain and changes in consumer preferences. One such software, which has been proven to provide businesses a competitive edge through the efficient use of monetary, human and input resources, while empowering the business to vary product designs to suit changing consumer demands and industry trends is manufacturing software.

The fenestration industry is experiencing turbulent times in respect to constant demand changes for new and innovative products, in reaction to external factors such as energy efficiency, style predilections and raw materials that produce the final products. To remain competitive in the marketplace, door and window producers must ensure that their business remains flexible in addressing the constantly changing environment in which they operate. There is no point purchasing software which provides ‘lock-in’ to its capabilities, with limited scope for flexibility in its use. Leading manufacturing software not only creates a streamlined and productive sales, marketing, management and manufacturing tool; it has a level of functionality which allows it to grow as your business does, and react to market trends.

Energy efficiency in the design of homes and buildings has created natural flow-on effects for the fenestration industry, where the design, process inputs and production process itself has to adjust to meet the legislation, ethical and sustainable responsibilities as a company and trends exhibited in the market for a desire for greater energy and resource efficiency. These issues have been transforming the fenestration industry for many years, which can be seen over a 50 year period of commercial window manufacturing where advancements from steel frames and monolithic glass has given way to thermally broken frames that hold insulating units with glass and coatings designed to spectrally reduce heat transfer while maximising natural daylight. With regulations referring to the efficient construction of new buildings, high quality fenestration products are often specified in the original design of the project, meaning that those producers who have not got the capacity to meet the new demands will not even be considered for such projects.

Ensure that your productive capacities are able to change with the times, while at the same time improving the efficiency of production, output and conversion of potential customers to actual sales. Get the right tools in the right place and enquire about manufacturing software today.

CNC Machine Tools

Machine Tools are devices that are mechanical in construction and are powered by an external source. They are most commonly used to produce (fabricate) Machine Components by Machining… Machining is the removal of metal (selectively) from a material. The actual term machine tool describes machinery that is powered by an electrical source (or an external powers source) and not the manual use by humans. Although If the set up is done so appropriately there are certain machines that can be powered by people and are still referred to as Machine Tools.

Historians that focus on past technologies and their developments over time refer to Machine Tools as being truly born when human involvement was removed entirely from the stamping process or shaping process used to manufacture tools. It was back in 1483 when the first machine was manufactured that was directly controlled without the need for people, it was a Cutting Tool Lathe that was for cutting screws. This Lathe did not make the screws from metal though, it used wood and produced Screw Threads, it was a technological breakthrough that forever changed the was machinery worked.

It was much later around the 1800s when the first Machine Tool was actually produced for sale and was manufactured in England by Matthew Murray.

They have evolved so much over the centuries that they are now Computer Numerical Controlled and are referred to as CNC Machine Tools. Computers are used to plot out a process that the machine must take; it follows the steps and creates the desired product. They do not require any human assistance and are extremely precise and accurate.