New Shop Floor Management

In this first comprehensive departure from the time-and-motion dictums of Frederick Taylor's Shop Management that have influenced management practices for most of this century, Kiyoshi Suzaki offers a framework for successfully conducting business at its most crucial point-the shop floor. Drawing on the principles of holistic management, where organizational boundaries are smashed and co-destiny is created, Suzaki demonstrates how modern shop floor management techniques -- focusing maximum energy on the front line -- can lead to dramatic improvements in productivity and valueadded-to-services. The role of management today, Suzaki argues, is to eliminate its own responsibilities by thinking of the organization from the genba, or shop floor, point of view. In this challenge, Suzaki claims, organizations need to collect the wisdom of people by practicing "Glass Wall Management," where organizations become transparent, enabling employees to contribute maximum creativity as opposed to blocking their potential with what he calls "Brick Wall Management." Further, to empower individuals to selfmanage their work and satisfy their customers, Suzaki asserts that they all should learn to manage their own "mini-company," where everybody is considered president of his or her area of responsibility. Front-line supervisors, Suzaki shows, must develop a mission and goals and share them both up and downstream. He cites examples of the "shop floor point of view" -- McDonald's Corporation's legal staff learning how to sell hamburgers and fix milkshake machines; Honda's human resource staff training on the assembly line -- that narrow the gap between top management and the shop floor. By upgrading people's skills, focusing on empowerment, and streamlining processes, Suzaki illustrates that an organization will realize concrete improvements in quality, cost, delivery, safety, morale, and ultimately, its competitive position.

Kanban is the name given to the inventory control card used in a pull system. The primary benefit of kanban is to reduce overproduction, the worst of the seven deadly wastes. A true kanban system produces exactly what is ordered, when it is ordered, and in the quantities ordered. It is essentially a dynamic work order that moves with the material. Each kanban identifies the part or subassembly unit and indicates where each one came from and where each is going. Used this way, kanban acts as a system of information that integrates your plant, connects all processes one to another, and connects the entire value stream to customer demand. Kanban for the Shopfloor provides a working manual for those seeking to implement this method of production control in any operation. It defines the various terms and methods employed in kanbans, and illustrates how when adhered to, kanban is an element of continuous improvement that ultimately leads to the ideal of one-piece flow." In addition to reducing the waste of overproduction, kanban will help your company increase flexibility to respond to customer demand, coordinate production of small lots and wide product variety, and simplify the procurement process. About the Shopfloor Series: Put proven improvement tools in the hands of your entire workforce! Progressive shopfloor improvement techniques are imperative for manufacturers who want to stay competitive and to achieve world class excellence. And it's the comprehensive education of all shopfloor workers that ensures full participation and success when implementing new programs. The Shopfloor Series books make practical information accessible to everyone by presenting major concepts and tools in simple, clear language and at a reading level that has been adjusted for operators by skilled instructional designers. One main idea is presented every two to four pages so that the book can be picked up and put down easily. Each chapter begins with an overview and ends with a summary section. Helpful illustrations are used throughout. Other topics in the Shopfloor Series: Kanban, 5S, Quick Changeover, Mistake-Proofing, Just-in-Time, TPM, Cellular Manufacturing

Shop floor control and namely the problem of job shop scheduling have been fields of research for a long time. However, until now no comprehensive framework on the various aspects exists. This book will provide a systems perspective towards shop floor control by stressing its sociotechnical and cybernetical nature. It focuses on the behavioral aspects of control activities and sees the shop floor as the center of value-adding manufacturing activities within an enterprise. The book enables the reader to understand the interaction of organization, information technology and human resources. This eventually allows to achieve holistic and agile solutions and facilitates profound organizational change. The book will therefore provide a welcome addition to several standard textbooks on the issue.

As a consultant, Kiyoshi Suzaki has helped scores of Fortune 500 clients improve manufacturing operations and get the job done faster, cheaper, better, and safer. Now, in this detailed "operating manual" -- full of more step-by-step applications than any other book available -- Suzaki spells out new options in production and employee resources that can help American industry regain the cutting edge in price, quality, and delivery of products. A well-known expert in the field, Suzaki begins with the premise that "if it doesn't add value, it's waste" -- a concept devised by Henry Ford and later used by Toyota. He recaps what Toyota identifies as the seven most prominent forms of waste in factories. Most importantly, he meticulously details steps individuals can take to "simplify, combine, and eliminate operations" -- thereby reducing waste, improving quality, and saving money. Describing in detail the basic techniques culled from Japanese industrial philosophy and procedure, Suzaki shows how small, family-run businesses and billion-dollar American corporations from a wide range of industries -- automotive, electronics, cosmetics, and even defense contractors -- are meeting the manufacturing challenge today -- demolishing the widely held belief that most American manufacturers have become distribution organizations for products manufactured overseas. In addition, he links his methodology with several successful production systems, from Just-In-Time Production, Total Quality Control, Total Productive Maintenance to Computer Integrated Manufacturing. Throughout this practical handbook, he places emphasis squarely on the shop floor and grounds his approach in easy, yet powerful techniques everybody can understand and implement today. Illustrated with numerous charts and exhibits, The New Manufacturing Challenge shows how to integrate people and techniques to improve the workplace and, thus, strengthen any company's competitiveness in the global marketplace.

Industrial engineering is the profession dedicated to making collective systems function better with less waste, better quality, and fewer resources, to serve the needs of society more efficiently and more effectively. This book uses a story-telling approach to advocate and elaborate the fundamental principles of industrial engineering in a simple, interesting, and engaging format. It will stimulate interest in industrial engineering by exploring how the tools and techniques of the discipline can be relevant to a broad spectrum of applications in business, industry, engineering, education, government, and the military. Features Covers the origin of industrial engineering Discusses the early pioneers and profiles the evolution of the profession Presents offshoot branches of industrial engineering Illustrates specific areas of performance measurement and human factors Links industrial engineering to the emergence of digital engineering Uses the author’s personal experience to illustrate his advocacy and interest in the profession

The philosophy of kaizen, which simply means continuous improvement, needs to adopted by any organization seeking to implement lean improvements that go beyond cost cutting. Kaizen events are opportunities to make focused changes in the workplace. Kaizen for the Shopfloor takes readers through the critical steps for conducting a very effective kaizen event: one that is well planned, well implemented, and well documented. As the newest addition to the Shingo Prize Winning Shopfloor Series, Kaizen for the Shopfloor distills the complexities of jump starting lean processes into an easily accessible format for those frontline employees who make lean possible. About the Shopfloor Series: Put proven improvement tools in the hands of your entire workforce! Progressive shopfloor improvement techniques are imperative for manufacturers who want to stay competitive and to achieve world class excellence. And it's the comprehensive education of all shopfloor workers that ensures full participation and success when implementing new programs. The Shopfloor Series books make practical information accessible to everyone by presenting major concepts and tools in simple, clear language and at a reading level that has been adjusted for operators by skilled instructional designers. One main idea is presented every two to four pages so that the book can be picked up and put down easily. Each chapter begins with an overview and ends with a summary section. Helpful illustrations are used throughout.

With continuous improvement (kaizen) and Total Quality Control (TQC) becoming increasingly important to world class companies, there's an urgent need to build quality into every management decision. The tools presented in this book allow you to do just that. They represent the most important advance in quality deployment and project management in recent years. Unlike the seven traditional QC tools, which measure quality problems that already exist and are used by quality circles, these seven new QC tools make it possible for managers to plan wide-ranging and detailed TQC objectives throughout the entire organization. These tools, some borrowed from other disciplines and others developed specifically for quality management, include the relations diagram, the KJ method (affinity diagram), the systematic diagram, the matrix diagram, matrix data analysis, the process decision program chart (PDPC), and the arrow diagram. Together they will help you to: Expand the scope of quality efforts company-wide. Set up and manage the systems necessary to resolve major quality problems. Anticipate potential quality problems and actually eliminate defects before they happen. Never before available in English, Management for Quality Improvement is absolutely essential reading if you are in any area of project management, quality assurance, MIS, or TQC.

In today’s competitive global environment, manufacturers are offered with unprecedented opportunities to build hyper-efficient and highly flexible plants, towards meeting variable market demand, while at the same time supporting new production models such as make-to-order (MTO), configure-to-order (CTO) and engineer-to-order (ETO). During the last couple of years, the digital transformation of industrial processes is propelled by the emergence and rise of the fourth industrial revolution (Industry4.0). The latter is based on the extensive deployment of Cyber-Physical Production Systems (CPPS) and Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) technologies in the manufacturing shopfloor, as well as on the seamless and timely exchange of digital information across supply chain participants. The benefits of Industry 4.0 have been already proven in the scope of pilot and production deployments in a number of different use cases including flexibility in automation, predictive maintenance, zero defect manufacturing and more. Despite early implementations and proof-of-concepts, CPPS/IIoT deployments are still in their infancy for a number of reasons, including:• Manufacturers’ poor awareness about digital manufacturing solutions and their business value potential, as well as the lack of relevant internal CPPS/IIoT knowledge.• The high costs that are associated with the deployment, maintenance and operation of CPPS systems in the manufacturing shopfloors, which are particularly challenging in the case of SME (Small Medium Enterprises) manufacturers that lack the equity capital needed to invest in Industry 4.0.• The time needed to implement CPPS/IIoT and the lack of a smooth and proven migration path from existing OT solutions.• The uncertainty over the business benefits and impacts of IIoT and CPPS technologies, including the lack of proven methods for the techno-economic evaluation of Industry4.0 systems. • Manufacturers’ increased reliance on external integrators, consultants and vendors. • The absence of a well-developed value chain needed to sustain the acceptance of these new technologies for digital automation.In order to alleviate these challenges, three European Commission funded projects (namely H2020 FAR-EDGE (http://www.far-edge.eu/), H2020 DAEDALUS (http://daedalus.iec61499.eu) and H2020 AUTOWARE (http://www.autoware-eu.org/)) have recently joined forces towards a “Digital Shopfloor Alliance”. The Alliance aims at providing leading edge and standards based digital automation solutions, along with guidelines and blueprints for their effective deployment, validation and evaluation. The present book provides a comprehensive description of some of the most representative solutions that offered by these three projects, along with the ways these solutions can be combined in order to achieve multiplier effects and maximize the benefits of their use. The presented solutions include standards-based digital automation solutions, following different deployment paradigms, such as cloud and edge computing systems. Moreover, they also comprise a rich set of digital simulation solutions, which are explored in conjunction with the H2020 MAYA project (http://www.maya-euproject.com/). The latter facilitate the testing and evaluation of what-if scenarios at low risk and cost, but also without disrupting shopfloor operations. As already outlined, beyond leading edge scientific and technological development solutions, the book comprises a rich set of complementary assets that are indispensable to the successful adoption of IIoT/CPPS in the shopfloor. The book is structured in three parts as follows: • The first part of the book is devoted to digital automation platforms. Following an introduction to Industry 4.0 in general and digital automation platforms in particular, this part presents the digital automation platforms of the FAR-EDGE, AUTOWARE and DAEDALUS projects. • The second part of the book focuses on the presentation of digital simulation and digital twins’ functionalities. These include information about the models that underpin digital twins, as well as the simulators that enable experimentation with these processes over these digital models. • The third part of the book provides information about complementary assets and supporting services that boost the adoption of digital automation functionalities in the Industry4.0 era. Training services, migration services and ecosystem building services are discussed based on the results of the three projects of the Digital Shopfloor Alliance. The target audience of the book includes:• Researchers in the areas of Digital Manufacturing and more specifically in the areas of digital automation and simulation, who wish to be updated about latest Industry4.0 developments in these areas.• Manufacturers, with an interest in the next generation of digital automation solutions based on Cyber-Physical systems.• Practitioners and providers of Industrial IoT solutions, which are interested in the implementation of use cases in automation, simulation and supply chain management.• Managers wishing to understand technologies and solutions that underpin Industry4.0, along with representative applications in the shopfloor and across the supply chain.