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Component Manufacturing dverti$er
Ben Hershey, President, Coach, & Mentor 4Ward Consulting Group, LLC
April 2017 #10213 Page #50
Adverti$er
Don’t Forget! You Saw it in the
How Quality Control is Essential in your Lean Program Part 4 in our TIMWOODS Series
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higeo Shingo, who is considered the world’s leading expert on manufacturing practices and the Toyota Production System, wrote “humans are animals that make mistakes.” But how often do we make mistakes in our lumber yards, millwork, and component operations? Trained military technicians make mistakes 20% of the time in simulated emergency situations. (Scary, isn’t it?) So is the solution to mistakes and defects getting rid of human operators and automating the whole process? No. Even if everything could be automated, we would still have imperfect raw material. We will always need to address the reality that “animals that make mistakes” are at the heart of our operations. We cannot eliminate all defects, but we can work to limit them. Defects are what most people think of when you talk about waste, but these are only one small part of the eight wastes. Defects are mistakes that require additional time, resources, and money to fix. In a lumber yard, a defect might be moldy material that is passed on to a customer that you have to make a special trip to go back out and replace. In our component yards, it may be material with excessive wane or knots that passes through our saws and makes it to the assembly tables only to be rejected and stop production. Recently I was in one of the many operations I work with each year and I saw both the good and bad of how defects get through our system. But let’s start with this philosophy right up front that should be non-negotiable for everyone: TIM WOODS: Our “friend” and acronym for the eight wastes in Transportation, Inventory, Motion, Waiting, Over-Processing, OverProduction, Defects, and Skills.
• We do not accept bad work or material • We do not do bad work • We do not pass on bad work or material
These three principles serve as good best practice for any quality control program in any operation. Indeed, defects can be limited using best practices including standardized work plans, more stringent quality control at all levels, a full understanding of work requirements and customer needs, and simple job aids such as checklists and visuals.
Defects tend to be the result of: • • • • •
PHONE: 800-289-5627
Poor quality control Poor documentation Poor work practices Misunderstanding of customer needs Poor design
• • • • •
Poor repair Lack of standards Weak or missing processes Poor inventory control Lack of standards
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