Tools for Successful Process Improvement

Process Improvement plays extremely important role in any organization. In one of our
article, we had written about the Fundamental Principles of World Class Manufacturing
(WCM) which describes how WCM philosophy will help organizations to achieve
success. It was followed by another article on Steps to achieve WCM which talks about
Faber's proven framework that helps organizations become proactive and not remain
reactive to the changing market dynamics.

To follow this series on WCM, in this article we will discuss important improvement tools
and techniques that are deployed by several transformation leaders and have reaped
fruits for organizations across the world in the continual improvement journey. Details
of few of the powerful tools/methodologies deployed successfully by Faber Infinite at
several client locations are as follows:

Lean Facility Design This is a preventive tool that applies lean principles to
organizations future projects so that waste (muda) can be prevented at an early
stage. This detailed step by step methodology has been devised by Faber Infinite
based on its experience of various elements of industrial engineering, lean and
challenges faced during new facility set up, expansion or relay outing existing
setup. It is a strong enabler towards highly efficient world class set up from day
zero.

Light House Exercise Yet again, this is a framework devised by Faber Infinite
that helps to determine or develop organizational goals and provide a suitable
direction to achieve those goals. It is a robust framework for goal setting and
building its linkages to all the layers within the organization; and policy
deployment.

Autonomous Maintenance It is one of the main pillars of the Total Productive

Maintenance Framework. It helps to enhance the operational excellence journey
and imbibe the continual improvement culture on the shop floor or Gemba. It not
only helps to improve the Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) along with
availability, performance and quality ratios; but helps in creating a culture of
ownership amongst operators.

Quick Change Over This tool can help bring down the setup time by as high as
almost 50% by the implementation of an effective approach of Single Minute
Exchange of Dies (SMED). Even with its classical methods, this tool has never
failed to deliver results where low volumes and high variety is need of the hour.

Value Stream Mapping It is an effective tool which helps the organization to

identify the significant prospects for process improvement, cost reduction,
productivity improvement and improve efficiency thus saving time. It can further
help organizations to improve their performance using existing resources. It is a
paper-pencil tool which encourages participation from the shop floor members
along with the leaders to zero down on the real issues with the larger picture in
mind and not focusing on localized improvements.

Small Group Activities (SGA) Such tools help in enhanced financial returns and
stronger cultural impact. They are also known as Focussed group activities based
on continuous improvement. This is based on a Japanese term called Kobetsu
 Kaizen. This is a structural method of problem-solving and it prevents
reoccurrence of the problem. The members of the group are taught problem-
solving skills, team work, decision making so that they can help each other to
grow and improve.

These are few of the proven strategic excellence process improvement tools, new or old
but have delivered results to the organizations. There will be few more to follow in our
next article.