Keep Your Workfoce Engaged

Do your employees have a ho-hum attitude about the work they perform for you? If you don't even know the answer to that question, then you need to make some time to spend it on the shop floor to see how engaged they are. Sure, they may act differently when "the boss" is on the floor, but in that case, spend some time to ask them, "How happy or engaged are you?" "What more could we do to make your workday better and you more productive?" You'd be surprised how happy your employees would be to know you were asking!

If you're in the start up phase and have to hire new employees, what steps can you take to hire and

keep an engaged workforce? Here are a few items to think about:

1. This should be a no-brainer, but you need to hire the "right" people. To do that you need to know what you expect of them and their specific roles. Don't try to fit the "perfect" person into a role just because he or she may seem perfect on paper. Hire to fill the role you need filled. 
2. Make sure your people are empowered to do their jobs. Sure there will be a training period, but once they've progressed past that timeframe let them do their jobs. Plain and simple. 
3. If your employees don't understand your business's mission and vision, how can they be expected to carry it out? 
4. Talk to them. Just as you talk with your upper management, you should talk to those on the shop floor as they are integral to your business's success. 
5. Offer feedback. Constructive criticism is welcomed by most people if it will help them do better at their jobs. Offer a criticism that also provides a way for them to improve. 

When is the last time you talked with your workforce to see how well they're doing and how happy they are? 

Is Your #Manufacturing Company A Job Shop?

If you were to ask manufacturers if they are a “job shop," I’d guess a great percentage would say “Yes.” They’d say they work on “jobs” and of course a “shop” is just another name for a facility or factory.

In my mind, a true job shop is one that makes discrete quantities of parts on a purchase order and ships them all to a customer in one shipment. No long-term delivery or commitment requirements. On the other hand, a shop that does have longer term purchase orders with multiple releases and/or formal purchase agreements or contracts is not what I would describe as a job shop.

Let’s go through some of the pros and cons of each so you can clearly see what type of business mix you have and whether it works best for you.
                                   

“Job Shop” (as described above)
         
Pros:

• Lower volume- lower investment in outside processes
• Shorter time to payment as total process/invoice cycle is short
• Lower or no WIP (Work In Process) and finished inventory.

Why Kanban Doesn’t Work For #Manufacturers

For many #manufacturers, Kanban is a way of life. It assures minimal inventory and costs of goods sold. They’ll produce only what parts are needed for the next operation or shipment to the customer. On paper, this is terrific. In practice, well, here’s the rest of the story.

For manufacturers that have predictable requirements AND have done research to determine the proper lot size to release in terms of time required and cost for that number of parts, Kanban works pretty well.

Here’s the rub. Many manufacturers adopt Kanban releases without considering how the new system will impact the internal and external systems. For example, let say this manufacturer got a firm order for 1,000 parts from their customer with deliveries of 100 per month for 10 months. However, their internal processes

to make, buy and/or assemble this part are not predictable and may even be described as erratic. For instance, they are not able to process 100 parts per month through their system making or buying these parts. In addition, the time required to make 100 or even 200 parts exceeds a month.

What they should do is have an honest internal discussion and face the reality that only putting 100 pieces at a time into the system causes both higher per piece costs and delivery issues. A second step would be to increase the release size to take into account the completion and needs variations and suck up the inventory costs to carry parts that can’t be delivered.

Let's Talk About The Minimum Wage: A Manufacturer's Take

There is move afoot to raise the minimum wage to “a living wage.” Right now, the federal minimum wage is $7.25/hour. Individual states also have minimum wages that in some cases are higher and some are lower. When you add in minimum wages for “tipped” employees, you get a witch’s brew that is ripe for contention.

I will fully admit that $7.25/hour is not a whole lot of money. Multiply this number times 2000 (40 hrs/wk x 50 weeks) and you get a whopping $14,500 for the year. At this rate, I can’t imagine any taxes being due, so this would also be the net to the worker.

However, the economics I learned does not support raising this wage.

Support Small Business on #SmallBusinessSaturday

When you shop at a locally owned store, 52% of what you spend stays in the community. That is a

staggering figure, I think. When you consider that if you work with a local #manufacturer for your goods and services, you're also benefiting the community, the workforce and likely your own clients because you'll be getting high quality goods at a better price than if you had to ship/shop overseas.

As a small business owner (who will not be braving the malls or other stores on Black Friday) I encourage you to shop local, especially on November 30, which has been again designated, #SmallBusinessSaturday.

Manufacturing Skills Get Learned Overnight? REALLY?

I was reading comments in one of my LinkedIn Groups and almost fell out of my chair. This person who holds a PhD in history, claims that if there were really a shortage of workers for manufacturing companies, wages would be rising and workers would flock to the industry. In a perfect world it might just be true.

Out here in the real world, it just ain’t so. If money were the fix, I’m pretty sure many manufacturers would just throw a gob of money at this problem, snap their fingers and click their heels to solve this “simple” problem.

Unfortunately, the PhD is only half right. Entry level people may not be attracted to the $12-$14 per hour starting wages for many of the unskilled positions you'd score with a basic high school education.

Profit Power Series: 'It's Like Finding Money On The Shop Floor'

We continue with our Profit Power Series which includes: Marketing/Sales, Quality, Engineering, Manufacturing, Finance, Purchasing/Procurement, HR, IT, Facilities/Utilities/Acquisition

As a manufacturer there are many areas of the facility that you need to concern yourself with and one of those is how to best utilize the manufacturing shop floor. As a manufacturing consultant I’ve found that the biggest problem facing shop owners is the use (or improper use) of the space in a manufacturing facility. When companies have a lot of space and are in growth  mode, they tend to use their space without a clear objective or without an eye toward either the bottom line or what they will do when the shop is at full capacity. I see that some planning has been done, but there are no long-term shop-wide plans in place for shop equipment placement.

What does that mean? Machines get placed, in many cases, without regard to how work will flow in and around this machine as well as those around it. Yes, it’s probably in the right department, but more often than not, little thought is given as to how this location will impact workflow in the shop.

Engineering For Manufacturing Success

Engineering is one of my favorite subjects because I believe that most of the upfront planning and work done by any manufacturing company can be classified as “engineering”. The work done by either the shop engineer or the parts designer can dramatically influence how much money will be made.

Two functions of the shop engineer
Just as a train engineer decides how fast a train will go or how to vary the speed during various parts of a run, the manufacturing engineer sets up a routing or process as to how the job will run through the shop. On a more basic level, an engineer may also be responsible for the design of the part or items. These two job functions form the guts of the “engineering” of the parts.

The shop engineer as parts designer
On the drawing board, the engineer has a blank sheet. If he or she designs a part or item that can be readily made by their own shop or multiple outside vendors, out of obtainable materials and relatively standard specifications, chances are good that the part or item can be made to print AND meet the product’s expected price and profit margin. If not, well, watch out and be prepared to get your checkbook out!

I can remember a job my company ran that had a very difficult hole shape that we could not make in-house. When we got quotes to have an outside company make this shape, frankly, I had to do a double take and even a triple take. The price was SO high that I actually called them and they replied that if I didn’t like the price, too bad, as they knew that they had a monopoly on this process. I then called the customer’s engineer about this issue and he told me “that’s how I designed it and that’s how it’s got to be.” Clearly both of these responses are way wrong but I just priced the parts and got them made as they were “engineered.” This customer is no longer in business.