A multi-plant manufacturer of metal products was ready for a change. They enjoyed an excellent reputation in the marketplace, but the good reputation came at a price. Internal scrap and rework metrics told the story. High costs reduced the bottom line and took a human toll. With executive support and a broad-based team effort, one of the company’s facilities is serving as a transformational model of the focused, strategic shift to a data-driven culture.
The Director of Corporate Quality described it this way, “We had the ‘monthly one-off syndrome. "We had a different reason for not making our target every month.”
Problem-solving teams constantly shifted their focus to address the current emergency. They lacked constancy of purpose over the long term. To make matters worse, data that could help them identify and solve problems was sadly lacking.
"It was chaotic,” the Director explained. “Everybody was working like maniacs. They were all super busy… It wasn’t that our people weren’t working hard or even that they didn’t understand what they needed. The issue was they didn’t have the data in front of them to know what to work on. Or if they made an improvement, how do they quantify it?”
While the plants were not in danger financially, plenty of money was left on the table from the high scrap and rework costs. Those high costs were a “hidden factory” that produced nothing but waste. If a company with 20 machines operates routinely with a 5% scrap rate, it is the equivalent of one machine in the factory dedicated to producing waste. This is the hidden factory.
But more importantly, the company’s confidence in the data and what they could do with it increased significantly. With more time and more reliable data, they could solve problems faster and monitor the impact of their solutions much more effectively.
The manager explained that GainSeeker is “a primary tool for us to leverage and figure out when we go to solve problems.”
The company has seen a major transformation in how it collects and uses data. They’ve shifted from being reactionary to being proactive. “We’re trying to be anticipatory,” the Director explained. “We want our team to be in a position that when their boss asks them for something, they already have it.”
This transformation has already paid the company significant financial and personal benefits. The team expects GainSeeker to enable transformation well into the future.
Ready to foster a data-driven culture in your manufacturing operations? Contact Hertzler Systems today to learn more about how GainSeeker and/or GS Premier can help you succeed similarly to the manufacturer who reduced scrap by 90%. Turn your data into a competitive edge and unlock measurable improvements.
Hertzler offers flexible deployment options to suit your specific requirements:
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