August 11, 2016 Industry Forum Blog lean manufacturing, Olympic rowing Eights, Oxford and Cambridge boat race, Takt Time Takt is a German word meaning beat or rate. We can see this in action; in the annual Oxford and Cambridge boat race or the Olympic rowing Eights. The cox calls the stroke, or beat, which co-ordinates the power and the rhythm of the rowers. To win you need to get the rhythm or pace right throughout the different stages of the race. In manufacturing we co-ordinate the rhythm or pace at which we produce parts using takt time. It is defined as: “The rate at which you need to produce products in order to satisfy customer demand.” Why do we use takt time? To “win” in manufacturing we need to make exactly what the customer wants, when they want it. This is the first principal when creating a lean manufacturing system. If we make less, the customer is not happy. If we make more, then we are over producing and create inventory. These are wastes and cost us money. Takt time helps us to make the quantity required by the customer at just the right time to keep inventory to a minimum. How do we set takt time? We can work out what our takt time needs to be by using two key pieces of information and this formula. Takt time = Time available for running the process Customer demand The customer always sets the demand. The manufacturer sets the amount of time available. It is equal to the total available time minus planned downtime. See the worked example. In high volume manufacturing plants, like car assembly plants, takt time is usually expressed in seconds. Longer units of time are used if the processes are particularly lengthy, like assembling an aircraft wing. Tip: Don’t confuse takt time with cycle time or throughput time. What if cycle time is greater than takt time? You’ve worked out your takt time is 20 seconds, however it takes 80 seconds to make the whole part. There are 2 options. Have a number of identical stations producing the same part. In this case you would need 4 to meet customer demand (=80/20). Split the manufacturing down into a series of smaller stages. Carry each stage out on a different station before passing it on to the next. The total time for the work at each stage can be no longer than your takt time. Think of it in terms of the rowing. The race takes more than 1 stroke of the oars to complete. But each individual stroke, at the required beat, moves the boat closer to the finish line. Each of your manufacturing stations is equivalent to one stroke of the oars. You can visualise the part moving from station to station until it reaches finished goods by clicking on the image below. Tip: Find a way to let people know if they are working to takt time. If we are left to our own devices it is very easy to either, go faster and overproduce, or too slowly and miss delivery. If you don’t have a fixed speed production line, where the part automatically moves out of your work zone, then investigate a visual method to indicate your actual output versus the target output. For more information on how to calculate takt time for your plant and use it as part of your unique lean system contact the Industry Forum team today.
August 3, 2016 Industry Forum Blog Ashley McKenzie, continuous improvement, Cool Runnings, Dick Fosbury, Fosbury, Fosbury flop, improvement, improvement cycle, Jamaican bobsledding team, Olympic athletes, Olympics, Sir Dave Brailsford, Spirit of improvement The mind set we use for successful improvement is one that our Olympic athletes demonstrate year in, year out. These 5 spirits of improvement apply whether we are running a kaizen activity or carrying out our daily jobs. Spirit 1. Challenge all the fixed ideas. We often find it difficult to break out of a long held habit or way of doing things. But unless we can challenge our fixed ideas in a positive way, we will never move forwards. This is exactly what Dick Fosbury did in the 1960’s. To help him jump higher he challenged the existing straddle technique. The resulting “Fosbury Flop” is now used by all the elite high jumpers. Fosbury also demonstrated the next spirit. Spirit 2. Do it now! No excuses. It is tempting to put off implementing a solution until it is perfect. The problem is you may never get round to doing it. Try out an improvement idea immediately. Even if it means mocking it up to prove it works before investing. Fosbury experimented over a number of years. First he tried the scissor kick before gradually adjusting his technique. He persisted, despite criticism for his style, and his results kept improving. End result – gold in the 1968 Olympics. Spirit 3. Use your wisdom, not money! You can always make initial improvements without having to spend. The trick is to think of ways to modify what is currently done. Then, try out your ideas by mocking up a solution. When you get it to work then you can invest. I couldn’t resist using the example of the Jamaican bobsledding team here. This tropical nation first competed in the Winter Olympics in 1998. While I found no proof that they practiced using a bath tub and a refrigerated van, as in the film Cool Runnings, it is true that they borrowed other team’s spare sleds. After 7 games appearances, in 2014 they appointed their own experienced coach, having started with support and advice from other bobsledders at the games. Spirit 4. Get to the root cause by asking why? – 5 times. The key to solving problems is to use a logical approach and get to the root cause of the problem. It’s no good applying a sticking plaster to the symptom. One way to do this is to keep asking “why?” until the root cause is established. I didn’t find any examples of Olympians using Problem Solving techniques, please share any you find. However, one of Team GBs current hopefuls sums up the perseverance required to make this technique work. Ashley McKenzie, who competes in the 60kg Judo category says “I am arguing all day, until you tell me I am right.” Spirit 5. Improvement is infinite, better is not good enough. This reminds us that the improvement cycle never stops. If you sit back after you have made 1 improvement then the competition will overtake you. All our athletes demonstrate this, however, Sir Chris Brailsford summed it up best, “Sport is about continuous improvement, it’s about getting better. It’s about being better next year than you are this year.” His cycling teams examine every single aspect of their sport and try to increase each one by even 1%. These all add up to give significant advantages. He adds “We’ve got to keep looking, researching and working – trying things. And that’s what it’s all about.” Contact our team to find out how Industry Forum can help improve your manufacturing competitiveness today.
July 27, 2016 Industry Forum Blog British Cycling, continuous improvement, Hoshin Kanri, How to lead, leadership style, leadership techniques, Olympics, Policy Deployment, Sir Dave Brailsford, Team Sky, Tour de France If you are seeking leadership techniques to get the best from your team, look no further than Sir Dave Brailsford, Principal for Team Sky. Team Sky crossed the finish line for the 2016 Tour de France with arms linked. Their 4th win in 5 years. Prior to this Brailsford was performance director for the British Cycling Olympic team. They built their medal haul from 2 in 2004, to lead the 2008 table with 8 golds. They repeated this feat at the 2012 Olympics. Between 2003 and 2013 British cyclists across disciplines as diverse as road, track, BMX and mountain bike racing won 59 World Championships. When he said “Sport is about continuous improvement, it’s about getting better” I realised he would have some good lessons for those of us leading our own business improvement teams. I’ve compiled these top 4 tips from interviews and articles about Brailsford’s leadership style. 1. Start with a clear vision and understand how to win Is your vision and goal compelling? Is your stated goal to win or just finish the race, maybe in a better place than last year? What effect will a wishy-washy goal have on your team? Will they be committed and accountable for their actions? Probably not. Each of Brailsford’s cycling teams’ starts by defining what winning looks like. They then work back and create a plan to get them there. Everybody in the team, not just the cyclists, have a clear role and tasks to accomplish. This is the crux of Policy Deployment, the technique we use in business to point everyone in the organisation in the same direction and navigate them to the desired end point. It’s also known as Hoshin Kanri. 2. Do the simple things excellently On the rare occasions where Brailsford’s team have not been successful he has analysed what went wrong. After the 2010 Tour de France he is reported as saying they concentrated on the peas rather than the steak. By this he meant they focussed on the clever touches rather than the basics of performance. This is just as true when leading improvement programmes. If you don’t concentrate on maintaining the basic standard created by deploying the foundation tools, you won’t have a stable base for the clever techniques to further enhance performance. 3. Behavioural change only comes from within Brailsford believes that you can’t force change on an individual. He states that change in behaviour will usually only happen when either the suffering is great enough or the reward big enough! That doesn’t mean you have to make people suffer to want to change. Remember the tale of the team and the newt. What he means is find what makes each individual want to improve and as leader, tailor your messages accordingly. 4. Give ownership and make people feel genuinely valued By creating the right culture for individuals to flourish Brailsford believes you get 30% more. He uses a coaching style and gets teams to create their own rules. The opportunity to influence the group improves buy in and individual engagement. These are just a few of the ways in which Brailsford prepares his team to win and continue winning. The good news is that they are all directly transferable to our teams at work. Examine your leadership techniques and see if you can benefit from a blend of Brailsford and business improvement techniques. If you would like to know more about Leadership and management for manufacturers, why not check out our Leadership Development Programme?
July 20, 2016 Industry Forum Blog F1, Hamilton, machine changeovers, Mercedes, Rosberg, Silverstone 2106, SMED, SMED the lean technique, standardised procedure, waste elimination Silverstone 2016 saw the second race of the season start under the control of the safety car. But rather than being dull, it initiated a breathtaking series of pit stops as the whole field changed from wet to intermediate tyres within a few minutes of each other. At one point, you could actually see both Hamilton and Rosberg, the Mercedes team mates, in the pits at the same time. Blink and you would have missed two perfectly executed, full tyre changes with no waiting. Check out the race highlights at around the 1 minute mark. Each stop takes about 2 seconds. The fastest ever recorded was at the US Grand Prix in 2013, when Mark Webber’s stop was timed at 1.923s How do they do this? It’s all based on the principles used for SMED; the lean technique we use to reduce the time it takes to change a machine from making one part to another. In F1, the pit stop is the equivalent of the machine downtime. The aim is to get the car back racing as quickly as possible. F1 pit stop tricks we can use in manufacturing Every one hundredth of a second counts on a pit stop. Here are some of the key waste elimination tips the pit crews use. These apply equally to our own machine changeovers. 1) Preparation before the stop is key The whole crew discuss and clarify their targets the night before the race. A few laps before the car pits, the crew receive warning and get into the right mindset. 2) Use precise locations for everything The car drives in and stops in a precisely marked position. This ensures it is jacked straight up with no time lost adjusting positions. 3) Follow a standardised procedure These exist for all common scenarios; wheel change, nose cone replacement, punctures, cleaning rubbish from the air intakes and adjusting the wings to alter downforce. On race day, there is no tinkering with the procedure. Trying different methods and tooling only takes place in controlled sessions back at the factory. 4) Practise, practise, practise The crew practise their set procedures as a team and individuals practise specific skills. The crew on the high speed air guns practise getting on the nut first time. The jack men practise clean lifts. The drivers practise stopping exactly on the marks. 5) Adapt the equipment The most frequently damaged parts are designed with quick changeovers is mind. On the nose cone, a quick release catch is used instead of multiple sets of time consuming bolts. The front and rear jacks have quick release levers as no powered device can be used. The front jack also has a swivel feature that enables the jack man to move out of the way quicker, speeding up car release. 6) Never stop looking for waste The length of time for F1 pit stops has changed drastically over the years. In this video from the 1950s, it took 67 seconds to change 4 wheels and add fuel. In the 1990s, when refuelling was still allowed, pit stops had shrunk to 7 seconds. Gone were the men appearing leisurely with wheels in their hands and removing them with hefty belts of a hammer. This table shows how the four step technique helped achieve this reduction. Even since the refuelling ban, the wheel change element has reduced from 4s to 2s. Your challenge: Incorporate these tips into the four step technique to further improve your own changeover times. – July 2016 authored by a Senior Consultant at Industry Forum Update Reviewing this very interesting article, one thing struck me, and the title explains it – the word ‘How’. As an Engineer, I often find myself diving into the detail – How does this work? How to do that? Perhaps though, we should start with asking Why? Why reduce changeover times? What is the benefit? With the F1 example, it was all about saving time in the pits in order to complete the race distance in the shortest time possible. But in manufacturing, the driving need (if you will pardon the pun) is different. By changing over in a shorter time, you can use the time saved to….do more changeovers! Why? Because by changing over more frequently, you can afford to produce smaller batch runs (as a shorter time will elapse before you will be making the same part again), and that’s a big benefit! Why? Because the shorter the batch run, the less inventory you will have to hold. If you make a part once a week, you have to make a batch big enough to cover the whole week’s demand. If you can be slick enough to changeover and make the same part twice a week, the batch size only needs to cover half the week – so the inventory carrying aspect quantity halves. If you can make a batch every day of a 5-day week, you’re down to one fifth of the cycle stock. That reduces risk (obsolescence, carrying costs, and quality issues) and releases cash. In manufacturing terms, that’s a race worth winning… If you want to understand more about lean techniques, visit our Lean Transformation page or click here to get in touch with Principal Lean Consultant, Mike Scull. You can also give us a call on +44 (0)121 717 6600.
July 14, 2016 Industry Forum Blog Scary statement! You have never done and finished with 5S. This lean tool is used not only to carry out an initial workplace organisation activity, but should become part of your daily routine. 5S, also known as 5C, is the 5 step technique that organises, maintains and improves any workplace so that it is safe and supports sustainable quality, cost and delivery performance. For you to get these essential business benefits you need to ensure that it is not just a one off activity. And if you are struggling with this, be assured you are not alone. Even world class plants can on occasion struggle to maintain what we call the 5S standard. About 15 years ago a colleague visited the Honda plant near Swindon, and was amazed when the person in charge apologised for their 5S standard! While they may have been in the middle of introducing a new model on the line, they still did not see that as a valid excuse for any lapse. At the other end of the country, Nissan don’t actually practise 5S. They have 3S! This is because they have ingrained the technique so deeply in their culture and daily work routines that they no longer list the last two steps. So how do we achieve this? You must start from a solid foundation. Let’s assume that you have already followed best practice to the letter (see our 5S guide). You have conducted the initial 3S activity to set and maintain a standard. The employees in the area have created and use simple 5S checklists. You and your team regularly find ways to further improve on that standard; the 4th step Standardise. You come up with modifications to make it easier or quicker to maintain the condition. And you identify re-occurring abnormal conditions from the Red Tag Log and countermeasure these to prevent re-occurrence. Step 5 – Sustain The aim of this step is for the technique to become custom and practise throughout the whole organisation. Here are my top 7 tips on how to achieve this Ensure you apply the technique in every department. Involve every member of staff, not just in the training but in the practical application as well. Include 5S training in the induction programme for every employee, no matter what level. Define each individual’s 5S responsibilities as part of their job description. Be consistent in your application. Don’t abandon 5S because of work pressures (remember Honda). Always provide the time and equipment for people to conduct their responsibilities. Don’t have special clean ups or hide things for visitors – this completely undermines and devalues the technique. Encourage staff from the area to show visitors round and explain the 5S standard. People take more ownership when they can express pride in what they do. Use a layered audit system to provide rigorous reinforcement of the importance of maintaining the standard. 5S is one of the foundation improvement tools. These are used to stabilise performance of the workplace and achieve customer satisfaction. Let it slip and it will undermine any other improvements you try and make, as well as affecting performance. At the workplace use your daily checksheets. Get these checked weekly by area leaders. Review prevention measures monthly. Have senior managers assess the spirit of deployment on a quarterly basis. Get them to ask probing questions. If you need additional help in ensuring 5S works for you then please contact the IF team.
July 6, 2016 Industry Forum Blog Supply chains as we know them are not just becoming quicker thanks to technology. They are about to be reversed. No longer will the manufacturer be the one to initiate which goods, and what volumes go to market. The pairing of smart phones and tablets with locally based 3D print shops and the advent of last mile delivery drones will shift control to the consumer. Traditional Up until recently most of us would go to a brick built store to buy what we needed from the range of goods available on the shelf. Our choice is limited to what the store decides to sell, or will order on our behalf and ultimately the manufacturer determines what specification, sizes, colours and styles will be available. Depending on the goods, these decisions are influenced by market research and forecasts. For something truly bespoke you would have to search for a suitable provider and pay accordingly. Once made the manufacturer pushes the goods out to the market usually via a series of warehouses. As shown in the diagram, the supply chain starts with the manufacturer designing, sourcing and making a range of goods. Modern Today an increasing amount of what we buy is done on-line. Companies like Amazon have allowed us to take control over when we shop, as well as where and to some extent when we receive our goods. On-line shopping and the resulting simplification of the supply chain route has already given us significant reductions in lead time from purchase to receipt. And although manufacturers are focusing on satisfying ever more demanding consumers, they are still the ones who initiate the supply chain. Read about changing consumer demands and how every aspect of the supply chain is being optimised by following these links to our recent blogs. Role reversal The next dramatic change to our supply chain model will happen with the arrival of local 3D print shops and the ever more sophisticated range of materials available to them. Because 3D printers work from electronic files, as opposed to being limited to the tooling they are set up with, they can produce a vast range of highly customised items, one at a time. Virtually at “the click of a button”! If you can make exactly what the customer wants (size, fit, colour, style etc.), when they want it, on their doorstep you will: Eliminate the costs of warehousing and inventories. Dramatically reduce the lead time as transport distances and times are minimalised. Only making what the customer demands will move control of the supply chain to the consumer. But what will happen to your factory? In this model there is no need to have a large, centralised manufacturing plant. In theory all you may be left with is the need to turn your designs into electronic files for the 3D print shops. Car parts and personalised human body parts, clothing and edible items are already being 3D printed. While this is unlikely to happen in every manufacturing sector, some are already making moves to adapt existing business models. The 2015 report by Frost and Sullivan “The Future of Parts and Service Retailing in the Automotive Aftermarket”, analyses how customers will shop in the future. It predicts that by 2025, 10-15% of all global part sales will be made on-line and goes on to show how the sector is responding. So what steps are you taking to adapt your business model? Localised manufacturing, B2C e-commerce, making money from your data?
June 29, 2016 Industry Forum Blog 7 Wastes, eliminating waste, improve your productivity, lean approach., Lean techniques, lean tools, Small and Medium Enterprises, SME “That’s great, but it won’t work here” is usually among the first comments we get when we tell people we help businesses deploy lean techniques to improve their competitiveness. Whilst most people now accept that these techniques work across more sectors than just automotive, the biggest challenge is in engaging the SME community. In the UK the number of SMEs are growing. At the start of 2015, 99.9% of all private sector businesses were classed as SMEs (UK stats). They provide 60% of private sector employment and 47% of turnover, which is £1.8 trillion. The pattern is similar across the EU and the States and these important economic contributors are under just as much pressure to perform as large multi-nationals. So the question is can techniques that work in mass production environments with several thousand employees, work for companies that employ less than 250 people? Can they improve the performance and productivity in businesses that make highly customised goods, provide services, are in construction or even farming? The simple answer is yes they can, and yes they do. How? There are lots of different lean techniques. It’s not all about load levelling and keeping expensive machinery in optimum working condition. Whether you are making goods or delivering a service you will rely at some point on people and there will be some sort of process. A process is the combination of manpower, materials and machines (equipment) to provide a good or service that the customer wants. The customer judges that good or service in terms of quality, cost and delivery. The lean tools help you focus on finding better ways of combining the process inputs so that you can not only please the customer but be profitable as well. Key approach for small teams Whether you are in a company of 1, 10, or more you will benefit from even spending a small amount of time doing this: Be sure you have a clear strategy – where you want to go. Turn the strategy into a plan with clear targets – even if that’s only two items! Quickly analyse where you are against those targets, to identify the problems and opportunities for improvement. Seek advice on the most appropriate lean techniques to bring about the change you need. My recommended top tool Understanding the 7 Wastes is key to making any improvement. It’s at the heart of all the lean tools. You can use it if you work solo or in teams, manufacturing in an office, designing, making, selling or ordering. Eliminating wasteful tasks allows you to spend more time doing the tasks that add value, without actually working harder. If you can produce more output by better combining your inputs and eliminating waste you will improve your productivity. Best of all it’s really simple to learn and deploy. And you will find you can make big performance improvements for relatively little financial investment. What can we improve using the lean approach? So if you recognise any of these issues, there is a lean technique that will help you. You need a sustainable way to reduce your costs; no cutting heads or limiting spending. Poor quality levels. Late deliveries. A shortage of working space or lack of capacity. You struggle to release your time to grow the business. Can’t get your ideas to market quickly enough. Problems keeping your equipment working. You can find advice on lean techniques in many places including books, online, in our Related Posts (below) and across some of our Case Studies. Why not contact our team for more information about how we can help your business become more competitive.
June 23, 2016 Industry Forum Blog AR, Automechanika, Job Detail Sheets, S&B Automotive Academy, shortage of skilled workers, Skills learning, using Standard Procedures, virtual and augmented reality, VR, VR training Previously we’ve blogged about how virtual and augmented reality (VR and AR) is starting to be used for off-line training prior to full scale production, and also the benefits of using Standard Procedures in training. Both methods allow people to reach a higher level of skill more quickly. I’m sure you will agree, being able to collapse the learning curve is becoming increasingly important. Every sector is under pressure to reduce costs as well as facing a shortage of skilled workers. The use of VR raised some interesting questions, so we set off to find out if it realistically mimics work conditions. Along the way we also found out how some companies are making best use of Standard Procedures for training. The reality of VR and AR training At the recent Automechanika show we went to try our hands at VR training. Under the expert tuition of Jack, from S&B Automotive Academy, we sprayed our first car door. We asked Nathan, a Level 3 apprentice, how he found training using the VR equipment. “It’s easy” he replied instantly, of course he is of the gaming generation! He did stress though how this technology really paid off when it came time to try the real thing. The trainees get to learn and practise transferable techniques while building muscle memory on holding the gun at the correct angle and the speed of movement. The detailed on-screen feedback and opportunity to watch others practise, both add to the learning experience. Jack added, “The VR gun is a replica of a real spray gun, it vibrates when the trigger is pulled to simulate paint leaving the gun. The user sets the air pressure when they set the system up… [and] can pick the type of paint, colour, finish and body part.” The user can also change the fan setting controlling the spray width and thickness of the applied paint. S&B also do AR training in welding. The screen and sensors are incorporated into a real welding mask and links with a real welding head via QR codes at the tip. Jack promises that, “The welder is possibly the most realistic, just minus the heat”. And the benefits of VR training continue. Not only do trainees get to have more attempts at each skill, it costs much less. Their figures show the initial outlay, around £25,000, is paid back in little over a year. Significant and ongoing cost savings are made in materials, energy, preparation time and teaching time. Training in “the knack” Incorporated on best practise Job Detail Sheets is the “ease” point. This is the clever tip. It explains the hidden knack that experts on the job use. While many of us have used this key point option, a large Tier 1 automotive supplier has taken it a step further. They run specific training sessions for employees who write these documents. Using a piece of custom kit, they demonstrate how important using an ease point is to reduce training times and improve quality, cost and delivery performance. The ease point also helps reduces variation in time between employees conducting the same task. A blended approach? We think that either of these methods present excellent opportunities to improve our skills training outcomes. Or for the bold, why not try a combination of both? Thanks to S&B Academy, Bristol; especially Jack Andrews (Sales Consultant), Aaron Lang (Senior Lecturer) and Nathan Mardani (on the S&B Bespoke Apprenticeship Programme specialising in Paint).
June 15, 2016 Industry Forum Blog 5S, 7 Wastes, Autodata, Automechanika, cloud based solutions, connected car, foundation improvement techniques, garage, lean techniques in non-manufacturing, service and repair, Standardised Work, Visual Management Have you ever been frustrated when booking in your car in for a service or repair? Have you been put on hold, transferred multiple times or waited for a return call? Maybe you had to wait in a queue to check in? Worse still, your car wasn’t ready at the time it was promised? That’s just the customer facing side of the business. Technicians are faced with an ever increasing array of vehicles fitted with more and more complex technology. Stores and reception staff are also under pressure to accurately provide parts and information within ever decreasing deadlines. Where do we start? Although our garage is part of the service industry, the functions they perform can be described as a process. They may not be manufacturing but they are still using manpower, materials and machines (inputs) to make changes in line with customer requirements. We, the customer, judge their output in terms of quality, cost and delivery time. Once we understand this, we can capture each process and improve it. I use simple process flowcharts like this one. Many of the identified “problems” can be eliminated at very little cost by applying the foundation improvement techniques; 5S, 7 Wastes, Visual Management and Standardised Work. Once the simple, low cost solutions have been implemented, garages can look at how best to utilise the opportunities offered by cloud based technology. Simple, low cost solutions Take a look at the before (left) and after (right) shots of a repair workshop. While the before shot may look quite tidy, the improved layout and visual locations created using the 5S technique, resulted in a 50% saving in technician time searching for equipment. Improvements were also made in the time taken by each vehicle to go through the shop and a reduction in damage to parts removed during repair. Using the same techniques in the car parks and spares stores resulted in improved customer experience, time to retrieve parts form stores and part availability. Reception and customer enquiry experiences were also improved in time and accuracy by eliminating waste from the processes and creating standardised work procedures. So for the investment of some time, paint, hooks and labelling machines, you can improve competitiveness and profitability at the same time as enhancing customer satisfaction in terms of quality and delivery. Workshops of the future I recently attended the Automechanika show and saw many examples of how we can use cloud based technology to further eliminate wastes in our garage services. The example that stood out most was the vision presented by Autodata. Autodata currently provide up-to-date technical information for over 29,000 models using a cloud based system. Can you imagine even having the hard copy manuals for that, let alone retrieving the one for the job? Even if you did, they would appear in different formats and be quickly out of date. The beauty of their system is that other providers can develop applications to share the same platform. This will mean that the wastes incurred by accessing separate systems for bookings, queries, ordering parts and invoicing can also be eliminated. This system will also link with your connected car. Once your car has communicated its needs, the system will automatically arrange the details and order the parts. Then the booking slot, cost and directions will appear on your smartphone. All you have to do is press “YES”. I’m looking forward to this day, and who knows, perhaps my car will then drive itself in as well! For more help applying lean techniques in non-manufacturing situations contact the IF team.
June 8, 2016 Industry Forum Blog Active8 Robots, Cobot, collaborative robots, operations manager, Plant and Asset Management 2016, Rethink Robotics, Rodney Brooks, Sawyer Modern operations managers are facing a tough decision, rather like Prince Hamlet in Shakespeare’s classic play. Perhaps not a matter of life or death, but the decision to use cobots, collaborative robots, certainly raises questions about the future of our human workforce. What is a cobot? This new generation of robots are a world away from the giant, tireless mechanical arms we see manipulating large objects on car manufacturing lines. I was lucky enough to interact with several at Plant and Asset Management 2016. Small, mobile and smart, they are designed to work alongside people in the workplace, instead of being fixed and caged. This is made possible by a number of features like cameras and multiple sensors on and around the joints. When the cobot feels or senses another object in its path, like a human, it will quickly stop without exerting harmful pressure on the “obstacle”. Well that’s the theory, I did get pushed about by one of them! It reminded me of a horse who liked to squash me in her stable. Another differentiating feature is the ease with which they can be “taught” to do tasks. No intensive programming required. After simple guidance from the exhibitor, I could teach the robot what I wanted it to do. This is going to revolutionise the use of robotics in our workplaces. Instead of being confined to long runs of repetitive tasks, these devices can be quickly moved and set working on a range of tasks. And that brings us on to some of their other features. They are very precise, one I saw was quoted as having 0.1mm accuracy. Some use cameras that can read, like a human, information from human machine interfaces (screens to me). No cables needed. Some can “feel” their way into fixtures and machines which means they can be used in existing work cells without layout change. The cost of each unit is falling and ROI is measured in days. (It’s around £25k for a basic model and 195 days payback) For me, the one that stands out most is Sawyer. “He” has eyes! It’s a psychological thing I guess, but he feels friendly and easy to be alongside. I met Sawyer on the Active8 Robots stand and taught him successfully, without being pushed about. Giving artificial intelligence a physical look is an important feature for their designer, Rodney Brooks, founder and CTO of Rethink Robotics. So what’s the dilemma? As the costs of these smart and flexible robots fall, will they push people out of work? Weighing up all the different arguments, I think our workforce will have to change and adapt. In several cases the driver behind their development has been to meet a shortage of human workers. In others it’s been to take on the dirty, difficult and dangerous tasks. These are my favourite examples; robotic bulldozers in Japan, and Spot the US military robot dog who scouts for danger. Most of the developers see cobots as being another tool for a worker to use, rather than a replacement. Of course the makers of these devices claim that cobots increase productivity. They are certainly being purchased in greater numbers across automotive, semi-conductor, electronics, food and consumer manufacturers. For those people that are displaced it will be a case of retraining for roles where demand is growing, like those that require an artisan’s touch. The trick is going to be matching that demand with training in new skill sets. And for those of us in improvement, ensuring we don’t robotise waste.
