Empirical relationships between some manufacturing practices and performance

Intense global competition, rapid technological changes, advances in manufacturing and information technology and discerning customers are forcing manufacturers to adopt manufacturing practices and competitive priorities that enable them to deliver high quality products in a short period of time. Identifying manufacturers' competitive priorities and effective manufacturing practices has long been considered one of the key elements in manufacturing strategy research. This paper presents the results of a study conducted to identify some of the effective manufacturing practices that have a significant influence on manufacturing performance. This study also identifies the main competitive objectives of manufacturing industries that participated in the study. The results reported in this paper are based on data collected from a survey using a standard questionnaire administered to 1000 manufacturers in Australia. Evidence indicates that product quality and reliability are the main competitive factors for manufacturers and price has become surprisingly a relatively less important factor. Results show that simultaneous pursuit of advanced quality practices can neutralize the potential negative impacts of manufacturing difficulties and significantly improve product quality and manufacturing performance. Failure mode and effect analysis (FMEA) is shown to be an important tool for improving product quality and on time delivery performance. FMEA practice driven by the intention to improve customer satisfaction is more effective than that practised to fulfil customer requirements. Effective supplier relationships are shown to contribute positively to the manufacturing performance. The results also suggest that maintaining a supplier rating system and product data management and regularly updating them with field failure and warranty data are important manufacturing practices.