A methodology for developing sustainable quantifiable productivity improvement in manufacturing companies

This paper describes a model which has been developed to direct and generate productivity improvement in a group of manufacturing companies. The companies are of all sizes including Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) and form a cross-section of industries and abilities with regard to manufacturing. There is a wide range of manufacturing efficiency improvement methods available to the companies, such as Just in Time (JIT), or a range of lean manufacturing tools. The selection of appropriate tools for manufacturing improvement, together with their applicability, incorporation and acceptance within operations is a major problem for many companies. A methodology has therefore been developed which consists of three clearly defined steps, starting with a Productivity Needs Analysis (PNA), which gives an overview of the current manufacturing condition of the company, identifies the key productivity measures for the plant and forms the basis for a detailed study of production efficiency. The plant processes and problems are defined and are associated with the appropriate tools and metrics in a Manufacturing Needs Analysis (MNA), which generates an initial 1-year improvement plan for a particular manufacturing unit. The output from the procedure is obtained as a numerical ranking. In order to ensure that the tools which are found to be efficacious are fully embedded within the company, the PNA and MNA are combined with a Training Needs Analysis (TNA). The paper describes the approach and the results obtained from 15 companies plus an identified exemplar, Nissan Motor Manufacturing UK Ltd. (NMUK). (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.