s01e09 – High Performance In Manufacturing: Part Two

SPEAKERS

Graeme Fitzgerald, Chris Davey

Graeme Fitzgerald 

Welcome to manufacturing mastery with Graham Fitzgerald, the podcast. My name is Graham Fitzgerald. And for over 30 years, I’ve led some of Australia’s largest manufacturing organizations, right in the highs and lows, the occasional failure, and the plentiful successes that inevitably come with being in business. This podcast is aimed helping you progressive Australian manufacturer with practical and real world advice on navigating your pathway to sustainable success in manufacturing, myself, and my special guests will cover everything from how to embed a planning framework into your business, new approaches to innovation, the importance of culture, and how to lead change, and navigating the new normal as an Australian manufacturer. So manufacturers let’s master like this, some podcast is aimed at helping our listeners maybe just take away some something from today’s discussion that they can apply in their own business. There’s a practitioner, with responsibility for achieving those real results. Can you share with us one of your greatest challenges in business performance and improvement? And how you tackled it?

Chris Davey 

Oh, absolutely. We’ve had we’ve had quite a few. And I guess over the last over the last 20 years, we’ve certainly certainly seen some some enormous challenges. And then it’s been great. It’s actually awesome to take them on and work through them at some one thing I don’t want to do is take a backward step from from an issue that needs to be resolved. So it’s just how long does it take me to solve it?

Graeme Fitzgerald 

Yeah. And

Chris Davey 

so we can probably share with you one of the one of the biggest business challenges we’ve had was when we were working at a pipe mill, and we had a large a large project, it was a $300 million pipeline project that come into a box that we mentioned in the contract for now, this the terms I guess, if you do feel very familiar with this, that we you don’t have unlimited supply material. And to win the contract, we had to have a certain a certain cost base, to say that we could produce this amount of pipe at a certain target yield certain average length of pipe. And we we only had a certain amount of steel cost to do this. So in terms of pricing and everything, we were fairly, we were fairly tight, it was fairly lean. And the manager at the time of the contract, he came in and spoke with me and said, Chris, we’ve got we’ve won the contract, great news. But you have to get us a yield of 85%. For the for the entire pipeline. So when I went away and looked at all the data and statistics and basically looked at the size of the gauge and the grade of steel, and the amount of tons and had we done it before and what’s comparable, we had run trials, before this same pipe August, this type of steel, we’d only ever met 3% of you. So I immediately look at it and thought well before the 2% deficit where we’re going to be struggling because l l. l factory or partner is not actually designed for this type of type of steel, or size pipe. So when I went back and spoke with the manager and said, Are you aware of this, he said, Look, I’m aware of it, but we’ve got to make it happen. So this, this was probably now the biggest challenge in front of us because we we were the technically the only suppliers of this type of pipe in the country. So what what I basically did, we looked at that, and we broke it up into five stages, thankfully, and we, we sort of we prepared and I thought that the best thing I can do is get involved with the workforce a bit more and start to create a lot more, a lot more momentum behind each individual person on site. So I pulled the entire workforce together and held a meeting. And we discussed that there was only three outcomes, we really needed yield, which had to be above 85% output of 160 parts per day, in average length of 17.4 meters per pipe. Now that that’s the time could probably manage an 18 meter pipe. And we had so much variation happening and stoppages and breakdowns that we would have links with also quite a lot. In all three instances of the visual three KPIs that we set, we had never achieved them before, historically. So we had something new and the attitude that we had to take into the room was we can do this, we just need to understand our processes a little bit better. So I basically got the entire workforce together and broke them into groups and rotated them through which sort of credit stations, which is paper, ask them to write inputs and behaviors. And the key, I think the key thing was the behaviors required to achieve these three outcomes. So, with a willing workforce, we had over 500 items listed, and the entire workforce almost became engaged overnight, because we’ve suddenly empowered these people to start to think about how they can, how they can take on the fight and achieve this end result. So we had people that would generally not not be engaged, triggering how they can fill up machines on night shift and how we can prepare things for the next shift. And doing all of those one percenters that matter, that add up to help you to achieve the final target. We did the preliminary work. And all of our conclusions were the profitability would be based on steel consumption rates and priority measures of reject rates and things like that. So we had all these technical KPIs that the management team would look at, and understand if we’re doing well or not well, but what that meant for me was I needed to take that to the shop floor and translate that into a language that people could understand. So I put that into numbers. And I basically did this with with the certain aspects of items, I need you to measure that each day. And, and it’s got to be within two decimal places. So if you can set that machine at that, at that point, each day and then recorded in a way that we go, that’s that’s your role. And that’s You’re doing a great job. So we set up visual management stations, we set up everything that we could sort of support within. And I asked people what they needed to do their job, and how they how they felt about the daily routine that we’ve created. And the the engagement in the feedback all of a sudden started to take a whole new shape where people were, were coming to me saying, Can I get a computer on the on that section of the mill, I wanted to start to learn Excel, I need to understand how to add these numbers up, I need to, I need to start monitoring each day. And then we started to get the success stories coming in with I had this problem, but I went back to the standard. So reset the machine back to the numbers, and it worked again. So we were fine, we’d actually had a bit of drift inside the tolerances. Over time with the machine being worked and being used. We were kind of we were kind of all set up. And then stage one came up the project. And guess what happened, we didn’t like the yield, we got 83% 82%. And we everybody sort of took the hit because we were so g dub and we’re so excited. And so so much effort has gone in that we were we were positive would make this 85%. So we stopped and had to think about it nice. We ended stage one we were preparing for stage two. And the the message that came from the shop floor was just hold everything in standard, hold everything where it needs to be because it’s got to be something that we’re not saying, now this is operators starting to give me feedback. This is them starting to take control the shop floor. And when ABS is in perfect for credit, more setup sheets, will will do a few more audits, we’ll make sure that everything is where it needs to be in this in the middle. And then stage two and stage two started. It started badly. And

Graeme Fitzgerald 

as it always.

Chris Davey 

Yeah. And one of the operators who came to me and I was sitting in my office at the time and he said, Chris, I need to show you something. He said I can’t explain it. But I need to show you something. And I said okay, what’s let’s go for a walk. So we went down and had a look at that these these coils. And he said to me every single time I get a call that looks like that, I get that yield result. And every single time I get a call that looks like this one, which is really good, nice and awesome shapes, I get a really good yield result. So I thought, Okay, well, let’s just draw some letters on these anb coils and see coils, and we’ve got a, b and c and d and we started to grade these coils and make up our own design of experiment. And we ran these coils. It’s a really short trial. And what we found was that clauses today we’re getting 90% yield 92% yield. And then as we went down through the the lettering, obviously the the they got worse in condition. It was actually the way that the steel is responding inside the mill. So we ended up variation A Yes, it was one of the biggest inputs that we hadn’t accounted for. So so we ran another trial. And this time, we actually ran a formal design of experiment and got the call suppliers involved. And they came over to our mill and they had a chat and they said it’s impossible. It’s got to be your meal. It’s got to be your setup. And for the first time ever, we were able to sit down with them and show them how the operators had got the entire process under control and where all the machinery should be the tooling wheel speeds everything that we had this system control, and that when we have a certain shape coil, we get that result, a good result. And when we get a really poorly shaped coil, you get a bad result. So we ended up to get to the to the end of it, we ended up right running that trial in two places at the supplies location. And used, we use the graduate to actually track the coils, and on our location and our coils, actually, they matched up for Standards and Quality. And we worked on telescoping of coil and so forth and what the numbers might be. And then we put that back through Minitab crunched the data and had a look at it, and staged it all and lo and behold, it came out that coil shape was probably one of the biggest critical variables in processing,

Graeme Fitzgerald 

input variation, quality of inputs is really at the thought that that might happen in a manufacturing process.

Chris Davey 

Exactly. So we we enjoy really, sorting, sorting that out really, really, really well with the supplier actually changed their process, and gave us really good quality coils. And we we made up on the second half of stage two, we’re now getting yields of 87% with an overall so it’s an overall 85% for the entire five stages, we still had to sort of catch up some work. And then one of our other managers there, who was he was looking at the disc cutting operations, he came back and said, you know, if we if we have a cutting plan, that actually changes the length of cotton, we go to 17.2, and some coils and 17.6 and others. And we and we manage it a certain way and try and get a certain specific length of coil from the supplier, that we could probably call this back and made all those targets. So when we when we said progressed into stage three, our process control and CRO quality was so good that we were getting coils in the range of about 97% yield. So we’d suddenly gone from, from struggling to world’s best practice on polio. China names the

Graeme Fitzgerald 

process. If you’re wanting tailored one to one coaching for fast results, perhaps my mentoring services the option you need. This package includes to one to one sessions each month, and the weekly accountability call, as well as access to the growing network of members in the mastermind group. Find out more by visiting grand Fitzgerald com.au forward slash mentoring, or contact me directly via the form on my website to understand how I can best help you grow your business. If I hear what you’re saying creasing, yeah, there’s a whole heap of stuff there about process control.

Chris Davey 

But the overarching common thing is engagement of people to help actually get that control in place. Yes, yes, that’s it. And the people are your army, they’re the ones that can change things quickly in a large scale setting. You can’t if you bring contractors in or or people in to try and change your process for you and then hand it back to the operator, you’ve probably spent a long time working on something that maybe could have gotten a bit sooner, if you’re if you’re working was was involved from the start in a way that they can now start to have their identity tied into achievement inside the workplace. So

Graeme Fitzgerald 

antastic example. Yeah,

Chris Davey 

it was a big challenge. But um, we ended up coming out on top servers was a very worthwhile one to take on.

Graeme Fitzgerald 

So Mike, it’s been many years since you started on your journey to master people and performance improvement. What’s been your greatest lesson in that time? And how’s it influencing you today? And as you go forward in business? Well, I

Chris Davey 

would say that the greatest lesson for me is around. It’s been around people and culture. It sort of was a long time ago, but I didn’t understand the depths of value that it can bring. So I think for me, the important effects, who is it in your business that empowers it’s your workforce, who is it that influences your workforce, it’s probably potentially still the most poorly misunderstood dynamic in a workforce today. Standard employment processes I feel I really take into account behavioral traits and patterns and so forth. So I think for me, around performance improvement and around people, it’s really about matching people and their traits, their personality traits, with what the challenges that they need to they need to resolve or with the day to day discipline or the daily the daily routine, more more so than whether education is out or their experiences been at those sorts of things because the only true way to get to know someone is when you what we said when you say Under opportunity or pressure is the only way you actually understand who they are. So you can employ people based on their resume. But when you get them, when they get into the into the mix, you can generally start to see exactly exactly what’s going on. And when you when you understand their traits, where you’ve measured them previously, you can even put them into the right role. And then you develop them in terms of education, and experience, and so forth. And help them help them sort of achieve what it is that they truly want to achieve. So, with that in mind, I think I always throw out the challenge to workforces. What what sort of platforms are you creating in your business for people to achieve their basic desire. So, and there’s a, there’s many examples of that. And I think the most common one in manufacturing would be, if we have someone who has a very high striving for, for power and an order and save engines, and some other things, then they’ll look for a platform where they can be disruptive, or they’ll look for a platform where they can be they can have some power over the people if management doesn’t necessarily relate to, or have any control over. So there’s, there’s all these different personality traits that when you when you bring them in, you kind of need to create a cultural normalization strategy for normalization process. And how do you incorporate people into your, into your organization to keep them and keep them sort of happy and engaged in paperwork to a part of the team rather than falling into the culture of the workforce? That hasn’t been let go? So yeah, there’s, that’s, that’s probably the single biggest thing for me that I still I still see and deal with, in businesses.

Graeme Fitzgerald 

One of the one of the things that I guess I sort of this describe, Chris is that I don’t think I’ve ever been disappointed when I’ve challenged people, and they’ve taken the challenge that they’ve been able to deliver far more than, than they thought they were, they were actual capable. So as you say, when you when you put people under, under the pump, so to speak, or give them a challenge, most times, good people will step up and probably outperform what they even thought was possible.

Chris Davey 

Yes, that’s exactly right. And I completely agree with the grant, when the manager does give somebody that, that challenge and that opportunity, and they create that platform, so they can step up. That person doesn’t have to be the next in the chain of command, it doesn’t have to be the next person that was there. Because they’re the longest serving members, they have a right a birthright to, or any sort of right to it. When you when you see traits in people that that are useful and that want they want to improve. I always encourage people to reach out and sit there and find something that’s going to actually engage them and let them go on that journey because it’s an employee who’s engaged. And, and, and utilizing that energy to return back to the workforce and do some good stuff is is far worth far worth the money that you’re paying to be there. So yeah, I think I totally agree.

Graeme Fitzgerald 

Fantastic, Chris, Look, I know we could probably go on for hours discussing business performance and the connection with people and creating world class businesses. That it’s probably a good place to wrap up. I know manufacturers are always busy people so how can people get in contact you with you if they want to follow up man?

Chris Davey 

Look, I’m they can email me at Chris dot Davey at process pierce.com today, or, or contact yourself and you can pass on the details to them if they’re interested in having a discussion about human or business performance and how it might help how we can look at that there might be a benefit or benefit to their business.

Graeme Fitzgerald 

And you’re you’re still based in the illawarra

Chris Davey 

why sure em on the south coast. So I sort of I do, I was traveling a fair bit prior to COVID. But I’m, I’m based on the south coast. So anywhere in New South Wales at the moment is easy to get to. And I don’t mind traveling with Chris,

Graeme Fitzgerald 

thanks for your time and insights today. It’s great. It’s been a pleasure.

Chris Davey 

Thanks. Thanks, Ryan. I’ve really enjoyed being on the show with you and catching up to on between drinks, so we’ll have to catch up.

Graeme Fitzgerald 

Catch up soon, right.

Chris Davey 

Yeah. Fantastic. Thanks, Graeme. All the way.

Graeme Fitzgerald 

Thank you for being part of this week’s episode was great to have you. I’m always keen to hear your thoughts, questions, ideas and suggestions for future topics for the podcast. So please get in touch to my Facebook page, grand Fitzgerald, manufacturing growth specialist, my LinkedIn page or via my website, Graham fitzgerald.com.au. That’s gra me fitzgerald.com delay. If you’re enjoying what I’m putting out here, please rate review or subscribe to the podcast so more manufacturers can find out about it. And we can build our community masterminds, manufacturing this great nation. Talk to you soon.