At a time when it is necessary to cut costs, generate savings and strive to maximize efficiency, many companies are looking for tools that will increase productivity and eliminate waste. Visual management solutions come to the rescue. These relatively inexpensive and effective methods allow you to minimize losses and achieve a significant return on investment (ROI). 

Visual management and "lean" waste

According to the Lean Management rules, it is worth constantly looking for manifestations of waste in the way of organizing work, identifying and removed them. They can take the form of unnecessary operations, various irregularities or uneven or unjustified loads and not using the full potential of employees. Visual management solutions are effective tools for minimizing the risk of waste and help to put into life rationalizing ideas for slim management experts. Here are some examples of adverse situations from the point of view of process optimization - along with the ways in which they can be prevented.

How to prevent excessive stocks by marking

In companies where digital inventory systems have not yet been implemented, maximum and minimal storage conditions using simple visual management solutions can be effectively marked. Depending on the type of goods, the maximum inventory markings can take the form: stickers indicating the height, which should not be exceeded by the deepened loads or the designations of the last pallet place, which should be occupied by a load of a specific type. On the other hand, you can also mark the palette, after which the order should be placed so as not to go below the minimum state of stocks. The alternative is the introduction of the visualization of the communication system based on tools between people using a product of a given type and people responsible for its orders. For example, it can take the form of a table placed on a magnetic table with a list of raw materials along with magnets in colors illustrating the storage. They are changed by employees depending on the number of products of a given type in the plant.

Visual management against errors in the process and qualitative defects

Visual management solutions can also be successfully used to minimize the number of defective products and reduce the occurrence of risk risk in the production process. Recently, a hit among our clients - both due to reducing the negative effects of rotation and leveling the consequences of language differences - there are picture position instructions. Tasks to be performed at a specific point described in a way that resembles comics or assembly instructions from the IKEA store increase the likelihood of correctly carrying out activities - also by inexperienced and non -Polish -speaking employees. Used together with the product correctness templates and a clear marking of raw materials for use or those excluded from further use, significantly accelerate the implementation of new people and translate into a fewer number of deficiencies.

Shadow boards and labels of storage sites against time losses

In the scale of the entire plant and in long -term terms, the time lost by employees on searching for semi -finished and tools translates into losses calculated in thousands of zlotys. Each five minutes wasted during the 8-hour working day for 1 person translates at 100 workstations to about 5 thousand. PLN loss per month - assuming that the plant works for one shift and offers linear employees a minimum wage: 3.5 thousand. PLN gross. In multi -pipeline functioning and higher wages, losses are multiplied. Therefore, it is worth using shadow boards, thanks to which you know where the tools should be postponed; labels indicating the location of the semi -finished products needed in a given position; And also the above -mentioned picture position instructions. This will save the valuable time of linear employees, but also brigades who will be less likely to help in the search for the necessary tools and raw materials.

More complete use of employees' potential to improve processes

Thanks to well -developed position instructions, designation of semi -finished products and shadow boards, you can increase the productivity of employees performing tasks within existing processes, increasing the rate of time in which they create added value. To constantly improve the functioning of the plant, you also need to introduce innovations. According to Lean / TPS assumptions, the best source of inspiration regarding organizational changes at workplaces are people performing tasks on them. Therefore, employee suggestions are often introduced in the plants. However, they are not always effective. At the plant of one of our clients, the procedure for reporting improvements by employees was described on several A4 cards next to the box for ideas. The number of suggestions was close to zero. When, at the client's request contained in the text, we presented the content in the form of an 8-string infographic with 2 sentences of the description to each illustration, the number of reported improvements increased by several hundred percent per year. This is just one of the many ways, thanks to which we can, to a greater extent, realize the potential of employees and increase work efficiency, using visualization, markings and graphic support tools.