TXM E-News – Volume 6, Issue 3, November 2011

The Top Five Foundation Lean Tools

By Michelle Brown

TXM Senior Consultant, Michelle Brown, provides a great insight in to our all time favourite lean manufacturing tools and techniques in this article from our blog. The TXM team visit many different manufacturing companies, from the food and pharmaceutical industries to machining and sheet-metal engineering companies, with a huge variety of different industries that fit somewhere in-between. Regardless of what industry you are in, the top 5 Lean manufacturing fundamentals remain the same.

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Finding the Right Unit of Measure in Process Manufacturing

By Tim McLean

In much of manufacturing counting what we make is easy …. one car, two cars, three cars etc etc. We call this discrete manufacturing where production is measured in units. Metrics such as takt time, productivity, inventory and lead time are therefore easy to come up with as they can be usually measured against output in units – eg. units per hour, units per manhour etc. However in process industries measuring output is much more complex. In a packaging plant raw material may be consumed in tonnes, printed in sheets and finished in units (or boxes). The same with fast moving consumer goods where there may be multiple units of measure at any point of the process. So how do you develop meaningful metrics in these environments without drowning in complexity more…

Can Your Business Afford Lean Training?

by Tim McLean

How do you get started in trying to create a lean enterprise? For many organisations the answer seems to be to send everyone on a lean training course. Perhaps create some “Black Belts” and “Green Belts”. Once this is done then our newly qualified team can go find some projects to “lean out processes”. In Australia at least, this type of training is extremely well funded and many organisations are even offered the happy prospect of programs where the government grants exceed the cost of the training, enabling the company to “make a profit”. But is “lean training” really good value for money – even if the trainer comes for free? more……

What Big Manufacturers can Learn from Small Manufacturers and What Small Manufacturers can Learn from Big Manufacturers

By Tim McLean

At TXM we have been lucky enough to work with a huge range of manufacturers, our customers range from small, niche operations employing fewer than 10 people to some of the worlds largest and most respected global corporations employing tens of thousands. The TXM team have all been trained in large global organisations, however we have learned much from our smaller customers. TXM Principal, Tim McLean shares the top five things that big companies can learn from their small and medium sized counterparts and the top five things that SMEs can learn from their big brothers more….

Getting to the Point with Single Point Lessons

By Michelle Brown

In this article from our blog, Michelle discusses Single point lessons, also called 1-page plans, which are an important part in establishing and maintaining a new Lean Enterprise System or process. As with many of the Lean tools, it’s elegance and simplicity means it is often overlooked or dismissed as not needed. But then, if you haven’t documented your new process, how can we clearly communicate that to others, expect them to “remember” what to do when you are not there and have a clear foundation on which to build improvement? more…

Case Study – Implementing Lean in a Small Manufacturer

by Michelle Brown

Fortress Systems Pty. Ltd. is a designer and manufacturer of custom-made power resistors and had been acquired by the Post-Glover group when they first began working with TXM. Fortress were facing some real challenges with poor plant layout, low productivity and poor houskeeping. Read how Michelle coached Fortress to apply lean manufacturing to achieve a transformation in productivity and agility for the small team at Fortress. more…

TXM News

 

TXM Talks to the Galvanising Industry about Agile Manufacturing

TXM Principal, Tim McLean, was a keynote speaker at the 2011 Galvanisers Association of Australia Conference on 19 October. Tim introduced the concept of Agile Manufacturing to the leading players in the Galvanising industry. Galvanising is a critical service to construction and manufacturing and is seen as a link in the supply chain for many products. Galvanisers need to continually improve lead times while keeping costs down in order to enable their customers to become more agile and responsive. Read more about Agile Manufacturing

here…

TXM Food Industry Events In Australia Highly Successful

In September and October TXM Consulting Director, Anthony Clyne has introduced over 50 food industry executives from across Eastern Australia in to the secrets to implementing lean manufacturing in the food industry. Feedback from the workshops in Hobart, Melbourne and Mildura has been outstandingly positive with many participants intending to directly apply the concepts in their business. The one remaining event in Geelong on 15 and 16 November will have a wine industry flavour with an on-site workshop at one of the region’s major wineries featuring on the second day. Download Geelong Event Flyer (83)

Learn About TXM and Lean Manufacturing on our Blog and Social Media Sites

For several months now, TXM has been actively contributing to the social media. You can connect to us have your say about lean manufacturing, agile manufacturing and manufacturing issues in general:

• Read our blog - make sure to click on the “Join our RSS Feed” logo in the right hand side bar to get the blog sent weekly to your RSS reader.
• Join the TXM Total Excellence in Manufacturing Linked In Group
• Follow us at the  TXM Facebook site
• Follow @TXMLean on Twitter

All these channels are updated at least weekly and give you the chance to comment and contribute the discussion.

TXM Launches Upgraded Chinese Language Website and Chinese Social Media Presence 

TXM recently launched an upgraded Chinese language website upgraded content, graphics and many of the features now seen on our English language website. This provides customers and members of our network the opportunity to learn more about lean manufacturing and agile manufacturing in their own language. In addition, TXM now has its own chinese language blog and our own site on the Chinese microblog Weibo.

The Challenges of Implementing Lean In China

TXM Managing Director, Tim McLean spent the last two weeks in China, presenting a series of seminars about how lean can help Chinese manufacturers address many of the challenges they currently face. A common theme at these seminars and in the range of meetings Tim had with clients in China was the challenge of successfully implementing lean in China. more….