PRODUCTION AREA Reorganization Pays Many Dividends

摘要

In the fourth quarter 2019, the team at Milwaukee Electronics' headquarters began looking at ways to improve throughput by eliminating customer-focused cells and enhancing worker responsibilities. The goal was to make it easier to shift cross-trained employees among work cells to support variances in demand. The electronics manufacturing services (EMS) facility was divided into five areas, each headed by a supervisor with direct responsibility for the team in that area. This put resource allocation in the hands of the people who work with those resources. Instead of dedicating space and team members to specific customers, each supervi-sor now has the flexibility to move their team around based on that day's demand. They can also request additional training for any team member if they feel additional skills are neces-sary. Additionally, one supervi-sor was assigned as an assistant to the production manager. A production manager has finite bandwidth. The assignment of a roving supervisor to address day-to-day challenges helps ensure tactical issues don't sidetrack the production manager from focus-ing on more strategic issues.