USSTC – FEL1 Study

Posted on October 23, 2013

USSTC was evaluating their current sites for company business continuity and projected growth or 5 to 7 percent for the next 10 years.

  • USSTC decided to hire an outside engineering consulting firm to develop a FEL1 study of current facilities. This study included a 30 percent cost estimate and milestone schedule. The study included a new facility which will also accommodate the companies need for business continuity and new process and packaging technology and automated material handling methods in existing sites.

Project Deliverables:

  • Complete facility layout including office and employee complex. On-site boiler/maintenance buildings.
  • Equipment list with estimated capital cost for process equipment, facility services and building construction.
  • Automation justification.
  • Milestone schedule
  • Site staffing estimate

Project Results/Benefits:

  • Productivity increased: A new facility and upgrades to existing facilities will allow USSTC to double production with a lower manpower staffing ratio than current levels.
  • Capacity increased: Double production by end of 10 year period.
  • Quality Improvement: The new manufacturing facility was designed to isolate dirty operations from clean critical operations. The new site will meet all FDA regulations.

 

OBCDC Greenhouse Revitalization

Posted on October 3, 2013

OBCDC was interested in having our team “conduct a needs assessment for the redevelopment of sustainable greenhouse production.”  The intent was to essentially develop a business case for the development of greenhouses in Old Brooklyn which would reflect the historical status of Old Brooklyn as the “greenhouse capital of the world”.

Reason for Project:

  • Discuss and plan for a sustainable local food production system that will nurture Old Brooklyn and the surrounding communities both economically and socially.
  • Visibly illustrate the linkages to other economic development activities underway in Old Brooklyn and the surrounding areas.

 Project Deliverables:

  • Documented the current-state systems which affect the feasibility of a new greenhouse food production system in Old Brooklyn using an Action Research Methodology.  This included a series of structured interviews with key stakeholders, the development of a stakeholder map and the creation of a causal loop map.
  • Completed a feedback session with all system stakeholders (26) using a modified “World Café” format http://www.theworldcafe.com/pdfs/cafetogo.pdf.

 Project Results/Benefits:

  • Clarified/Documented Strategic Plan: The project resulted in the development of a strategic plan with defined initiatives, committee assignments, goals and metrics to track success.
  • Moved the Project “Ball: Our part of the project led to a presentation to OBCDC Board; funding exploration by Entrepreneurs 4 Sustainability, NOFN and OBCDC; and the hiring of a “Greenhouse Nudger” by OBCDC. Also, Leadership Cleveland chose our project for next year’s focus project.
  • Publication: After the project was complete, an article of our project success was published by Kessels & Smit in November 2004.

Food Industry Client

Posted on October 2, 2013

“Good return in a short amount of time.”

– Food Industry Client 

American Red Cross

Posted on October 1, 2013

“Thanks again for facilitating the meetings…  I have received some very positive responses…”

– Director, Education and Training American Red Cross, Greater Cleveland Chapter

American Red Cross- Strategic Planning

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The Business and Industry Council for Emergency Planning (BEPA) had recently completed a SWOT analysis to evaluate its status as an on-going resource for the Greater Cleveland area.  At that time the Strategic Advisory Committee was at a cross-roads and concerned about the health of the initiative and the general lack of clarity concerning the short- and long-term strategy/plan.

Reason for Project:

  • Clarify understanding around the current state of the BEPA program.
  • Define a future-state vision of the BEPA program that would allow it to best meet its objectives.
  • Develop a short- and long-term action plan for implementing the future-state vision.

Project Deliverables:

  • Led the Strategic Advisory Committee through a current-state review considering industry trends and the SWOT analysis.
  • Brainstormed a compelling future-state vision for the BEPA program and led a discussion to prioritize characteristics.
  • Developed metrics for measuring the success of the new system(s).
  • Developed a plan (series of initiatives) for implementing the future-state system over the next year.

Project Results/Benefits:

  • Clarified/Documented Strategic Plan: The project resulted in the development of a strategic plan with defined initiatives, committee assignments, goals and metrics to track success.

– Vice President & CFO FFr, Inc.

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“You did a very good job leading FFr’s management staff through the evaluation process.”

 

FFr – Product Launch Process Review

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FFr

Due to the large and growing number of new product projects in the “pipeline”, FFr wanted to find a way to improve their speed-to-market cycle for new products while maintaining their high customer satisfaction rating and prioritizing those products with the highest potential for large profit.

Reason for Project:

  • Reduce the time to launch a product once it has been approved for development.
  • Improve the ability of functional areas to work together on new product launch (NPL) projects.
  • Identify and fix “gaps” in the process that cause unnecessary delays in the NPL process.
  • Improve the tracking of projects in the “pipeline” so that the project status is clear to customer service and management.
  • Develop a better method for prioritizing product development projects so that all projects get completed in a timely manner and “best” meet FFr’s customer satisfaction and profit objectives.
  • Reduce the amount of obsolete material created due to the NPL initiatives.
  • Improve the link between the NPL process, the product bill-of-materials and the manufacturing operations.

Project Deliverables:

  • Led the executive team through a system redesign of their new product design process using the Action Research process (Discovery, Feedback, Collaborative Design).
  • Documented how the existing system operates through observations and interviews with the system stakeholders.
  • Identified the key drivers that impact the speed of designing/launching new products.
  • Developed a plan for implementing documented improvements over the next year.

Project Results/Benefits:

  • Streamlined Process/Increased Speed to Market: The developed process significantly streamlined the product design/launch systems by eliminating some of the typical delay factors.
  • Increased Capacity:  The new process design enhanced FFr’s ability to generate new designs by removing system delays, rework and non-value added activities.

Motorcycle Manufacturing – Paint Shop Kaizen

Posted on September 25, 2013

A Midwest motorcycle manufacturer was experiencing inventory and throughput issues in the Inspection and Finesse Area of their Paint Shop.

 Reason for Project:

  • Epicenter was invited to participate in a Kaizen event to identify the root causes of the issues and develop sustainable corrective measures to eliminate the problems.

 Project Deliverables:

  • Over the course of 1 week, Epicenter actively participated in the Kaizen activities. Activities included: observation, interviewing of plant personnel, time study data collection and analysis, hands on “try-storming” and extensive team collaboration.
  • All information collected was summarized, analyzed and reviewed with the team.
  • A final report summarizing the findings and improvement recommendations from the Kaizen was generated.

Project Results/Benefits:

  • Throughput Improvements: Improving work methods, accurately identifying defects (as soon as possible in the process) and reassigning/rebalancing work activities increased throughput per Finesse operator by 40%.
  • Labor Savings: These throughput improvements directly resulted in a labor savings of 1 operator per shift.
  • Quality Improvements: The importance of identifying and appropriately dealing with quality issues as soon as possible in the process was highlighted and procedures were implemented to facilitate and maintain this moving forward.
  • WIP Inventory Reduction: The quality improvements (parts stored are defect free and ready for Finesse) and throughput gains (parts can be finessed faster) allowed the client to operate with a significantly smaller WIP inventory without the fear of starving downstream operations.

Food Industry – Throughput Increase

Posted on September 2, 2013

Our Client was experiencing a high production loss due to various process issues. The current operations were profitable but seen as inefficient.  In addition, the product yields were limiting their ability to meet increasing requirements of the products.

Reason for Project:

  • Our Client decided to hire an outside engineering consulting firm to study the manufacturing facility during canning season. Observations of the entire process from truck unloading of raw materials through palletizing of cased products.

Project Deliverables:

  • A comprehensive list of process improvement ideas around the dicing lines; addition of in-line weight checking equipment; and oven and cooling process enhancements to increase throughput.
  • Also identified manpower reduction opportunities through staffing changes, installation of larger magazine feeders and the replacement of two low speed lines with one high speed canning line.

Project Results/Benefits:

  • Productivity Improvements: Process improvement showed an increase of 12,790 cases (4%).
  • Labor Cost Reductions: Total proposed labor cost reduction would reduce annual labor cost by $600,000.
  • Throughput Enhancement: Increased production capacity within the same footprint.
  • Quality Improvement: Reduced can filling losses by $60,000 annually and empty can loss by $40,000 annually.

Rockline Industries

Posted on August 13, 2013

Rockline Industries