Today I thought I would put together a sample excel sheet for those who want to visualize their manufacturing downtime. This is something I use when I work directly with manufacturers. It is one thing to define the costs of lost time, but it’s something else entirely when you can explain the root causes of high cycle times. This sample sheet not only itemizes the company’s downtime, but it puts it in a pie chart format, one where the company can immediate see the impact of high cycle times. For those of you looking to put together a presentation, or summary, of lost time emerging from your shop floor, then this sample excel sheet might just be what you’re looking for.
Capturing Lost Time in a Workstation
I’ve written several posts about analyzing manufacturing cycle times when setting up a work station. However, the basic premise involves the following: First, take a series of cycle times, flaws and all. While tracking these times, make sure to write down any immediate causes of high cycle times – but don’t worry too much about lowering these times; you want a true representation of lost time as they occur. Second, summarize all these times in a table. Third, eliminate all the root causes of downtime.
For instance, if downtime was caused by poor assembly outlines, inaccurate work orders, incomplete bill of materials or worse, material shortages & machine downtime, then eliminate these as issues. Granted this may take time, but it is all part of the process of capturing lost time in a given work station - and it's definitely worth the effort. Finally, take a new set of cycle times after eliminating all these issues. It's a guarantee those times will be reduced significantly.
- Take cycle times as is – note any causes of downtime.
- Summarize downtime in a table.
- Eliminate the root causes of lost time.
- Take a new set of cycle times.
This pie chart of lost time is similar to the sample chart I used in the post: Manufacturing Essentials: Sample Pareto Excel Chart for Lost Time Analysis. In that post, I summarized lost time in a given workstation by using a Pareto Chart. That Pareto chart is included below and is part of this sample excel sheet for expressing manufacturing downtime. Except, in this sample sheet, I've included a pie chart.
A Pie-Chart Representation of Lost Time in a Work Station
I’ve often said that manufacturing employees must operate like surgeons. However, the only way for that to happen is to capture all causes of idle time in manufacturing and to show that impact to production employees and management. In essence, you're showing everyone the break down of your production's biggest cost drivers. I use this approach all the time. It's a great way for production people to visualize the root causes of production issues. In fact, most of these production employees see this as a Godsend. They quickly become my greatest ally because the information we gather together is then used to improve how they work. More importantly, they get to show management why they've been complaining so much.
The information included in the above video explains how to set up individual work cells within work stations and is available here.
I actually had one project were after eliminating high cycle times, the production people were happy with the decrease in overtime. With that we were able to lower production cycle times and increase throughput. The company spent less on overtime and its workforce was rewarded with production efficiency bonuses. Granted, some production employees live on overtime - but not when it affects a company's bottom line. If that happens, it makes it far more difficult to make it work.
Overtime is often associated with companies taking on more work that they existing capacity can manage, or with a sudden influx of demand. However, sometimes it involves a substantial increase in waste. After all, fractured production schedules, and inefficiencies, contribute heavily to overtime - and that's never a good thing. I've seen first hand what the damaging effects are of a company that has huge amounts of overtime - not because of a sudden spike in demand, but because of a poor production planning approach.
When using this sample excel sheet, be sure to capture the root causes of idle time in manufacturing. This exercise is best done with the help of production employees. Take the time to explain to them that the ultimate approach is to show management how the inefficiencies waste time, drive up costs, and impact the company's manufacturing productivity rates. It's natural that some production employees will be apprehensive about this entire exercise. After all, you're basically exposing the inherent flaws in their production work station - it's understandable that they'll think this reflects on them. However, if you take the time to show them how this exercise will work, then it should alleviate some of their concerns. Here is the sample excel sheet: Download Manufacturing Downtime in Pie Chart Format Sample Excel Sheet
Comments