NEW PRODUCT/SERVICE DEVELOPMENT & INNOVATION
When developing, innovating or simply reengineering a product or service, the most common problems encountered are related to a too long time to market. The world is moving fast, the customer too and there is never time to properly develop and prototype the new solution. In these cases, a Value Stream Map always allows you to reduce the time by 30% to 60%.
If the problem is instead of cost, quality and/or performance, the SDR/3P is a very powerful tool.
SUPPLIERS MANAGEMENT
Supplier management, especially with the complications of recent years, is particularly relevant for the achievement of corporate objectives. The most common problems are related to late delivery, insufficient quality of the parts received and rising costs. The solution to these three problems allows you to have a resilient supplier base and always starts from the observation of critical suppliers' in-house processes and joint analysis of critical issues. In this way it is possible to reach a common vision of the root causes and agree on effective actions that benefit both (e.g. redesign parts to do without critical sub-suppliers, review of tolerances based on the production technologies used, etc.)
MATERIAL MANAGEMENT
By planning materials and managing the warehouse, we very often find ourselves facing problems of materials missing from suppliers or too high a stock level. The first is solved by segmenting into the most impactful suppliers and product categories, visiting the relevant suppliers at home, with the whole team including the designers and together understanding the root causes of the delays. For high warehouses, however, the stabilization of production processes and the improvement of planning with Lean and Six Sigma techniques are very useful.
PRODUCTION
Production is often the collector of most of the problems generated by all the upstream phases because it is the place where, in order to be able to release the product or service to the market, the anomalies received must be resolved in some way.
Normally we find ourselves with supply quality problems (which when analyzed worldwide derive from design inconsistencies), problems of missing materials (where the root causes are the most disparate), problems relating to inadequate methods and tools, etc.
Some are very simple and can be solved in a day with a gemba in the workshop and a 5WH/5Why, others more complex require a DMAIC or the complete mapping of the process with the cross-functional team and an A3.
TEST
During the testing phase even trivial problems are sometimes detected where the process allows it, but more frequently problems of non-trivial and immediate solution. In this phase it is important to 'slice the elephant' ie parettize them by families and attack the most frequent ones first with 8D or A3 depending on the complexity and size. For these problems, more than ever, it is essential, in addition to the right method, the presence of the main functions to be able to identify the root causes and be able to eradicate the problem.
AFTER SALES
In the after-sales phase we are totally exposed to the Customer who will measure us, for future purchases, also on the basis of the service we provide in this last phase.
Whether it is the shipment of spare parts or products supplied to order, normally the most frequent problems in this phase are related to quality, performance or delays in installation and commissioning: in all cases, speed of resolution is the priority .
For this reason the 8D is widely used and shared with the customer to give even more credibility to the answer given.
To increase speed in the installation & commissioning phases of products designed or supplied to order, a site gemba and a specific Value Stream Mapping on these two activities are very useful.