A key element of creating a Visual Workplace is being able to identify abnormal from normal situations. In this Single Point Lesson team members organized a work cell, identified the items in the work cell and used flags to signal a reorder request to a material handler driving by. Wastes reduced: Transportation, Inventory, Motion and Waiting.
1. Visual Management - Re-Order Point
Multiple inventory part
numbers were stored here
but you wouldn’t know it!
After constantly running out
of packaging and stopping
production, the team rallied
together and came up with a
better way:
Built a rack to hold 2
rolls of each part
number.
Added a label for each
Created flags to signal
to the material handler
when more was
needed.
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Editor's Notes
In a facility that compensated their employees based upon piece rate, you can imaging how frustrated the operators became with process inefficiencies. In this work cell, as finished goods were completed, they were covered with these large poly bags before staging. The operators were constantly running out of the poly bags and often when the material handler replenished the inventory they brought the wrong item#.This created excessive downtime and often prohibited the team from making their goals. As a counter-measure they not only organized the poly bags but they found a very clever way to signal the material handler that more was needed BEFORE they ran out. The flags were used to indicate at a glance when more material was needed simply by flipping the from green to red.