Audience Opinion Piece

Smart connected manufacturing systems are revolutionizing the way products are made and delivered. These systems use advanced technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI), and machine learning to connect machines, people, and processes in real-time. This connectivity enables manufacturers to optimize their operations, improve efficiency, and reduce costs.  You may be thinking, yes, I understand but how do I get started and continue to drive change effectively?

I’m going to share six areas of focus that may help you jumpstart or restart your journey into the future.

1.     Culture

You may have the best ideas and all the skills necessary to lead a digital transformation, but is the team ready?  If you have a site that is largely paper based within manufacturing, jumping right into smart, connected systems is unlikely to generate the excitement you expect.  In fact, you are likely to receive a lot of resistance because change is hard. Here are some indicators that your culture is ready for the next level:

·       Problem solving culture: Teams consistently use the data they have (even if manually captured) to solve problems across functions.

·       Kaizen: Teams work together to overcome challenges and improve the business. Daily small changes to improve processes are a consistent part of business operations.

·       Basic digital skills: This can mean the ability to use basic Excel functions such as pivot tables, or promoting “hacks” to better use personal cell phones.  You can be creative here!  Meet people where they are at in terms of skills and focus on small things that enhance their life.  The digital world and change is less scary if they can see small benefits quickly and easily.

·       Employee feedback: If your employees are already asking for more information and tools to improve how they perform their work then you have a solid base to build on! Grassroots efforts to drive change work better than top-down directives. Leveraging their input and aligning your priorities will help the team feel valued.  

2.     Standard Processes

You cannot put a tool or a digital system on a process that doesn’t exist.  Standard processes provide a consistent framework for how work is done today.  Taiichi Ono (Toyota Production System) included this as a cornerstone of how work was improved “where there is no standard, there can be no kaizen (improvement).”

Many people seek out a digital solution to solve a problem versus solving a problem then optimizing the solution with a digital tool.  The difference in approach is significant.  A digital tool will not fix a broken or non-existent process.  For example, if a site does not have updated bills of materials (BOMs) and routings, you cannot implement a full Manufacturing Execution System (MES) without first creating these fundamental data sources.  

3.     Define a clear, customer focused problem statement

A quick search online will bring thousands of results for MES, sensors, digital performance management, digital work instructions, AI…the challenge is not the ability to find a solution to a problem; it’s solving the right problem, at the right time, with the best-fit strategic solution.

Documenting a robust problem statement and scope helps the team understand what processes will be impacted, current standard work, how data is captured and used today, and what the desired outcome is.  

4.     Strategic Alignment

I mentioned “best-fit strategic solution” in #3…do you have a 3-5 year digital strategy? Is it fully connected within the business or only applicable to your site?  Does your business (if multi-site)have strategic vendors?  If yes, you need to know and understand how the work you do today, and the solutions you select, support that broader future vision.  

“Information is the oil for the21^st century, and analytics is the combustion engine” – Peter Sondergaard, SVP Gartner.  It is often claimed that data has overtaken oil as the world’s most valuable resource. Just like oil, data is useless until it is mined and handled (i.e. analyzed) the right way.  

I’ve seen many sites add “cool” digital widgets and applications they found from a google search or meeting a vendor at a conference, but they don’t connect into any other systems.  For example, adding sensors and leveraging an application that doesn’t easily support data sharing across your applications means you will be unable to use this information for more robust problem-solving or getting a value chain view of opportunities. It also means another application and user interface for your team to use and learn to try to get value from the investment. Another example is digital work instructions.  There are more and more start-ups, as well as well established industry leaders, trying to make digital work instructions easier to create and use.  That is fantastic. However, if it doesn’t integrate to your current or future strategic systems(such as an MES), then your team will always be limited to using a separate application instead of seamlessly creating one user interface for the team.

For us, we have identified strategic vendors for product line management (PLM), enterprise resource planning (ERP)and manufacturing execution systems (MES). From there, any application, tool, sensor, PLC, etc. we add to the business should connect or enhance one of these systems.  We are on the journey as well, with sites that have all different levels of maturity and current systems in these three core areas.  The journey includes selection of short-term, lower cost solutions that can easily connect into our future core systems, eliminating the duplication of work and reducing the time to integrate the changes.  Ideally, once the core systems are in place, the end user only experiences improvement on a system or view they know instead of constantly having ‘new’ applications or sources of information.

5.     Agile Deployment

I strongly recommend leveraging agile methodology when managing change – any kind of change.  There are a few reasons for this 1) it eliminates time wasted trying to deliver a “perfect” solution; 2) end users have a chance to give feedback consistently and impact the outcome and  3) as the users see their recommendations included, they develop a sense of ownership and pride in the outcome.  Bonus, it also takes the pressure off you to deliver a perfect solution immediately.  While you can get into the details of scrum masters and other structures, the most important part is bringing people on the journey with you and leveraging their experience to deliver the best possible outcome.  

6.     Measures of success

Once you have an overall strategy, defining measures of success helps keep teams engaged and budgets aligned.  Smart manufacturing capabilities, when done well, tend to start slow and then increase exponentially over time.  Ensuring the team is ready (culture), able to leverage the new data to improve the business (problem solving) and driving a kaizen/agile/improve the process everyday mindset takes time – and it is time well spent.

Seeing positive momentum and value may be a challenge; lack of progress can lead to disengagement.  This is where measures come in.  Some ideas may include the ability to digitally capture all aspects of OEE within bottleneck processes, or maybe itis the ability to automatically validate critical to quality requirements within a process. Smart manufacturing isa journey that is never ending.  The capabilities of today are significantly more advanced than what they were five years ago, and will be more advanced in the next 5 years.  There isn’t an end state and defining meaningful measures, aligned with your problem statement will help you build a story worth telling.  

In conclusion, smart connected manufacturing systems are transforming the manufacturing industry. By connecting machines, people, and processes in real-time, manufacturers can improve efficiency, reduce costs, and deliver high-quality products to their customers. As these systems continue to evolve, we can expect to see even greater benefits in the future.

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