Computer Applications, How Far Will They Go?

"In your travels, what are the most exciting factory-oriented computer applications you’ve seen and can you share them with me?" M.L. TX

Just in case you haven’t figured it out yet, the goal of your competition is to put you out of business. They are developing (and in some cases already using) computer programs designed to improve production and quality, reduce costs, improve morale and help service your customers better then you can. Departing from the Taylorisitic management style, computers are being trained to ultimately make all the mathematical and human resources decisions necessary to run factories. You may smugly say, "they are light years away from accomplishing that objective and they’ll go broke trying." So, let me share only some of the programs with you (non-disclosure agreements with my clients, and the space limitations of this article limit what I can share) and then you make the decision if you want to sit back and wait.

We begin by looking at the ordinary work ticket in a typical factory which contains more information than just units and piece rates (used by payroll departments). The ticket also contains lot location, style, size, color, operation performed, estimated time to complete the lot and the worker who did the work. Since the focus for tomorrow is better customer service, predictions, options and people oriented programs rather than documentation, tabulation, organization and frustration, tomorrow’s leaders are already doing more than payroll with all this valuable, important information.

Factory work station entry devices allow workers to slide small magnetically encoded plastic cards through their slots. "On-line" programs – use the information contained on those cards and break away from tradition. Succinctly on-line factories now track the progress and results of every worker – and lot – against customer demands and automatically make the most knowing production loading, scheduling and cost decisions.

Interactive computing is already in place in some factories. When a worker inserts the lot control card into the slot, the computer either speaks (through headphones), or, displays a message (on a mini screen) such as, "Good morning Sylvia. Yesterday you worked 480 minutes and earned 528 minutes making you 110% efficient. Today, you’ll be "closing" again all day. When on "closing" several days in a row, your efficiency picks up, so today you should earn 561 minutes. This lot should take you 21 minutes. Have a good day. If you need help on anything, remember to press the ‘help’ key . . . and by the way, Sylvia . . . . Happy Birthday."

Computers are now doing the boring, but necessary mathematical work of balancing lines, assigning work to utility workers, expediting rush lots (predicting the least amount of interruption of other work flow and the least excess cost involved in changing jobs), locating any excessive machine down-time (that can evolve into production problems) and keeping track of all other direct labor variances. With its on-line capabilities, computers accurately predict shipping schedules even when component parts are made in different factories. Why not? The information is there! This leaves the exciting work of dealing with people to the supervisors, which is as it should be.

There are always machine repair delays. Mechanics input on-line information too. Computers are programmed to know the status of machine repair delays and then, in the event of projected critical machine or operations delays, the computer prepares alternate production plans to avoid imbalances, excess costs and chaos.

Some of the factors determining a worker’s efficiency and morale is the quality and temperature of the air surrounding that worker and the music they want to hear. Workers select the temperature they want, then, using sensors at the workplace, computers control the delivery of air conditioned, filtered air (much the same as in the cabin of the modern airliner) to each work place. Using earphones (again similar to airliners), a worker can listen to any of thousands of music selections from a computer indexed CD library.

Not limited to modules, one of the most elusive and important factors affecting worker achievement, and frustration is the number of different jobs a worker is called upon to perform in a day. Management, engineers and human resources departments have valid concerns regarding the known negative impact on productivity and worker morale caused by frequent job switching, training/retraining times and unfair compensation plans. Using well designed computer programs . . .

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