Agile Manufacturing Update: Recent Comments

Comment on Fred Taylor, Scientific Management, and Agile Manufacturing

Jefferson Martin — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 19:59:30 GMT

I am really enthused to find an apologist for even a portion of Fred Taylor's works and appreciate your insights and comparisons to 'modern' methodologies.

While Taylorism became somewhat of a pariah among the pre-World War I manufacturing houses, we should give the man his due for at least having identified early versions of 'takt' and work breakdown structure.

Comment on 5S Report Followup

web development — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 12:31:06 GMT

That was inspiring,
This is a great follow up,
Thanks for sharing,
Keep up the good work

Comment on How to Get Started: Part Six - Implementation IV: Value Stream Mapping 5 - Current State Map (continued yet again)

hazel wagner — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 15:28:11 GMT

There are so many productive ways to get brainstorming going in addition to one person writing on a flip chart. Take a look at the many suggestions on www.brainstorming-that-works.com or read the free chapter at www.askhazelwagner.com.

I wish you great ideas at lightning speed,
Hazel

Comment on Fred Taylor, Scientific Management, and Agile Manufacturing

Bartola — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 13:52:31 GMT

Thanks for this. It really helped me out!

Comment on Agile Manufacturing: Good...Outsourcing Core Competencies: Bad

Andre Albero — Wed, 13 May 2009 16:42:24 GMT

Good point. I enforce the same philosophy for more than 20 years. Is a battle to reduce cost accounting nonsense.

Comment on How to Get Started: Part Five - Planning I

Tom Dee — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 11:54:57 GMT

You are spot on! From management's perspective it comes down to this:

"Don't Manage People...Manage Attention"

If more managers made the connection between the numbers (objectives) and lens (level of attention), organizations will achieve results and employees buy into objectives. The concept is powerful. When management realizes the sanity of this idea, attention, rather than people, is a heck of better way to get things done.

Comment on Value Added per Employee Hour: Best Agile Metric? Part Five

George Bohan — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 16:47:38 GMT

Richard,
I got it from a booklet (that I can't find at the moment) put out by Working for America Institute (workingforamerica.org).

Interestingly, WFA is an AFL-CIO supported organization.

Comment on Value Added per Employee Hour: Best Agile Metric? Part Five

Richard Maybury — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 14:24:27 GMT

Hi George, I came across your helpful series of posts simply because I was looking for reliable information to confirm what I thought was meant by a client who recently asked us to use their given 'Return on Value Added Hour' $ number in our ROI calculation for the impact of our Priority Management with Outlook training for their sales team.

Like you said in your first post, it is a metric I too was familiar with but had managed to forget.

When we run ROI calculations we usually run cost of training and measured productivity gain against total cost of employment per person, and that's impressive enough. This very large IT industry client is using a Value Add Hour figure as a measure of overall individual salesperson contribution to the business, so it does not include other costs. It is still a useful metric and not one I have seen used very much here in UK outside the Manufacturing sector.

Your first post says you recently came across it, I am running a report on it as I write this post for a recent training for this client's sales team. Do you recall where you recently picked up on this metric?

Thanks for your helpful posts,
Richard

Comment on Value Added per Employee Hour: Best Agile Metric? Part Five

George Bohan — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 10:11:13 GMT

Bogdan, thanks for the comment.

The Total Labor Hours would be actual Total Labor Hours. It wouldn't be be average hours or derived from the BOM. On the other hand, my experience is that hours derived from the BOM generally are developed with at least some of the wastes I mentioned in mind. For example, change over times are often on the BOM at a greater time than is actually required.

Comment on Value Added per Employee Hour: Best Agile Metric? Part Five

Bogdan Nicoara — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 07:25:29 GMT

Hello George
I have some general questions that you might please answer: the worked hour that you consider is it actual or just an average based on headcount or is it derived from the bom (bill of material)? Because you might find strange differences- I encountered that - btw I am using the same metric produced hours to cost and I agree that is the best way to describe and compare business. Please feel free to e-mail me at nicoara.bogdan@yahoo.com