Building a Continuous Improvement System at a Defense Contractor

Situation

The client has a very important and trusted brand and product.  They received significantly higher orders than they were able to produce.  After hiring many new employees, their quality was deteriorating and they were significantly behind schedule, leaving their customer searching for alternatives.  Scott was contracted to help stand up a Continuous Improvement System.

Action

• Stood up three Product Center (Plant) Steering Teams in three locations.  These team were charged with guiding and supporting the Continuous Improvement Process.
• Stood up seven cross functional support teams made up of Materials, Quality, Industrial Engineering, Manufacturing Engineering, and Unit Manager.  This team is charged with completing A3 PDCA Problems and supporting the hourly workforces teams in completing their A3 PDCA Problems.
• Stood up seventeen hourly workforce teams charged with identifying problems in their area, and with the support of their supervisor and the cross functional support teams, completing A3 PDCA problem solving
• Trained all of the teams listed above in A3 PDCA problem solving and coached the teams in completion of their first A3.
• Conducted Value Stream Mapping events with cross functional teams in the bottle neck areas of the product center and used this information to create a roadmap of Kaizen events in the area.
• Conducted Kaizen events with cross functional teams per the roadmap to improve flow, 5S, and layout in the bottleneck areas
• Trained and coached client’s Continuous Improvement Employees in the training & coaching of A3’s, how to conduct VSM & Kaizen, and how to continue the Continuous Improvement System after we left.

Results

• Implemented $3,090,489 in cost reduction
• Created $15,840,000 in additional revenue based on new capacity from relief of bottlenecks.