I read with interest a recent WSJ article “How to Fix Boeing: A Repair Manual.” We had similar invisible factory issues at Ford 30+ years ago.
Boeing has (correctly) identified “traveled work” as a bad practice. In automotive, we called it “first-run” but it was the same problem. Not completing work in station snowballs down the line. Before you know it, there is an invisible factory doing repairs.
Here’s the story of how we dramatically improved final assembly first-run during the initial Explorer launch circa 1991:
At the time, the domestic auto industry was scrambling to respond to significantly better customer quality survey results posted by Japanese competitors. Additionally, the domestics were also struggling to meet the productivity of the transplants.
Part of the effort to close this gap was the Q1 program. Q1 outlined operational standards and the qualification process stretched plant management teams to achieve them.
Dr. Deming was advising the Ford board and, as you can imagine, Q1 emphasized variability reduction through statistical process control. But not exclusively.
Q1 also recognized that first-run capability was the principle in-plant quality indicator of not only how well individual processes were operating but also how well the entire system was performing. The invisible factory had to go!
Common practice at the time was to only keep track of defects coming off the end of the flat top. That obviously hid a lot of problems…and the invisible factory. My team set up control points at in-line repair stations.
Each repairman was given a tally sheet. From these tallies, daily control charts and monthly paretos tracked progress and prioritized improvement actions.
These documents were prominently displayed on SPC boards at each control point. The invisible factory was suddenly very visible. In-system repairs were quickly reduced by 30% with similar reductions in pre-delivery overtime and off-line inventory.
As Louisville Assembly Plant’s Q1 systems matured, the repair reduction system was integrated into control plans with other customer-driven significant characteristics. A reaction plan flow chart completed a closed-loop system to continuously reduce in-system repairs…and eventually eliminate the invisible factory.
In the digital age, all of this information can be at the finger tips of every employee. Whether a 737 or an Explorer, the best practice is to build in station. To get there, make your invisible factory visible to all.