Best reasons to use six sigma in manufacturing

Six sigma is a manufacturing process that your manufacturing business can use to help improve their processes. Six sigma is a great choice for your business because it has certain benefits over other manufacturing processes because it is designed to focus on improving your manufacturing processes through a quality measurement program. With six sigma rather than focus on increasing products that are manufactured it focuses on the quality of the products that are being manufactured.

Knowing how six sigma works is still not enough information to help you decide in choosing six sigma for your manufacturing process. To make the best decision possible you are going to want to find out the best reasons that other companies use six sigma for their manufacturing process rather than some other manufacturing process.

Basics of six sigma

In the 1980's Motorola developed a manufacturing process called Six Sigma. Six sigma is an approach that is specifically used by manufacturing companies to improve the quality of their manufactured products, by eliminating any waste that is found and by improving all of their manufacturing processes. Six sigma improves a manufacturing company's processes because it examines each process one at a time to see where improvements are made; it provides your business with a narrow focus rather than a broad focus.

The focus of six sigma is on quality, but the definition of quality for six sigma is not going to be the company's definition of quality. Instead, with six sigma the definition of quality is going to come from the customer. Six sigma is going to look at how your customer is viewing your product, meaning what they consider the value of your product to be. Six sigma is also going to take into account the manufacturing processes that your business uses to achieve the results that your customers are seeing.

With six sigma, one of the most important aspects of the program is to improve your overall customer satisfaction. The reason for this is that if your customers are happy with what you have to offer they are going to be more likely to come back and pass on to their friends and family how wonderful your business is.

Basics of lean manufacturing

Lean manufacturing is a quality control program for your manufacturing plant that focuses on cost reduction in your manufacturing plant. Lean manufacturing also focuses on any increases in turnover that your manufacturing company is dealing with. When it comes to dealing with the increases in turnover what lean manufacturing does is eliminate any activities that are causing the increase in turnover time and by eliminating any activities that are not needed in your manufacturing process. What lean manufacturing is doing is eliminating and reducing any waste that is associated with your manufacturing processes, whether it is wasted time or wasted materials.

One of the most important tools that is used in lean manufacturing is visual controls because visual controls can be applied anywhere in the workplace, including the sales office and the shop floor. Visual controls are tools that you can use to look at the manufacturing plant to see what is going on. When looking at what is going on you are going to want to see what things might need to be improved or what things are broken.

Using visual controls will allow you to spot problems before they occur, which means you can head off the bigger problems sooner rather than later. Using visual controls in lean manufacturing is important because it allows you to manage any variances in your manufacturing processes, but it also allows you to control the outcome of your manufactured product. Visual controls work the best because they allow you to respond faster to any potential problems that might arise when compared with other lean manufacturing tools.

What is Batch Production Manufacturing?

The primary characteristic of Batch Production manufacturing is that all components are completed at a workstation before they move on to the next one. Batch production is mostly popular in bakeries and in the manufacture of sports shoes, pharmaceutical ingredients, inks, paints and adhesives. In the manufacture of inks and paints, a technique that is called a color-run is used. A color-run is where the production process manufactures the lightest color first, such as light yellow followed by the next increasingly darker color such as orange, then red and so on until reaching black and then starts over again.

This helps to minimize the cleanup and reconfiguring of the machinery between each batch. White (by which is meant opaque paint, not transparent ink) is the only color that cannot be used in a color-run due to the fact that only a small amount of white pigment can adversely affect the medium colors.

It is important to note that there are inefficiencies that are associated with Batch Production Manufacturing. The production equipment must be stopped, re-configured, and its output tested before the next batch can go on to be produced. The time between batches is known as "down time" and can be costly for a manufacturing company.

What is Total Quality Management?

Total Quality Management (TQM) is a business management strategy that is aimed at embedding awareness of quality in all organizational processes. This process has been widely used in manufacturing, but is also used in education, hospitals, call centers, government, and service industries, as well as NASA space and science programs.

Total Quality Management is considered to be the organization-wide management of quality. The management process consists of planning, organizing, directing, control, and assurance.

Manufacturers often refer to this process in order to help achieve more cost efficient and timely results. Total quality is called total because it consists of two different qualities: quality of return to satisfy the needs of the shareholders, and quality of products.

Small Business guide to manufacturing processes

While many people assume that small businesses are often not associated with manufacturing, in the U.S. small manufacturers can be found in all fifty states. Organizations such as the American Small Manufacturers Coalition (ASMC) exist solely to promote small manufacturers and to lobby government to assist with legislation and federal programs.

Small manufacturers offer specialized and personalized products that larger manufacturers cannot make profitably. Niche manufacturing by small manufacturers can allow them to operate in areas that have little or no competition from larger companies.

Reluctance to new technology is hurting U.S. manufacturers

Manufacturers are finding it very difficult to stay competitive in the world market for several reasons. Some of the most common reason is:

1. The ever increasing costs of raw materials
2. Global competition particularly with China
3. The difficulties that are associated with finding, recruiting, training and retaining skilled employees
4. A real lack of confidence in the world market when it comes to goods made in the U.S.
5. An ever increasing number of government regulations
6. The day to day problems and demands that go along with managing complex supply chains

OHSA is increasing training for their trainers

Because of the changing market OSHA has implemented more stringent guidelines and increased spontaneous monitoring visits to eliminate fraudulent trainers. This is following the market wide trend of cost cutting and improving efficiency.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration's (OSHA) Outreach Training Program is a nationwide network of more than 16,000 independent trainers who are qualified to teach workers and employers about workplace hazards and to provide OSHA 10-hour course-completion cards, that signify an employee has received training in specific core elements of safety and health.

Manufacturing Process Management

Manufacturing is the use of machines, tools and labor that are used to make things for use or sale. This term can refer to a range of human activity, from handicraft to high tech, but is most commonly applied to industrial production, in which raw materials are then transformed into finished goods on a large scale. Such finished goods may also be used for manufacturing other, more complex products, such as household appliances or automobiles, or sold to wholesalers, who in turn sell them to retailers, who then sell them the consumers.

Manufacturing is known to take turns under all types of economic systems. In a free market economy, manufacturing will usually be directed toward the mass production of products for sale to consumers at a profit. In a collectivist economy, manufacturing is more frequently directed by the state in order to supply a centrally planned economy. In free market economies, manufacturing occurs while under some degree of government regulation.

Manufacturing indicators

When understand manufacturing processes it is important to understand what manufacturing indicators really mean. By understanding what the manufacturing indicators are showing business owners can better grasp the needed concepts of manufacturing process.

The three key measurements of manufacturing health are:

• Business Inventories


• Industrial Production


• Capacity Utilization

Lean manufacturing a trend that has come back

In today's tighter economy certain trends that were once put by the wayside have come to back to the forefront of manufacturing. One of these trends is lean manufacturing. In a manufacturing environment that must know produce under tightening costs lean manufacturing is once again moving to the top of many companies production methods.

Lean manufacturing or lean production, which is often known simply as "Lean", is a production practice that considers the expenditure of resources for any goal other than the creation of value for the end customer to be wasteful, and thus it becomes a target for elimination. The idea is that working from the perspective of the customer who consumes a product or service, "value" is defined as any action or process that a customer would be willing to pay for.

Basically, Lean is centered on creating more value with much less work. Lean manufacturing is considered to be a generic process management philosophy derived mostly from the Toyota Production System (TPS) (the term Toyotism is also prevalent) and identified as "Lean" only in the 1990s. The process is renowned for its focus on reduction of the original Toyota seven wastes in order to improve overall customer value, but there are varying perspectives on how this is best achieved. The steady growth of Toyota, (from a small company to the world's largest automaker) has focused worldwide attention on how it has achieved this.

Industrial trends around the world

As predicted the drop in export demand has hit countries other than China and Japan. Many analysts, however, do predict much of Asia's growing consumer base will play a major role in a global recovery.

As with China, Japan and the rest of the world, India, and South Korea are also suffering from declining economic and industrial growth that is mainly due to decreased export orders. Although economists' numbers show reduced growth, many analysts are also optimistic about Asia's ability to bounce back. Experts also report that Asian countries are hit by plummeting exports, from the double-digit growth of the past decade to double-digit declines, declining domestic demand and rising unemployment.

Industrial trends

Trends will show the way and often dictate what direction businesses should make their next move. Industrial trends are no different. Based on responses from vendors, consultants and buyers, new research has provided insights into manufacturing and supply chain developments that are expected for 2009. While many experts say that the coming year will be challenging to say the least however, many manufacturing companies are viewing this pause that is coming after six years of fairly steady profitable growth, as an opportunity to recalibrate their business models and invest for the inevitable recession.

Industrial experts feel that overlooking new opportunities to reassess and "recalibrate" the business-as-usual approach to the supply chain is one of the biggest ways to waste this downturn. Recent reports show that many industrial trends will base their success on a company's ability to re-market during this uncertain economic time. Other industrial trends that will follow are:

How Batch Production Manufacturing works

As businesses grow and their production volumes increase, the production process is often changed to a "batch method". Batch production methods require that a group of items move through the production process together, one stage at a time.

For example when a bakery bakes loaves of bread, a large ball of dough will be split into several loaves which will then be spread out together on a large baking tray. The loaves on the tray will then together be cooked, wrapped and dispatched to shelves, before the bakery starts on a separate batch of another bakery item. It is important to note that each loaf is identical within a batch but that loaves (or other items) can vary from batch to batch.

How Batch Production Manufacturing is used

Batch production is used to produce any product in groups that are referred to as batches. A great example of batch production can be found in a bakery. The products that are sold in the bakery are made in batches of however many will fit in the baker's oven at a time. When that batch is completed, the baker will then start the process again with a new batch. Batch production techniques are also used in the manufacture of specialty chemicals such as active pharmaceutical ingredients, inks, paints and adhesives and many other items.

When choosing a method of production, there are several factors should be taken into account. Some of these are: