Simple Solutions That Work! Issue 12

T he most recent two years in the non-ferrous foundry business have seen both strong growth and record low unemployment. For most of us, this has presented some real benefits as we’ve experienced growth and has introduced some significant new challenges as it relates to finding and retaining good people. It seems that almost all business conversations during this timeframe include elements of how some growth has been constrained due to lack of available people and how difficult it can be to maintain consistency across the company’s operations. In the spirit of getting “back to basics” this month, let’s focus on the issue of process consistency in times of high turnover. “WRITE” IT DOWN It seems obvious enough, but when the company is growing quickly and/or you are faced with high turnover, it’s very easy to overlook the importance of good documentation. This is a form of internal communication that will pay big dividends during times when we are seeing high turnover because even if certain key positions turn over more rapidly than we would like, we have the necessary information on hand to be used by the new person. Work instructions may be the best example. If these are available to people to people in ways that make them as easy as possible to use, think video, pictures, simplicity it will make a huge difference in achieving improved consistency. We have become a society that wants to see things in images, we don’t read the way we once might have. Look at what you have that is available to show someone how to do something, and if it is a manuscript, consider how you might make it visual. Everyone in the company is a potential film maker thanks to the technology we all have in our hands. We can harness that in ways that are even sometimes fun to improve how we communicate more effectively. TRAIN, TRAIN, TRAIN When we are seemingly working around the clock to keep up, and the door seems to be constantly revolving, it’s hard to make the time for training, and yet it might be the biggest opportunity so see improvement in consistency. One of the keys is to determine when to train and how much to train so that you can make the best use of the training resources and ideally spend more of them on the people who will in turn most benefit the operation. Incentives can be slippery slopes, but in this case, can also be very valuable if you can reward both the people providing the training and those receiving it so that there is alignment in making it effective. This is a good time to have your Human Resources people be creative in looking for ways to provide incentives (not always money) that link the training methodology and implementation to the desired outcomes (lower scrap as an example). The level of training can be increased as new people demonstrate that they are engaged and commit both to attendance policies as well as quality standards. A few pizzas and gift cards will likely be far less of an expense than the loss of 8 JEFF KELLER CEO MOLTEN METAL EQUIPMENT INNOVATIONS ARTICLE TAKEAWAYS: • Process consistency is the key to success in the foundry business • Consistency of anything is challenged during times of high turnover • It is more important than ever to document best practices BACK TO BASICS: WRITE IT DOWN, AND THEN LOOK AT IT