Conference to illustrate process improvement

The PICME Annual Conference has become the forum for UK process-based companies to learn how to get the best from the lean manufacturing approach.

The PICME Annual Conference - this year in Telford on Tuesday 27th September - has become the forum for UK process-based companies to learn how to get the best from the lean manufacturing approach and how to make that improvement journey positive and beneficial for all concerned.

For the past four years the pre-conference PICME dinner has come to provide the best place for the UK process industries to meet, network and share experiences in manufacturing sectors as diverse as pharmaceutical, plastics, chemicals and coatings.

It is also "a good do".

"The process industry scope is very wide", says PICME Chief Executive Mark Lewis, "but there are a host of common issues".

"In very broad terms the process sector makes stuff, as opposed to things, and this feature means that we at PICME have often to help improve client systems of continuous production, as opposed to discrete and batch manufacturing, although we do much work in this area also".

There is no substitute for sharing the experience of implementing these lean manufacturing solutions at company level, says Lewis.

"And the PICME conference is unique in doing this", he says.

"From the beginning we designed the event so that it relates the stories of in-company improvement through the words and actions of the cross functional and shop floor teams who actually did the work".

"This year's PICME conference format will start with a pre-conference dinner and networking event".

"I am pleased to see that more and more operations people in our industry are learning and valuing the power of focused networking to learn and discover from each other different ways to do things better", says Lewis.

"The road in manufacturing may be sometimes difficult to define - there is no sure-fire text took recipe for success - but you certainly know it when you hear it and see it".

"There are a good few myths and preconceptions about what various lean manufacturing systems and approaches can and can't do", says Lewis.

"It is our experience that context and individual client's needs are always paramount".

"In our introductions we shall be as clear as we can about which tools work in which settings and why".

"We want our audience to see that manufacturing improvement is something done through people and is not a theoretical science", says Lewis.

"In the manufacturing workplace, the WYSIYG maxim nearly always applies - what you see is what you get - and any journey to manufacturing excellence always returns you to that point".

Lewis says: "At this point in time it's important for us to address another possible myth and to show how UK process manufacturers can compete and win against lower-cost foreign competition from the Far East".

PICME's services in lean manufacturing are not just confined to the companies with the greatest improvement journeys to make.

Making gains for sustainable lean manufacturing is a process that never stops and even if you have been on the journey for 3-4 years you must keep going.

For example, leading specialised organics producer AH Marks (AHM) - the UK's largest privately owned and independent chemical manufacturing company - will speak at the 27th September conference on a recent programme of work with PICME that has seen the Wyke based manufacturer achieve a quantum leap in process decontamination effectiveness.

In terms of financial impact, the manufacturing improvement work done by the company with PICME's help is now calculated as contributing a seven figure saving to the AHM's annualised gross margin.

Included in the AHM inventory of improvements are: a complete re-assessment of its decontamination process; waste removed from decontamination process and target times agreed; a new system of data collection implemented; a planning matrix updated to raise the awareness of product changes; and operational changes made to column feed rates, water flush, column drainage and mixer settlers.

In another very important part of the UK process industries lessons in plastics processing improvement will be shown as part of the PICME conference.

Leading European plumbing and drainage supplier Geberit Terrain will speak of its journey from its first PICME production masterclass to the planning and installation of a second extrusion line producing plastic pipe using lean thinking ideas.

Van Williams, Geberit Terrain Operations Director has been involved from the outset in the PICME work.

He says: "We really took to the problem-solving philosophy of 'inch wide, mile deep'".

"Drilling down into the fundamentals can be a bit testing - but one of the benefits of working with PICME is that they really don't leave you to it".

"Like it or not, they also don't take 'no' for an answer".

"Little by little, we went further down a funnel of factual analysis, eliminating our pet theories until the true answers were revealed".

These answers were generated by Geberit Terrain's dedicated eight-man, cross functional team, with more than 123 years experience between them.

Using the traditional PICME mantras such as "lead by example" - "use wisdom not money"; "work smarter - not harder" - "be positive, can do, do it now", within three months the Geberit Terrain team had identified the needed solutions; had freed new capacity - thus saving the cost of a new extrusion machine - and the potential to waste on the problem line by 50%.

For Van Williams the proof of the pudding was in the eating: "We came with baggage - we had had two sets of consultants previously - and it hadn't worked".

"Consequently there was an element of scepticism within the organisation".

"However, all are now positive".

"We discovered and acknowledged that we didn't know everything about our own process".

"But, by opening our minds to all the possibilities we have now grasped some very effective principles.

With PICME's help, we are now looking to roll these out throughout the business".

Full details of the PICME conference on 27th September are now available from the company and from its supporting trade associations in the process industries.

Speaking companies will include AH Marks, Geberit Terrain, Innovia Films, Macfarlan Smith, Tetley GB as well as members of the PICME team.

Mark Lewis sums up: "For a successful learning conference the fruits of experience can be relied on as the best teacher".

"These are often hard won but always valuable".

"PICME's conference makes sure the process industries see how improvement can work in their own special environment".

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