One company I worked for made flexible pouches for the medical device, food and military markets.
I'd just
recently joined and was following my first order through the plant, so I
was still getting to know the people in the production department as
well as the processes they used to make our products.
When I came
around to the line where my customer's product was being made, I noticed
nearly all the operators had bandaids on their thumbs. So I asked one
of them why so many people were wearing bandaids.
This particular
customer's product was formed and then diecut to shape in a second
operation. To ensure the printing on the pouch was in register to the
seals and the overall shape of the pouch, we used what is called a pin
registration system. This means that, when the pouch is formed, a series
of holes are simultaneously punched around the perimeter of the pouch.
When the pouch is diecut, it is placed on a board with a steel ruled die
and the holes punched in the pouch fit onto pins mounted in the die
board to ensure the pouch is cut consistently and with print in register
with the seals and the overall shape.
In this case,
the operator explained they were puncturing their thumbs as they
struggled to stretch the pouch over the die board to align pins with
holes in the pouch. The pins being used were actually nails which, of
course, had sharp points. Moreover, the nails were aluminum roofing
nails and were so soft the operators were constantly trying to
straighten them out - the tension of the stretched pouch was causing the
roofing nails to bend.
This particular
product was new to me, but had been run before in our plant and the
operator told me this was how the company had been doing this operation
"for years."
I liked the
ingenuity of using nails for registration pins, however, the type of
nail being used was so soft they would only be truly in register the
first time they were used. As more pouches were cut, the nails became
more and more distorted.
I went to the
production manager and suggested they modify the design of the die to
use steel nails, which were much stiffer and more resilient. I
explained the operators were getting injured from using the original die
design and the aluminum nails were not helping us produce a consistent
product.
The next day, I
found the diecutting operation going a bit quicker, and the die boards
now had steel nails instead of aluminum. I asked the operators what
they thought. They told me the new "pins" lasted much longer and they
didn't have to keep trying to bend the pins straight. However, the pins
were still nails and they still had sharp points. People weren't
getting hurt so easily, but they were still getting hurt.
Now I spoke
with our plant engineer about the issue in our diecutting department.
Like me, he thought using nails as pins was resourceful, but still a
long way from being a best-in-class die design. He modified the pin
system to incorporate spring-loaded steel pins with rounded tops.
When we
introduced these to the diecutting department, the feedback from the
operators was very positive and productivity improved.
I think the
operators in this plant appreciated having someone come out to see how
they were struggling with a poorly designed process. Even though our
first modification - from aluminum to steel nails - wasn't a complete
success, it showed the operators someone was listening to them. We
reinforced that by getting more input from the operators, which led to
our plant engineer's solution.
Another thing I
found was that, when I went out into the production floor, the
operators seemed much more helpful and friendly. People opened up. We
talked about families, pets, hobbies - and about the processes we used
to make our products. One operator gave me a complete tour of her
department - just because I asked "why do you do things this.....?"
Let there be no
doubt about it, the people in the diecutting department knew they had a
faulty process. But management either wasn't listening or was just too
cheap to do things the right way. The employees were afraid to ask for
improvements. It just took someone from the front office going out to
ask how things were going to get the feedback and drive some action to
remedy the issue.
