Poor use of data halting CI programmes, WMMC told

Industry leaders criticised UK operators for overcomplicating key metrics or ignoring them completely. Grant McPherson, plant director at JLR Castle Bromwich urged British managers to learn from Japanese factories where electronic target boards were widespread. He added: "Clear and concise data displayed at the right place is essential. We need to avoid the temptation to overload and overcomplicate visual data to a point where it becomes difficult to understand." The keep it simple message was echoed by Barry Tumelty who has led a three year CI turnaround at car components manufacturer Gestamp. "If you start showing information through too many complex graphs then people get bored. We came up with a smiley board for operators. If it's green you've achieved your target, if it's red you've not." The comments came as over 150 manufacturing managers gathered at WMMC in Solihull to learn CI best practice. Delegates were urged to breakdown historic barriers between management and shopfloor. Managers must get out of the back office and visit the factory floor more regularly, speakers said. Senior staff must also look to champion problem solving and remove the fear of failure that limited kaizen, WMMC heard. For more on WMMC see WM's December issue.