Precast Consulting Service
Finance, Marketing &
Operations
Effective Work Groups
& Team problem Solving
Some things to think
about
We can help you improve
the effectiveness of your work groups. It can be done!
Corporate Culture Often we get
locked into ways that are not very productive. We have lofty ideals,
but the practical reality is something else. There isn't time to
get it all done. One way of breaking out of that is to engage the
creativity of each work group. This has been proven time and again,
yet somehow we get out of that habit. Supervisors try to do it all,
and they can't. Read on. There is something here that can help,
a lot.
Lean Manufacturing, Six-Sigma They
generate very good improvement ideas. (For a description of Lean Manufacturing
click
here.) But somehow, the ideas don't get fully implemented in
a lasting way; we slip back. The secret is to engage the team that
has to make it happen. Here's how:
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Work Group What is
a work group? It is a group of people that work together everyday
on a common task. It typically has a supervisor (not always salaried)
and a division of labor. Work groups are a source of strength that
often are badly underutilized. Every employee should be in a recognized
work group. For a success story, click
here.
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Empowerment This
buzzword means that each employee is given the responsibility to do their
job without being told what to do and authority to take initiative to overcome
problems. click here
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Team meetings A work
group needs to know what the plan is and the goals and priorities.
Every work group should have a short meeting to do this. Production
groups probably need to meet daily for 15 minutes or so on the shop floor.
Staff groups can be effective meeting weekly or every other week for 30
minutes to one hour. Have an agenda. Stick to business. Make
assignments. Be accountable.
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Turnover Turnover
in our industry is too high and it costs a lot. Productivity is sharply
reduced and (re)training costs are high. It requires excessive supervisory
staffing. Effective teams reduce turnover.
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Training Every employee
should have a training checklist. It is derived from the job design.
Management should set training standards and track them. Team effectiveness
falls off if training completion is less than 80% average for a work group.
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Problem Solving Most
problems are best solved at the work group level. A portion of every
work group meeting should be devoted to quality improvement and problem
solving. We can provide tools and methods to help make this
happen. To download more on this subject here is Work Group Effectiveness
talk given at PCI Productivity Workshop : click
here [this will take several minutes if you have a low
speed line]
What can Precast Consulting do?
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Help you get started. Although
we recommend that you train an employee to take plant leadership, you have
to get started on the right foot.
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Help with workgroup effectiveness.
We have a lot of experience in this area. We can integrate workgroup
effectiveness with Lean or other initiatives. (For a description
of Lean Manufacturing click here.)
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Help with organizational design.
This will transform your organization. You will manage with fewer
overhead layers and more effective workgroups. We can bring our experience
with the best strategies to do that.
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What's worked elsewhere. We can
help guide your team in finding the best payoff and avoid the pitfalls
commonly experienced.
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Lean Manufacturing. Producers
are using this new discipline to great advantage to reduce cost.
Lean Manufacturing and work group problem solving go hand in hand.
For an overview, click here.
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Financial Assistance Significant
state financial training assistance is typically available click
here
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Management professionalism
for the Precast Industry