Yesterday, Managing Automation’s news hounds covered an announcement from Apriso, the company that makes FlexNet manufacturing management software, that it was introducing a new tool for streamlining business processes across global facilities. The story got me to thinking about my last Lean Matters entry, and the challenges some manufacturers encounter when they try to scale up their business while staying lean.

Members of the lean community argue often over technology’s role in lean endeavors, but here’s a place where it can earn its keep. If you’re a growing manufacturer with global aspirations, it behooves you to take stock of your most efficient and profitable manufacturing processes and implement them across all your operations. You can’t do that effectively through hand-typed work instructions or other manual means. It takes technology to manage business processes across a global sprawl, by automatically updating work processes, distributing them to the proper locations and personnel, and redacting them when they are replaced by better processes.

Remember, the employees you add in the next five years will be the most technologically savvy of any before them. They’ll expect digital work instructions and process flows. The ones who must change aren’t the youngsters who will help turn our great manufacturing engine; it’s the managers who fear the digital unknown.  

You might say, “We’re not growing in this economy, so why bother?”

As always, the companies that look past today’s quagmire to tomorrow’s opportunity — well, they’re the ones that will either go down in a blaze of guts and glory, or shine ever more brightly when the sun comes out again. Maybe it’s time to ditch the umbrella.

Is Your Company Progressive?

Managing Automation is celebrating our 5th year of recognizing manufacturers that successfully use technology to transform their businesses. Nominate a project today for inclusion in our Progressive Manufacturing 100 Awards Program and get acknowledged for your business accomplishments.

For more information, visit http://www.managingautomation.com/awards/aboutawards.aspx 

Posted by Chris Chiappinelli at 01/13/2009 04:32:55 PM |