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"Doing
the Impossible"
Lowara
Proves the Power of Lean
Lowara employees
had already warmed up to Lean Manufacturing when Lou Giuliano
threw more logs on the fire.
During a 2002 visit to the pump manufacturer's biggest plant in Montecchio,
Maggiore, Italy, the head of ITT Industries was impressed. Lowara was adopting
Lean as a way to strip their production processes of non-value added activities,
and had set some serious stretch goals: improving productivity by 30 percent
and cutting cycle time and scrap in half.
"They were excited about the prospect of change and thought they had a plan
to do it," Giuliano later said.
Nevertheless - call it reverse psychology or healthy skepticism - Giuliano
told plant officials before leaving, "I don't think what you're planning
on doing is possible."
Spurred by the challenge, plant employees redoubled their improvement efforts.
Today, only a year-and-a-half into their Lean Manufacturing initiative,
they've already increased productivity up to 30 percent, improved quality
by 50 percent on several production lines, and made great strides toward
Fluid Technology's goal of cutting cycle time in half.
What triggered the turnaround? Three factors: Lean training across functions,
a series of Kaizen blitzes and heavy emphasis on 5-S.
Daylong awareness workshops were followed by three weeks of in-depth Lean
training. "Involving a significant number of our operations people in the
training was the key to opening minds and breaking paradigms," says Franco
Picone, Lowara's Value-Based Six Sigma champion.
Kaizen blitzes - intense improvement pushes completed within a compressed
time fram - targeted areas such as just-in-time assembly and faster machinery
set-up.
Adoption of the 5-S regimen (sort, straighten, sweep, schedule and sustain)
created an orderly, efficient workspace for greater productivity and safety.
While proud of Lowara's progress, Picone sees them as "good preparation"
for larger accomplishments on the horizon. "We're in the middle of our journey,
not at the finish," he says. The keys to ongoing improvement? "Vision and
persistence," he says.
For now, however, Lowara employees are entitled to say "We told you so."
They made a believer of Lou Giuliano. Here's what he said at the Executive
Forum earlier this year: "Well, lo and behold, this year as we looked at
financial results and counted up the score … Lowara had doubled its inventory
turns in the last three years. Something, by the way, I've heard a lot of
people say is impossible."
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Lowara's first Kaizen blitz applied Lean Manufacturing concepts to their
DOMO pump assembly line. The just-in-time team leading the effort included
(first row, l. to r.) Orietta Griffante, Luigi Costanzi, Franco Picone,
Alberto Scarinci and (second row) Carmelo Marinelli, Enrico Cauduro, Oscar
Chiementin, Ugo Da Pra, Alessandro Verza, Luigi Di Pastena and Piergiuseppe
Albertini. |