Work Quality and Schedule control of Production Engineer
In this article, I will be talking about "Work Quality and Schedule control of Production Engineer". Based on my experience as a production engineer, I will introduce some key points about how to get the job done.
Outline
In the job of production engineering, you have to work with a tight schedule. For example, the start-up schedule of equipment and the delivery date of products to customers. Even when we feel that we need more time to schedule, we are not able to do so because of the customer schedule. it does not change.
It would be nice if you could complete your work at a level close to 100 points by the deadline, but the majority of people can't. So, in this article, I'm going to use a few examples to show you how to do a job that somehow leads to the next, even if you don't get a 100, at least a passing grade.
Introduction of a Mass Production Line
When I look at mass production lines, I feel the background of the time.
This is a story about a mass production line in China that was introduced more than 10 years ago. The production line was a poorly manual process line. It was a line full of homemade equipment that seemed to have reduced capital investment and was not very good looking. It was the exact opposite of an automated line, a line that was lowering capital investment by increasing the number of workers. I think it's similar to a prototype line.
Even such a production line seemed to take quite a lot of man-hours to start up (which is unbelievable). I think they had a hard time debugging and starting up because of the poor quality of their home-made equipment in the specification stage.
It's a level where you can say, "I'm allowed to do this level of work". Subsequently, we replaced faulty equipment with automated equipment and reduced the number of workers.
The point of this story is that even if you have a miserable production line, you can still get a passing grade if you have quality control and can produce good products. It is important that the line functions as a mass production line, even if it takes a lot of workers and a long equipment cycle time. As long as you keep that in mind, you can deal with the rest of it later.
Stand-alone equipment installation
Next, let's talk about the individual equipment case.
It is also desirable to finish the job at a high quality, but if you can't achieve this due to schedule, competence, or other reasons, you should aim to have the outline completed and in a stable state of operation.
Stable operation is the state in which quality products can be produced safely.
If the equipment is delivered in an incomplete state, the buyer will have a hard time later on. Although easy decisions should be avoided, acceptance conditions should be clarified before making a delivery decision. If it's a minor level of problem that needs to be debugged during continuous operation, you get it handled after delivery.
*This story is based on the assumption that only one piece of equipment will be installed.
When installing entire mass production line, depending on the status of other equipment, it may not be worthwhile to deliver specific equipment early. The decision should also take into account the overall progress of the project, including the readiness of component suppliers.
Individual Business Cases
Next, let's break down the work of a production engineer into smaller pieces.
For example, drawing, program debugging, specification preparation, defect rate improvement, equipment failure response, presentation preparation, training of subordinates, sample production, etc.
Ideally, you should aim for a score of 100 points, but if you can't get 100 points, you should aim for 70-80 points as long as you can achieve your goal. In the case of drawing and program debugging, 100 points is an easy-to-read drawing or code that is free of errors and bugs. Attention to detail is necessary, but if you don't have the ability and room for it, then focus on just the desired result first.
In the case of improvement in the failure rate, the goal is to reduce the target defective rate to zero. If you can't achieve this immediately, then do activities that will reduce it by at least 20-30%.
When dealing with equipment breakdowns, our goal is to identify the cause of the breakdown and to implement permanent measures. If you can't handle everything on the spot, the first step is to restore the equipment on a temporary basis. While the equipment is running, you can buy time to prepare for permanent measures.
In the case of presentation, the goal is to prepare a good-looking, understandable presentation and present it in an easy way to understand. If you can't, then the minimum line of achievement is to convince the other person of your ideas. It doesn't matter if your presentation material is poorly written or poorly presented, as long as they are convinced of your explanation, it's okay.
There is one important point, however. This concept can only be adapted to those who have a proper understanding of the 100-point state. If a person doesn't get the 100-point status right and thinks 70 points is good enough, then the quality of that work drops to 50 points. In other words, you should be aware of the compromises in your work, but set your goals high.
What do you think? If you're working on a schedule, use this as a reference. While the original goal is to achieve a score of 100, there are many cases where a score of 70 is acceptable, depending on the nature of the job (especially for internal work). When you are able to use your time well, taking into account your work objectives and priorities, you will get better results in your work.
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