{"id":3528,"date":"2023-02-20T19:42:50","date_gmt":"2023-02-21T00:42:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/scaffoldingsolutions.com\/?p=3528"},"modified":"2023-02-20T19:42:55","modified_gmt":"2023-02-21T00:42:55","slug":"how-incremental-innovation-improves-operational-efficiency","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.scaffoldingsolutions.com\/articles\/how-incremental-innovation-improves-operational-efficiency\/","title":{"rendered":"Incremental Innovations that Lead to Major Gains"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n
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Chaos versus Control<\/b><\/h2>\n

Does this sound familiar to you?<\/i><\/b>\n

Manager: \u201cAre we going to finish today?\u201d
\nForeman: \u201cNo. We need one, maybe two more days.\u201d
\nManager: \u201cWhat happened?\u201d
\nForeman: \u201cRan out of material. Truck late. Loading dock wasn\u2019t available. One guy was a no-show.\u201d
\nManager: \u201cAnything we could have done to prevent these problems?\u201d
\nForeman: \u201cNot really. That\u2019s just construction<\/i>.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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\"Scaffolding<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Stepping out of Manufacturing into the Construction World a few years ago, it struck me how much more chaotic the day-to-day operations were in the field compared to the shop.\u00a0 Job outcomes were more unpredictable.\u00a0 Daily or weekly schedules were frequently disrupted for a variety of reasons:\u00a0 not enough material; quality issues; labor shortfalls, unexpected job interruptions\u2026and so on.\u00a0 Field Supervisors spent a large amount of their time dealing with \u201chiccups\u201d and resolving issues.\u00a0 They rarely had time to look beyond today\u2019s challenges.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Field Supervision was also different than Shop Supervision.\u00a0 Foremen and Field Supervisors were usually promoted based on their ability to \u201cget things done\u201d despite<\/i><\/b> unplanned problems that came up in the field.\u00a0 They were great at getting results, regardless<\/i><\/b> of the roadblocks they faced.\u00a0 As long as the overall job budget and schedule was met (with zero safety incidents), the supervisor was considered successful.\u00a0 But how much unrealized potential was left on the table?<\/p>\n

Shop Supervisors by contrast tended to be promoted based on their ability to drive sustainable Process Improvement.\u00a0 Their performance was measured based on improving Throughput, Productivity and Quality, Safety and other KPI\u2019s.\u00a0 Yes, the overall bottom line mattered too: job profit, schedule, safety\u2026but those broader goals were almost secondary to meeting the more tangible, measurable daily metrics.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In manufacturing we mobilized small teams to observe and evaluate processes.\u00a0 We broke down larger processes into smaller steps and looked for ways to shave minutes of the cycle time, reduce waste and improve quality.\u00a0 Incremental innovation in the production process often added up to big gains in throughput and quality.\u00a0 We called it \u201cContinuous Improvement\u201d or \u201cLEAN\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the field, however, I noticed very little Continuous Improvement occurring. I saw waste everywhere I looked: oversupply, down-time, quality issues, etc.\u00a0 Few others seemed to notice and\/or didn\u2019t have time to deal with the issues.\u00a0 \u201cRoot-cause\u201d analysis was rarely performed to figure out why<\/i><\/b> the problems were happening in the first place.\u00a0 Supervisors appeared to be unusually busy all the time, reacting and solving problems on the fly, phones glued to their ears.\u00a0 They put their heads down, resolved issues and got the job done – obstacles or not.\u00a0 Once the issue was resolved, they moved on and rarely looked back.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Asking Questions<\/b><\/h2>\n

We wanted to break out of this endless cycle of reacting to issues, but how?\u00a0 Could we leverage innovation<\/b> to reduce chaos<\/b> and to drive process improvement?\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

We dug deeper into our issues.\u00a0 We collected data to measure how well (or how poorly) we were performing across a wide range of areas.\u00a0 We asked ourselves very specific questions:<\/p>\n