Manufacturing Productivity Center Areas of Expertise
Manufacturing Productivity Center offers a range of abilities that are focused on manufacturing firm needs and opportunities to improve productivity.
Management
Needs Assessment
FACT:Senior management devotes less than three percent of its energy to building a corporate perspective on the future.[1]
SOLUTION:Create a vision for the future. Determine the programs, plans and actions that will make that vision reality. Set priorities, develop teams, implement plans and evaluate results.
Due Diligence Review
FACT: Firms that are available for purchase typically represent both asset and liability. Prospective purchasers must know not simply the promise but the true reality that a prospective purchase represents.
SOLUTION: Evaluate the actual condition and potential for firms that are under consideration for purchase.
Team Development
FACT: Mergers, buyouts and reorganizations can destroy effective working relationships.
SOLUTION: Develop productive relationships among management and employees, or among working groups on the production floor or in the office.
Operations
Materials Analysis and Design
NEED: Assess current properties and supplies of materials that are used in components and processes.
SOLUTION: Explore new materials to improve performance, cost effectiveness of supply reliability.
Market Expansion and Retention
FACT: The continual flux of markets can erode a firm's ability to compete.
SOLUTION: Develop traditional and internal plans to prospect for new customers and retain an existing customer base. Implement data mining in order to find new prospects. Develop a fact-based sales presentation.
Production Process Analysis
FACT: Production processes can perform below optimum, sapping profit margins and productivity.
SOLUTION: Evaluate actual versus intended output in production facilities. Determine potential output, means to evaluate output, and essential requirements to continue process improvement.
Hazard Analysis
FACT: Over 700 U.S. workers died in 2000 as a result of falls, the second leading cause of workplace deaths behind motor vehicle accidents. [2]
SOLUTION: Identify hazards and establish workplace safety programs in order to keep productivity up and compensation claims down.
Training
FACT: Staff procedures can dramatically affect performance and the potential for errors and accidents.
SOLUTION: Develop programs to increase awareness of efficient and safe practices. Ensure performance consistency among divisions, departments and shifts.
Standards Compliance
FACT: National, state and local standards impose substantial requirements for businesses. Failure to comply can bring significant penalties. Ability to meet and beat standards can provide a competitive edge.
SOLUTION: Account for current and upcoming standards that affect product performance and manufacturing processes.
Logistics
Supply Chain Improvement
FACT: Vendor relationships based on terms other than performance and price threaten competitive ability.
SOLUTION: Evaluate vendor performance and value. Consolidate vendors according to key mission contributions.
Distribution Improvement
FACT: Global markets often go untapped due to complications in administration, valuation and customs.
SOLUTION: Explore foreign market opportunities and identify cost-effective initiatives. Develop and implement plans to cultivate foreign markets.
[1] Hamel, G. and Prahalad, C.K., "Seeing the Future First", Fortune, Sept. 5, 1994, pp. 64-68.
[2] "Worker Deaths by Falls: A Summary of Surveillance Findings and Investigative Case Reports", DHHS, National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, Publication No. 2000-116, Feb. 2000.
MPC Services
MPC staff members make on-site visits to initiate a working relationship with prospective clients. Contact MPC in order to improve your firm's productivity and to learn more about what the Center can do for your firm:
William Maurer
312.567.3654
maurer@iit.edu
MPC Clients
MPC clients range from small to medium to large businesses, primarily in the engineered products sector. Comprising the most dynamic and productive industrial sector in the Midwest, business to business, MPC clients include Kraft Foods, Navistar, Chicago Metal Rolled Products, Culligan, YKK, Allied Tube and Conduit, Omron Automotive, Parkview Metal Products, Tempel Steel, Duchossois Industries, Elkay Manufacturing, Pen-Tab, the Tooling and Manufacturing Association, and the U.S. Department of Defense.