With only enough detail to support the premise of this paper, I
will explain each of them:
• Continuous Improvement: A philosophy
which originates with the attitude that each day we can do
something better. Some present this philosophy as being of
Eastern origin, but in reality it is the pure nature of the
human being. Thanks to this behavior we have made it possible to
improve our world a little bit each day (even if we doubt this
when reading the news). This same attitude, translated to the
plant level, searches for a large number of small projects that
would have a stronger synergistic effect than a small number of
large projects that avoid team and individual participation.
• Design for Manufacturability: Related
with other ideas—for instance, concurrent engineering and
process reengineering; the goal is to develop products and
services while thinking of the customer who will receive them,
and involving all those responsible for the task, even the
customers themselves. Additionally, when designing our products
and services, we should think in family standarization and
growth, avoiding the NIH (not invented here) syndrome.
• Use of state-of-the-art technologies: Obtain
a competitive advantage through the application of reasonable
state-of-the-art technologies. When talking about technologies,
it refers not only to computer or production-process
technologies, but also to the organizational and management
technologies that allow an enterprise to become more dynamic
with a strong infrastructure.
• World class vendor selection: Applying
an easy principle— Do not do to a third party something you
wouldn't do to yourself—manufacturing companies have to find a
way to include their vendors in their organizational,
administrative, and production structures. That is not to say
these companies have to verticalize themselves by acquiring
their vendors, but they have to find ways to be partners with
them in order to strengthen the link in the value chain to which
they belong.
• Development toward a global company: All
firms, regardless of size, have to include in their
medium-term plans a way to be included in the world market, at
least looking to expand to a second country. This approach is
required to balance the market and competitive pressures of the
local market. Also, this gives the point of departure to grow
beyond the restricted national markets.
• Cost: There is practically no
business that has not or is not looking to obtain a competitive
advantage through the reduction of costs at the production
level. Some do it by locating plants where the labor or the raw
material is cheap, others look to achieve it through economies
of scale, through the usage of state-of-the-art technologies, or
with strict and efficient cost reduction programs. What these
companies are looking for is: to sell a product at the
calculated price, at the calculated margin, within the
calculated cost, for the calculated budget, and with the
calculated profit, meaning to achieve the "5
calculations" of competitiveness.
Quality: The concept of quality has, in
an isolated way, been present in many firms in the past.
Today, the challenge is not only to contribute with the value
of quality, but to integrate the concept to the one of cost,
withdrawing from the popular saying "it is expensive, but
it is precious". What we have presently is an
extraordinary battle between products with an excellent
quality level at a reasonable price on the market. There is no
doubt that this tendency will increase in time to unknown
limits, benefiting the consumer. In this way we get the
"5 expectations" of competitiveness: to produce the
expected article, with the expected features, the expected
functions, the expected advantages, and the expected benefits.
• Availability: This concept has been
getting progressively stronger in the marketplace. If not
considered, it will give unpleasant surprises to the unworried
manufacturer. An enormous effort is present in world class
manufacturers to deliver based on the required dates of their
customers, contrary to the monthly scheduled delivery of the
past. There is no doubt that, sooner or later, we will find
companies with "domino thinking": the delivery of
product within 30 minutes, or the customer does not pay for
the goods. Briefly, this concept can be summarized as the
"5 corrects": To deliver the correct product, at the
correct time, in the correct amount, to the correct customer,
to the correct place.
• Flexibility: Many of the ideas presented here were
actually developed by Henry Ford during the 1920s. Ford had
almost all of them at hand, but one: manufacturing flexibility.
When I think in flexible terms, I tend to think in something
very different to the production model of Ford. It turns out
that it has to be something different from the way car producers
think; they avoid changing production schedules at all costs,
building all cars the same color (it does not even have to be
black). Actually, flexibility has its "5 any": to
transform anything, for any volume, in any place, at any hour,
with any production cell.
