1. Bottom Line Results
2. Work Culture Conversion
3. Widening & Sustaining Lean and Six Sigma Gains

1. Bottom Line Results 

Information deficits (blurred, incorrect, late or missing information) are a huge profit-eater. Effectively implemented, workplace visuality wipes out these deficits, dramatically reducing defects, delays, and your overall lead time—regardless of venue.

Productivity typically improves by 15%-30% on a departmental level. Customer satisfaction rises in parallel. Here are bottom-line results some of our clients have enjoyed:

United Electric Controls/Boston: 300 employees

• 68% Reduction in Rack Storage Requirements
• 50% Reduction Time to Conduct Annual Physical Inventory
• 55% Reduction in Classroom Training Needs
• 96% Increase in Non-Conformance in Assembly

Fleet Engineers/Michigan: 80 employees

• 15% Increase in Throughput
• 70% Decrease in Material Handling
• 80% Decrease in Flow Distance
• 60% Decrease in Floor Space Requirements

Lockheed-Martin Aerospace/California

With 1000 hours of 6S/Visual (only) applied to a Fighter Jet Modification Station (unit):

• 15% productivity increase
• 700 hours of labor reduction per unit
• Complete payback on this 1000-hour investment in seven units

Skyworks Solutions/Boston (cell level)
   Before

• Ran out of chemicals on average of 1-3 times each shift
• 42 hrs per week downtime
• 2,184 hours per year

   After (Four Months Later)

• Eliminated all stock outs
• Increased production by 25%
• Zero hours per week downtime

Rolled Up Across Cell

• Reduced scrap by $2,555,000 per year
• Eliminated 7,132 hours of downtime and operator cycle time—yearly
• Reduced walking by 54%
• Eliminated all (100%) of the rework in plating process

Motorola/Texas

The first year of a visual rollout using our Visual Workplace DVD  Training System (only) resulted in, among other things, a $15 million reduction in inventory and a complete cultural conversion.

2. Work Culture Conversion

An effective implementation of visual principles, methods, and practices liberates tons of formerly hidden information—and with it, the human will. Dr. Galsworth’s dynamic “I-driven” approach results in a work environment that is populated by hundreds, even thousands, of visual devices and mini-systems, invented by a workforce that has learned how to think visually.

Visual thinking—and the visual solutions that derive from it—strengthens alignment when a healthy work culture already exists…or creates one when such a culture is lacking. Visuality builds ownership, empowerment, self-leadership, and visual inventiveness into all levels of the organization—supervisor, operator, staff, and CEO inclusively.

After a three-year visual conversion at Trailmobile’s Toronto site, April Love, Director of Continuous Improvement,

had this to say:

Our visual conversion created tremendous cost reduction—absenteeism fell by 60%, production efficiency increased from 86% to 117%, supervisor retention and quality grew dramatically…. And when gas prices rose and the market dried up, the plant had to cut back to one shift (50% fewer employees). The result? The 117% efficiency level  was sustained and increased by 7%.

VTI’s visual approach has un-locked the potential of our employees. That potential was always there. We just couldn’t see it.  Now associates are the driving force behind not just change but our journey to excellence. And new employees can light a candle from an existing flame where before there was nothing.

3. Widening & Sustaining Lean and Six Sigma Gains

Workplace visuality optimizes any production system—whether traditional (high inventory/long lead time) or already anchored in lean and/or six sigma. A fully-functioning visual workplace is a gigantic adherence mechanism—the performance logic and cultural glue that holds all other improvement initiatives together and makes their results sustainable.

 Here is how Mark Swisher, 6S/Visual Coordinator at Lockheed-Martin Aerospace (across all seven LM-Aero sites) talks about “taking visuality to the bank:”

 
You can’t take an F-16 to the customer, so you invite the customer into your plant.  That’s when they see how we treat their parts, how we take care of their product while its in our care.  The visual workplace makes all of that visible—and very impressive—the product discipline, material handling, and the flow of the work.