Make MES a Success

While purusing the MES Group in LinkedIn I came across a discussion that posed the question “What have been your biggest obstacles in gaining benefit from MES/MOM/EMI implementations?” (Thanks to Ted Bobkowski). This question is paramount in the minds of companies thinking about implementing MES and wondering whether all the pain will be worth it. Much like the Realtor when asked what are the three most important things about a property (Location, Location, Location). I’d reply similarly with Committment, Committment, Committment. To expand on this theme, there are three things that will help to guide a MES implementation toward success:

1. Getting the Business On Board. Committment from the business means becoming a full partner in the MES journey. Too often MES is an IT initiative with the intent to bring structure to the plant floor, retirement of legacy systems, and providing needed transactions to ERP. To be able to measure the ROI for MES, the business must realize how the high level KPI’s that steer the company are tied to the low level KPI’s that drive behavior.

2. System Replacement and/or Replication. As stated above, usually when MES is implemented, it is replacing something (legacy or manual). As such it is viewed as a simple technology problem. Expecting a ‘NEW’ MES that is a simple replication of a system in place to outperform its predecessor is unrealistic. The returns will generally not meet expectations. In order to realize significant gains, its really necessary to re-assess the manufacturing and business processes and let the business and manufacturing goals drive the technology.

3. Culture. This is really one of the hardest areas for some companies. From Operator “Tribal Knowledge”, to the Political machinations of the IT and Operations impasse. Operators that have specialized knowledge and 20 years of experience see change as a threat to job security. Resistence to change can be intense and can require significant corporate will to overcome. Political landscapes can also be extremely difficult to navigate. Large MES implementations require Champions from the business that can bring consensus.
All of that being said, the underlying theme here is “Committment”. Committment from the highest levels in the company are required to ensure that the reasons for putting the system(s) in place are understood, accepted, and the value is understood, supported, and that there is a common sense of purpose.

P2E – Why You Need It

There are a lot of reasons why major application implementations fail when they do.  Most of them are related to the process.  We’ve already talked about the importance of using Business Process Management (BPM) methods to make sure the manufacturing processes are accounted for when implementing an MES package.  Unfortunately, this isn’t the end of the story.  Even if you implement a MES package flawlessly, you may still fail.  How?  What do you mean?  I can fail even if I do a perfect job?  Yup.  Much of the value that can be realized from an MES is through integration; transactions that it generates and responds to from other systems (ERP, EAM, LIMS, PLM, SCM).  How well you integrate can have a significant impact on how much value you realize from your MES.  That means having a Master Plan.  Understanding the value of the information in all of the systems on your shop floor, and how they can support and enhance the value between them is a great first step in creating that Master Plan.

P2E provides the critical elements in that Master Plan that can make your MES a goldmine:

• Track & Trace through the Supply Chain
  • Tracking Sales Orders through Production – Giving Sales a differentiating edge
  • Shortening the MRP cycle through real-time consumptions – Getting you closer to JIT and reducing inventory stock
  • Quality and Compliance Tracking from vendor supplied data through production data delivered to customers – Using vendor data to improve yield, adding more value to the products you deliver.
• Order Fulfillment
  • Enterprise view of Order Status – Knowing how much and when streamlines the supply chain and delivery.
  • Enterprise Level Synchronization  - Co-manufacturers and vertical (linked) production between sites need a coherent view for planning
• Production Scorecards
  • Unit Costs – Actuals, not back-flushed… 
  • Production Targets – Once you know what it costs you can create production targets that are meaningful.
  • Volume and Quantity – Why do some plants, shifts, products perform better than others?
• Asset Utilization
  • OEE – Yeah, we know.  But did you know that you can apply it to an entire plant, site, division, product line?
  • Proactive Maintenance – Moving from fighting fires, to anticipating problems, planning and executing before they affect yields and capacity.
• Product Innovation
  • Streamlined Product Definition – Integrated Master Data for new products makes it easier to get R&D out the door.
  • Streamlined R&D Transference – Using templates and the same systems as production allows you to compare production costs early and iron out issues before production.

P2E – Is This New?

There’s been a lot of press and some confusion about what P2E is and why you need it.  Production to Enterprise integration is part and parcel to every MES implementation.  MESA, Gartner, and AMR (which is now Gartner) all agree that to realize the full value of an MES implementation you need full system integration with both ERP and Supply Chain.  Is this new?  Not really.  The original ISA-95 standard pretty much outlined and defined those integration points.  Why are we just now paying attention to that?  I think its just part of the evolutionary process.  ISA-88 was the first step in organizing information at the shop floor.  A lot of people, including yours truly, saw the ISA-95 standard as an evolution from a strictly process oriented standard to a more widely applied standard that included continuous and discrete industries.  So, we were stuck in the phase thing.  What is actually happening, and in what sequence, at the shop floor.  The standard does a good job of that.  Unfortunately, its a very limited view.  If you step back and look at the standard from the view of the Big Amoeba (the ten activity bubbles) and all of their interconnections you begin to realize that it’s really about manufacturing activities and how they inter-relate.   I’ve posted several articles on the need to understand your business processes (and manufacturing activities) before you even think about buying software or typing a single line of code.  Those business processes give you more than the high level view of how to make your plant more efficient and what the requirements are.  They give you the holistic view of how information is shared between all of the systems within your plant organism.  That’s where the payoff is.  That’s why P2E is important.  P2E is simply a repackaging of the ISA-95 message that you have functionality contained in seperate systems that depend on each other.  P2E is conductor, your systems are the orchestra.  If you want them playing the Fifth Symphony instead of random dissonant notes, you’ve got to think of them as an orchestra instead of a collection of really good instruments that sound bad together.

Next time – P2E Value – Where to find it.

Don’t Kamikazee Kaizen!

One of the great instruments of the Lean process is the practice of Kaizens.  Identify a process that is wasteful or inefficient, come up with a solution and don’t stop until it’s put in place.  While the Kaizen process has been hugely successful in reigning in waste and inefficiency, there are often a few critical factors that can be missed when implementing a Kaizen.

When evaluating a manufacturing process (for a kaizen), it’s important to focus intently on the process at hand.  While this can, and does,  bring great benefits,  the information and systems view is often lost.  Let’s start with an example.  Let’s say that Acme Manufacturing performs a quality inspection on a part it produces.  Acme would like to increase its throughput and inspection is the bottleneck in the line. A kaizen has been created to solve this issue.  The kaizen discovered that 100% inspection is performed for every part produced.  Inspection results (pass/fail) are recorded on the parts traveler and signed off by the inspector.  One of the recommendations from the kaizen was to move the inspection from its position as the 4th operation in the line to the end.  It was also recommended that the inspection procedure should change to perform inspection samples on every 10th item instead of every item.   The results where good.  Throughput increased.  However, other complications set in.  Rework also increased because defects were caught later, and since early defects were passed on, more scrap was generated.  Customer returns also increased slightly because of escapes.

So, the results were actually mixed.  Although the kaizen solved the problem it was meant to address, it also caused other problems.  So, how to address these issues earlier? 

An information and systems perspective can sometimes provide another tool in the kaizen toolbox.  In our example,  collecting statistically valid data would help in the long run, and provide solid ground for not only determining sampling rates, but acting as a predictor through trending.   Collecting this data at the operation would mean significantly increasing the operation time, exasperating the problem.  Perhaps a phased approach would work.  Sampling every 10th item and collecting the inspection values over time.  This would slightly increase the inspection time, but provide a valid statistical model for change.    Once the data has been collected, and a valid sampling rate has been established, collect the actual inspection values.  These values then become quality trends that can be used extensively as predictors for several factors.  For instance, knowing the number of hours  on the machine at that operation, and correlating that with the quality results provides a great way to predict maintenance and keep yields high.  In the longer term, it can provide the basis for eliminating the inspection itself.   How?  Quality funneling.  By adjusting the specifications for operations upstream, statistical sampling (six sigma) will show that parts will always arrive within an acceptable range.

So, while not part and parcel of the Kaizen process, the information and systems view can add significant value to solving production issues, often on a more holistic level.

EWI – Lightening in a Document

First, I’d like to thank  Grant Vokey, Gerard Ipskamp, and Jean-Luc Delcuvellerie for their contributions in the LinkedIn Manufacturing Execution Systems Group discussions.   I find these group discussions to be a rich and thoughtful source for all things MES.

Electronic Work Instructions, what are they?  Good question…  you may not like the answer.   The only way to answer this is to understand, at a high level, what they could be, and at the ground level, how they are implemented in different packages.   

 First, it helps to understand where they’ve come from.  Standard Operating Procedures, SOPs, have been part of the manufacturing environment since production managers could write down instructions.  Typically you’ll find these kind of instructions on the production floor on a laminated sheet (or sheets) hanging at an operation or bound in a humongous book in the quality office for every product and procedure.  They’re a big step in the right direction.  Getting your people to know what the right process is, and following that process is huge.  So…  problem solved?  Not really.   So, thinking that through… what happens when I have a change to the document?   Let’s say R&D has improved the operational procedure for a handful of products.  How does the change happen?  New documents are printed and distributed to the right locations.  When do you change over?  How do you coordinate the release of the document with when you want that new procedure put in place?  And this is really the simplest case.  Let’s consider what else might be in that SOP.  If we include setup instructions, quality inspection instructions, or production data collection instructions in the SOP, this document becomes a living document.  Each area of information may be managed differently, by different groups.   In addition, the information for each may or may not be related.  How do you coordinate this disparate data?  How do you make sure the right data is updated in the document at the right time and appears at the operator when it’s supposed to?

Managing this kind of information in a pure text document is both difficult and ineffective.   This has driven the need for Electronic Work Instructions, EWI.   So… what could EWI be?  Since there isn’t a definition in Wikipedia, I’ll make one up.  It could be an electronic document that contains embedded data fields that can be managed and distributed either automatically or according to some scheduling criteria.   I would add that there are some ancillary functions that actually make this manageable and useful:

• Document Versioning – An important feature, especially useful in a flexible production environment, or where rapid product changes occur.
• Review and Approval – The ability to create/modify a document and route it for review and approval.
• Data Integration – The ability to add or update data fields in the document based on an external data source (e.g.  Control Limits for a given product and operation).
• Distribution Management – The ability to schedule document distribution or initiate distribution based on business rules (such as release coordination with new products).
• Hierarchy – The ability to structure a master document with related sub-documents.  For instance a master document for Product A may contain sub sections for production, quality, safety, sanitation, etc.  Each of these sub sections may be divided into smaller divisions based on operations for instance.
• Security – The ability to control who may read, create, or modify documents.
• Electronic Signatures – Having the ability to record sign-off on a document is incredibly useful.  This is usually the cornerstone of becoming CFR 21 part 11 compliant, providing auditable records that can be easily retrieved and reported.

Once we’ve created a document and know how to publish it when we need to, we also need to be able to control access to it.  Actually, we’d like to coordinate document access with production processes, so that the right document (or sub-section, or sub-section item) is made available based on production conditions.  What conditions?

• Operations – Displaying the right document item based on the production operation
• Product – ditto for the product, usually in combination with Operations.
• Quality Status – Showing the right quality procedure based on sampling results and showing the procedure for further testing/evaluation.  Things like Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points, HACCP, Corrective and Preventative Actions, CAPA, and Material Review Board, MRB fall into this category.
• Setup or Changeover – Displaying the right document for machine/unit setup based on a product change.
• Sanitation or CIP – Displaying the right document for sanitation or clean in place operations before or after a production run.

All of the above require extensive coordination.  That’s why EWI has become more main stream in MES applications in the last few years.   You mean EWI creation and management in MES?  Well… Yes and no.  Yes, there are packages that have most of the required EWI capabilities in them.  What better way to determine current production state than through MES.  No argument from me.  MES applications typically have an intimate awareness of operations and the production state.  The issue is the information embedded in those documents.  Much of what should be there comes from Product Life-Cycle Management, PLM, applications, Enterprise Resource Planning, ERP, applications, or Laboratory Information Management System applications.   If you create those documents in a MES EWI function, then (if you don’t have some mechanism for automated updates) you have to manage that information in multiple systems.  You just don’t want to go there.  Better to use the MES EWI as a kind of reference engine, letting it retrieve the appropriate document from another location or system based on production conditions. 

So if we only point to the documents we need from MES, where should the documents be created?  No simple answers here.  ERP’s typically have some capability to create and manage these documents.  PLM’s are usually a better place to keep/manage them simply because the majority of the information needed is managed there anyway.  PLM’s also usually have the ability to distribute those data elements (like limits, set-points, sample id’s, etc) to other systems.  PLM’s aren’t for everyone however.  They aren’t cheap and require a resource investment to keep them fed with current and accurate data.  However you choose to implement EWI’s (or a combination of EWI and document management) there are some important factors to consider:

• Minimize the management of document data to as few systems as possible – keeping systems synchronized can be painful and unreliable.
• Use the MES EWI system to refer to documents – freeing the MES EWI function from document management functions simplifies the MES configuration and keeps the data in the system of authority.
• Develop alignment between systems – Making sure the ERP operations and the MES operations share common boundaries will ensure that the right document with the right data arrives at the right time.
•  Data Integration – Mapping out where and how data is managed before implementing an EWI can significantly reduce data integration requirements and significantly increase data accuracy and timeliness.

EWI can make dramatic improvements in production efficiency and quality.  How you choose to implement it really depends on your product mix, production complexity, and to a large part your IT infrastructure.

MES Finally Makes the GAMP!

There are several conferences coming up that you may want to pencil into your calendar…

ISPE’s Washington Conference, June 7-10 in Washington DC - http://www.ispe.org/2010_ispe_washington_conference

MESA’s North American Conference, June 21-23 in Dearborn, MI – http://conference.mesa.org/en/conferenceoverview.asp

A few notes about each:

ISPE Washington Conference

The Washington conference is noteworthy because it will be the launch for the long awaited GAMP Good Practice Guide:  Manufacturing Execution Systems.  MES finally made it into the GAMP!  A long time in the making, this guide will help to put the spotlight on MES.  Although the ISPE show will have lots of Pharma topics, there is a special session dedicated to the topic “How MES can help your company save time and money” (taken from their published agenda).   I would add “and add revenue to your bottom line”. 

There will be several speakers addressing:  

• Strategic Management Approach
• Models and Standards
• Domain of Functionality
• Electronic Production Records (EPR
• Case Study- discussing an on-site MES implementation

 I really like the session on Electronic Product Records (EPR) because this is really an expansion of the too limited perception of Electronic Batch Records (EBR).  Why the change in focus?  Because there’s a lot more value in electronic production records than just keeping track of batches.  This is a way of thinking about other production processes that need to be packaged with process data and associated to production items.  For instance Clean-In-Place (CIP) for some manufacturers may not necessarily be associated with a given batch.  It may be associated with an order or lot instead.  There may be setup operations where the setup and first run process data needs to be captured and associated with an order (or a batch as well).   This also opens up the view to more discrete operations, like packaging for instance, that require the collection and association of process or production data.  In the case of medical device manufacturers for instance, this may be represented by the Device History Record, DHR.  The DHR associates all the production, manufacturing, and quality data for a an item or lot, acting in much the same way as an EBR record associates a batch to production and process data.  So this expanded term, EPR, really speaks to this elevated view of what and how to make these associations.

These sessions will also address the new GAMP guidelines for Review by Exception and Real-Time Release.  Although not a new concept, it’s a shift from assessing risk based on application or system functionality to assessing risk based on the functionality of the process or activity.  It should be a very, very interesting conversation.

Although I’ve been droning on about EPR, the Guide is really the thing.  If you really want to know how MES can impact your business, and what are the MES best practices, you can’t afford to miss this one.

MESA North American Conference

Initially I thought this was going to be an automotive conference.  It’s sponsored by Ford Motor Company and held in Michigan.  Kind of gets you thinking that way.  I stand corrected.   After talking with a few MESA members and looking at the Agenda, it’s pretty clear that they’re staying on message:

• Tying Operational Performance Metrics to Financial Metrics
• Real-Time Enterprise
• Quality & Compliance
• Asset Performance Management (APM)
• Product Lifecycle Management (PLM)
• Lean
• Sustainability
• Reducing Operational Costs

I’m especially happy to see two items in particular.  Although “MES” people and “Lean” people have ignored each other’s message, and insist that the other isn’t necessary if only you’d drink their Kool-Aid, it’s pretty clear that there’s a symbiotic relationship there.  In order to make Lean work, you need data.  MES provides that data, and the ability to modify processes as the result of Kaizen.  Providing that manufacturing control and visibility is the MES raison d’être.   Seeing how others are applying MES to Lean initiatives would be enough reason alone to see this conference.   With the recent recession vividly in our communal consciousness and the unrelenting march toward environmental neutrality rooting itself in the manufacturing landscape, the Sustainability sessions are a see now, or regret later proposition. 

If you are in the Life Sciences, Consumer Product Goods, Food & Beverage, or some other FDA regulated industry these would be my top choices for MES conferences this year.

Making it Real: Implementing Your MES Roadmap

This is a continuation of the discussions related to “MESA to Change Direction?”   Before you implement your Roadmap for Change, it makes sense to find out what you have in your backyard that might support it today, and what you need to add or modify to support your plan.  It also makes some sense to make sure you have a team that can get you there.

Automation Data Capabilities and Requirements

One of the advantages of the MES Organic approach is that it is totally agnostic in relation to technologies.  MES capabilities may be fulfilled by one or many applications or systems.  In fact, some MES capabilities could be fulfilled by applications or systems that already exist.  Using the process flows and interface definitions from the workshops define what data is needed and what manufacturing activities need it.  By performing a Systems and Automation Data survey you can determine:

 

• Does the required data exist for use
• Does the system collecting the data provide access to the data
• Can the system be modified to provide the needed data
• Can the system be modified to provide the needed capability

 

MES capabilities rely on the particular data that is available from the automation and controls level.  For instance, getting the production count may be easy, but you’ll need a counter of some kind to perform the task, and the data from that counter has to be available to calculate yield or determine that the item count for an order has actually been reached.   By performing the above survey you will know if the current system can support your future state, if modifications are required, and if legacy systems can fulfill some of the future state requirements.

Implementing the Roadmap

Selecting and implementing a MES (or MES technologies) can be a daunting task.  Hopefully, by narrowing the number of capabilities you’ve selected, you’ve also reduced the complexity and effort required for implementation.  Having clear process flows and requirements for your future state also simplifies technology selection.  Framing these requirements in terms of ISA-95 defined capabilities and activities also provides a bridge to technology providers who have developed solutions compliant with the ISA-95 standard (and market their product that way as well).  While this doesn’t guarantee that their product will provide a complete solution, it does help you determine how well their product fits your requirements in terms that you are familiar with.

Integrate the Old with the New

• Extend Legacy Systems where appropriate
• Develop Automation capability where necessary
• Implement limited MES functionality with compartmentalized capabilities

 

Implementation isn’t all about technology selection though.  The project team will have significantly more impact on the success of your implementation than almost any other factor.

Getting MES Processes Right is a TEAM Effort

• MES isn’t an IT initiative, it’s a Team initiative
• Selected capabilities may dictate different SME’s, Operators, IT skills
• MES SUPPORTS Lean and Six Sigma Initiatives

 

Often MES initiatives begin as an IT initiative.  The glass wall between IT and Engineering is well known.   The solution is to empower all of the stakeholders.  Collaboration workshops accomplish some of this.  Another way to ensure buy-in is to find and assign a Project Champion from engineering, operations, or production.  Remember that it’s the process that’s important, not whose system is in charge.  Also remember that it may take subject matter experts from different areas and backgrounds to implement a holistic solution.

There may also be some resistance from Operations or Production if they own a Lean or Six Sigma initiative.  It’s often a mistaken assumption that a MES initiative is counter to Lean goals.  This is simply not true.  In fact, it is the opposite.  The information from MES initiatives can provide a firm foundation for the data needed for the Kaizen process.  MES technologies can also provide the framework for needed solutions.

Next Time:  How Do You Measure How Effective This Has Been?

How Do You See MESA?

I’ve received a few comments on the MESA series that seem to indicate that for manufactures who are just considering making use of MES capabilities, it is difficult to determine the value of MES, to understand it in terms of business activities, and to understand the material offered.  Some manufacturers feel like MESA is too focused on vendors and system integrators and not accessible enough.

I agree that MESA needs to be a lot more accessible. The intent of my posts is a kind of shot over the bow (more like a spit wad over an aircraft carrier) to anyone at MESA who might be interested, and readers who just don’t get what MESA might have to offer. I also agree that it tends to be a vendor centric view. For example, go to their website sometime. Finding anything of value is a real challenge. First just locating the information is a challenge, then making sense of the content is a challenge. If you already know MES and understand the different models it’s not too bad. If you’re a manufacturer unfamiliar with MES and trying to find out if where the value is, heaven help you. As far as conversation or dialogue is concerned, forget it. The impression is one of a one way street of education, they are the experts telling you how it is. I understand that they are trying to set up a value for membership model to pay for their content, but even so, I’m a basic member and it’s difficult to get to the content I need, and impossible to have any kind of idea exchange.

The original presentation by Matthew Littlefield was extremely revealing, showing that manufacturers in the general population actually fared well against MESA member manufacturers and better in certain critical areas, one of them being the involvement of C-level management in MES projects, the other being the inclusion of business process methods for implementing MES. I think this has been a blind spot for MESA from the beginning.

What are your thoughts?  Is this BS?  Do you think MESA is easy to work with?  Do you understand their MES value proposition?  Have you been able to incorporate other processes, like change management, into your overall MES implementation strategy using the MESA model?

Let’s stir the pot and see what comes up!

MESA Part 5 – Forging a Path Forward

This posting is a continuation of the “MESA to Change Direction?” posting.  This series discusses how to implement MES systems using a Business Process Management approach, looking at the manufacturing processes and then determining how to implement those processes through changes in how operators perform tasks and the technologies that enable those changes.

It’s not enough to simply hold workshops solve world hunger and sing Kumbaya.   Having a roadmap, a plan for change, and the business case to back up our claims for improvement can make it a reality.

Ok, so we’ve held the workshops…   WHOOHOO!   Exhausting as they are, we’re now armed with some fantastic information. Our four deliverables from those workshops look something like this:

To-Be Process

A process map of how each manufacturing activity will be performed in the Future State.

During the workshops, we sketched these on flip charts or whiteboards at a high level.  Afterwards, we need to create an electronic version with all the details, both in the form of a process flow map, and a textual document describing the process.  Route it through the participants and get their sign-off.   

System Footprint

A mapping of the capabilities defined in the above processes to existing systems and new systems that will be required to support the Future State.    This requires some analysis.  We’ll need to determine which capabilities (or pieces of capabilities) will be performed through modification of existing systems, and which will be performed through acquired systems.  We’ll need to identify those new systems.  How?  Because many of the MES application vendors (MES, LIMs, Data Historians, PLM, etc) have developed and market their products using the ISA-95 standard its usually a straight-forward process to map the future state processes with MES application capabilities.

Interfaces

A collection of “touch point” agreements between systems that specifies each specific interface called out in the To-Be process.   This provides the information we need to get the IT department in gear.  Probably the most important piece of this deliverable though is a Data Walk-Through.  This takes our future state process, assigns real values to the data transferred between systems so everyone can see how their processes will be expected to work.  I can’t emphasize enough how important this is.  Just seeing the real data will bring everyone down to the reality of how the new process will work.

Business Case

A high level business plan that contains:

• Description of the objectives
• A list of requirements
• A Gap Analysis
• A description of the change management issues
•  A migration plan
• Expected ROI’s by activity

Objectives – We’ve already collected these for the workshops, we just need to include them to frame the business case.  We can also provide some high level statements, from analysis of our future state and ROI, for how our new way of doing business will meet our objectives.

Requirements – Since we’ve conducted our workshops based on ISA-95 capabilities and functionality, we need to capture those capabilities and assign a priority value to each.  The intent here is to form the basis for selection of technologies and provide justification for changes in current business practices. 

Gap Analysis – Working from our list of shortfalls from the workshops we can now develop a gap analysis that describes how the new process addresses those shortfalls, or describes the mitigation plan where the processes do not address or solve the shortfalls.

Change Management – By including a change management champion in our workshop sessions, we’ve been able to collect change management issues, bring them into the discussions of future state, and begin the planning to address them.  The list of change management issues may surprise you but it’s imperative that the company is aware of and planning for the changes in how you will do business.  Change issues can range from simple tweaks to the way a department handles a transaction, to an overhaul in how documents are managed and employees are trained or certified.

Migration Plan – No matter how you will proceed, having a roadmap for how you will get there is critical.  A high level technical roadmap that calls out the order and timeframe of implementation of the systems needed to support your future state can provide the budgeting information you need to sell your program internally.   Don’t think it’s all about the budget either, having a plan for implementing fundamental capabilities or capabilities that have far reaching impact in your organization can help you transition smoothly and more efficiently.

Return on Investment – All the work we’ve done in the workshops to determine the costs of the shortfalls we’ve identified pays off here.  Remember that each workshop was set up for a particular set of capabilities or functions, and that we’ve collected the shortfalls, and the costs of those shortfalls for those capabilities.  In addition, we’ve identified estimates of lost opportunities during those workshops.  This defines our ROI for each of those activities.  Having this granular level of ROI allows us to do one very important thing, we can measure it.  Along with the identification of the ROI for each activity, we’re going to identify the KPI that measures how well we will accomplish the improvement we seek.

OK, that’s great!  We’ve got our workshop deliverables.  Now what do we do with them?

Next time – Making It Real

MESA Part 4 – Laying the Foundation for Change

This posting continues our discussion of how to apply Business Process Management methods to implementing MES. 

In previous discussions we talked about the materials we needed to prepare for a series of Consensus Workshops.  What are Consensus Workshops?  That requires a little background. 

What is a Consensus Workshop?

For the selected functional areas (see below) subject matter experts from each of the affected departments or functional areas are assembled to; review the current As-Is state and shortfalls, generate a To-Be state process flow, determine how the process flow addresses the shortfalls and the company objectives and strategy, develop a list of the gaps between the To-Be state and those shortfalls left unaddressed, and address the change management issues related to the future state processes.

What are the topics for the Workshops?

The full list of topics available for holding Workshops follows the ISA-95 Model:

1. Production Control
2. Quality Assurance
3. Maintenance Management
4. Material and Energy Control
5. Product Inventory Control
6. Production Scheduling
7. Procurement
8. R&D
9. Order Processing
10. Cost Accounting
11. Product Shipping

Some notes on this list:  You can usually combine Material and Energy Control with Production Inventory Control under a single topic Inventory Management (as it is in the MOM).  This allows you to address raw materials, WIP, and finished goods discussions in a single workshop.  If Energy Control is a significant topic, create a separate workshop for it.  Don’t discount the Cost Accounting and Order Processing discussions, they may be short but they can be significant.  For example, determining how product unit costs are evaluated can affect critical KPI’s and incentives.

How do we select the topics?

As you prepare the As-Is state process flows and gather shortfalls for the way you currently do business, a picture emerges of areas that need attention or present opportunities.  You could hold a workshop for each area of the ISA-95 model, one for all the activities in Production Control, one for all the activities in Quality Management, one for all the activities in Procurement, etc.  Do you need to hold a workshop for every area?  That depends on how comprehensively you intend to apply an MES system.  Another way to look at it is to identify those areas with the most problems and the most opportunity for payback.  It’s a trade-off, expediency and short-term payback versus comprehensiveness and longer term payback.

A few of the advantages of selecting a limited number of areas are;

• It is usually easier to determine the true ROI for change.
• It’s easier for participants to understand the value of the change. 
• It requires fewer resources to implement.  

Remember it’s a trade-off.  There are also advantages to the comprehensive approach;

• Having a full picture of the numerous and various interfaces between systems and implementing them one time is much more efficient, 
• Even if you don’t implement all of the future state or To-Be processes you will have a long-term plan to work towards,
• It’s easier to implement full-scale change while you have your foot on the gas.

Next Time:  Creating the Framework for Change