5 Day Rapid Implementation Workshop

It is as it says on the box: rapid implementation of RfS

Starting with RfS concepts on Monday morning through analysis - by the workshop participants themselves - of what the opportunities and barriers are from implementing RfS to setting up teams to address these and then ready to implement by Friday.

With around 25 participants including the Site Director, functional managers, engineers and line operators it is an exciting, energised and highly empowered week focussed on the objective of achieving RfS implementation by Friday. People work harder and longer each day than ever before and they finish the week elated, tired and cannot quite believe what they have achieved together during the week.

To get a further flavour of the week read the article "The magic of leveled scheduling".

2 Day RfS Audit

Based on a structured questionnaire looking at all aspects of the RfS implementation and the impact it has had in order to identify strengths, opportunities and any issues to be addressed.

Output is an agreed action plan with the Site Director with clear goals and responsibilities.

Re-sieve Support

A re-sieve is the process of determining and agreeing the next RfS cycle and usually happens two weeks before the end of the current cycle.

It is a new process in the business yet one that must be disciplined, structured and based on data - not just opinions. It is vital the re-sieve process becomes embedded and routine - part of the way the site is managed. For the first re-sieve having an experienced RfS facilitator, using a proven approach, can help the site develop its own robust re-sieve process. Usually support is only required for the first re-sieve.

Stretching RfS

Following a five day rapid implementation workshop economies of repetition happen quite quickly meaning there is a reduction in fire-fighting.

As a result people are less stressed and have more time. This gave rise to a problem that was never anticipated. People did not know what improvements to work on next. They had been fire fighters for so long they found proactively identifying and implementing further improvement opportunities hard to do. What was needed was some sort of aide memoire to help them identify what to work on next. A model was developed that we called "Stretching RfS", sub-titled "what do I do now?" It is intended to be used by Lean leaders in discussion with their team to agree what they should focus on next. It is not in any way a ranking or sequence of activities; rather it is a "menu" to choose from as you think appropriate. The key is to always be working on some aspect of improvement when you have achieved stability and repetition from RfS.

Some companies find it useful to use the "rapid improvement" approach to identify and action these opportunities. We can help facilitate these workshops. Using the same mixed participant approach as a 5 day workshop however the duration of this type of workshop varies between 3 and 5 days depending on the area of the business one is focusing on.

Where to apply RfS

Most manufacturing companies first apply RfS in their factories. Quickly followed by inbound and outbound logistics. Though it can be, and has been successfully applied to any business process including:

Successful application of RfS is not restricted to manufacturing. It has also been successfully applied in:

In every process looked at, the simple concept of separating the frequent few = the greens in RfS terminology, from the low volume majority = the reds, and then treating them differently can and does have a dramatic impact on performance.

For further information please contact us