LEAN management in Prepress

[Mr. White]

Hi all

Let me start of by saying that this is a great forum for all of us interested in print production. Thank you.

Now to the point. I am doing a project for a local production company, as they need to optimize their workflow due to the financial state of things. More specific I am working with the prepress department (25 people). I wan't to use LEAN management both outside and inside of their workstations - meaning that whatever order is optimized flow is applied to the outside is also applied inside the computers. So here's the question:

Seeing that many of you have great experience with implementing LEAN, I am wondering if you could help me get started on what elements of LEAN are best used for working with prepress?

Thank you

[mattf]

Originally Posted by Mr. White

Hi all

Let me start of by saying that this is a great forum for all of us interested in print production. Thank you.

Now to the point. I am doing a project for a local production company, as they need to optimize their workflow due to the financial state of things. More specific I am working with the prepress department (25 people). I wan't to use LEAN management both outside and inside of their workstations - meaning that whatever order is optimized flow is applied to the outside is also applied inside the computers. So here's the question:

Seeing that many of you have great experience with implementing LEAN, I am wondering if you could help me get started on what elements of LEAN are best used for working with prepress?

Thank you

Mr. White:

Welcome to the forums! I'm glad to see people asking questions about subjects pertaining to lean.

To get to the bare bones ideas of lean, you need to think about a few concepts. First off:

1) What is the current state of the pre-press department?
2) What areas are clearly in need of help/improvement?
3) What do you wish to accomplish by doing this?

Basic things to get off the ground. There are a lot of concepts out there concerning lean and what to derive from those concepts to make them applicable to the real world.

The whole idea of lean is to reduce waste. This could be wasted time, resources and so on. There are tons of areas within pre-press that you can reduce waste. One of the main things you need to focus on is a cooperative within prepress who will analyze and draw conclusions about what the waste is, where it is and how to eliminate it.

So there is one idea, come up with a team that will analyze the prepress area itself to find and remove waste. Since prepress itself is a combined office and production setting, you can easily implement both a 5S for everyone's office as well as the equipment. 5S is the first preliminary step to the elimination of waste, particularly what is visually seen.

5S would be a start to get rid of preliminary waste. The office area will look better and then you can go deeper into finding out what other waste is present, creation of value-stream charts to analyze the productivity of certain sections of pre-press and so on.

But yeah, start with the concepts of listening to the workers and finding common ground of what can be improved. A 5S event that will clean up the area and the office setting can follow, followed by more concentrated improvement initiatives.

Hope this helps.

[David Dodd]

Mr. White,

I agree completely with mattf that 5S is the way to begin your lean efforts in prepress. I would suggest that you then begin to define standard work procedures for repetitive prepress processes such as preflighting, checking proofs, etc. I described standard work in an earlier thread, and you can refer to that thread if you are not familiar with the term. Standard work is critical in lean because it provides the "baseline" for making improvements.

Good luck with your project.

[Mr. White]

Mattf & David Dodd

thank you for your response.

I expect I will start out in this way:
1. Doing a valuestream analyzis of the state og the prepress workflow toward the product/costumer. This will be done based on interviews and observation.
2. Implementing standart work to free up some man hours, and let the cpu do the work. This I imagine is best done for this firm using Power switch.
3. 5s to make the Desktop/file hierachy organised and boost productivity. For this I am thinking about using Hazel to watch over folders. Any better solutions for this?
4. Setting up an intranet where staffmembers can share their ideas within the company. The prepress manager then post the really good ones to a blog, creating an interactive meeting place to discuss it.
5. Talking to the managers about different motivation techniques, so that we ensure the new kind of workflow is maintaint og developed further.

Please comment on this approach, and share you better ideas.

Thank You very much

[mattf]

Originally Posted by Mr. White

Mattf & David Dodd

thank you for your response.

I expect I will start out in this way:
1. Doing a valuestream analyzis of the state og the prepress workflow toward the product/costumer. This will be done based on interviews and observation.
2. Implementing standart work to free up some man hours, and let the cpu do the work. This I imagine is best done for this firm using Power switch.
3. 5s to make the Desktop/file hierachy organised and boost productivity. For this I am thinking about using Hazel to watch over folders. Any better solutions for this?
4. Setting up an intranet where staffmembers can share their ideas within the company. The prepress manager then post the really good ones to a blog, creating an interactive meeting place to discuss it.
5. Talking to the managers about different motivation techniques, so that we ensure the new kind of workflow is maintaint og developed further.

Please comment on this approach, and share you better ideas.

Thank You very much

1) 5S should be your first initiative. Figure out where the waste is and just get rid of it before trying to implement any improvements on the system itself.

2) Attached is an example of a value-stream map. This will help you to document non-value added processes and value added processes.

3) Hazel might be too much. I worked at a pre-press department 2 years ago and we worked directly with in-house designers. Our department requested specific guidelines of our designers to insure standardization of work. One of which was Specific hierarchy of folders. As long as designers were aware of naming conventions, file submission and PDF creation was what we wanted, there was no problems for us in analyzing the files. Any specific issues were immediately seen at the beginning of our process and were corrected. Hazel can do all that for you, but a question that comes to mind, are the files coming from independent designers or consistent clients? That could change how you look at this issue.

4) Intranet with a blog, or just forums?

5) I think managers should be involved with meetings involving the whole prepress department. Understanding what the worker needs is the best tool for the managers to have. Understanding their concerns should be their top priority.

two and a half cents there :P

[mattf]

Another tool I like to use is a 5S audit sheet, its attached to this post.

This is used for internal evaluation of the area. Consistent audits help to support the concept of a clean and organized area that is sustained.

[Molly@ipa.org]

I want to mention that we have a comprehensive lean program developed specifically for prepress. You can find info on our site at e-LEAN for the Graphic Communication Industry - Total Learning Experience | IPAor contact me directly for more info (molly@ipa.org or 800-255-8141). IPA is a non-profit trade association with educational resources for efficiencies in graphics workflow (including prepress.)

[eastppress]

All these points are well taken: 5-S and the foundation, Value Stream Mapping, seeking improvement opportunities and involving managers. To truly make Lean effective, you need these, participation and involvement of cross-functional members, and, most importantly Management's commitment to support Lean. This commitment must be not just verbal behind closed doors, but it must be visible and on-going. Even if you start a program in your area of responsibility, you require support including if necessary the clarity from management that there is a permanent commitment that everyone must embrace and carry forward. Expecting that others will adopt your modeling of success is unrealistic optimism unless you are in the vast minority of experiences. Also, make certain that your training involves teaching participants about the importance and successes of Lean. Having conducted a thesis on "Effective Implementations of Lean Manufacturing", I assure you that training is critical to success.
Best of luck and keep us informed of your progress.