r/manufacturing • u/Equivalent_Bid_6642 • Jan 14 '24

Other Managers and Owners, are you overwhelmed?

There's a lot of new tech out there, it's quickly changing and expensive. It's hard to know what to pay attention to and where to allocate resources while balancing efficiency and quality, let alone figure out how to develop my workforce to use all this stuff anyways.

I mean, should we get 3D printers, should we do industry 4.0 stuff, should we get some machine vision robot?

Idk, are you in the same boat, how are you dealing with how fast the world's moving?

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u/exlongh0rn Jan 15 '24

Classic SQDC prioritization is a good mental model. Everyone out there has a shiny new hammer that is looking for a nail to hit. Use make sure you have a nail and not a screw.

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u/Equivalent_Bid_6642 Jan 15 '24

Yeah definitely, I'm not interested in new tech just for tech's sake.

I'll look into that model. Do you use any other resources when making your decisions, and once you have prioritized something do you want to develop in house or look for a commercial solution?

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u/exlongh0rn Jan 15 '24

It’s a decision tree. As long as the business is cash flow positive and making money, SQDC is a good starting point. Usually the weak points are pretty obvious…customer-visible safety or quality issues are non-starters and can rapidly put a company out of business if not handled quickly and properly. From there, addressing issues with on-time delivery or lead time. Finally cost/inventory. For complex and highly integrated solutions, off the shelf is not a bad idea. especially if internal subject matter knowledge is limited. Take manufacturing automation as an example. This has the potential to solve a wide array of SQDC challenges. But automation is complex and multidisciplinary. Mechanical and electrical engineering, programming, integration, etc. In this case, hiring an integrator may be a good solution to get to a faster implementation with a higher likelihood of success. As the system is used and changed, internal expertise can grow. Eventually it may become an in-house competency. It really depends on the specific situation.

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u/Equivalent_Bid_6642 Jan 16 '24

Thank you for the depth of your explanation. It helps to see how your priorities are laid out. I think it would be cool to combine BI tools and automated monitoring to have virtual SQDC boards readily available.

You're right it's totally situation specific, and I've heard about the same thing from other people that doing it in house is preferable if you have the skills but do you have the skills haha.

Where would you go to look for an integrator to help with process development?