Manufacturing

Long Changeovers Force Big Batches

Long Changeovers Force Big Batches

26 Jul , 2026 - Manufacturing

I once sat in a humid, windowless factory office in Southeast Asia, watching a production manager insist his facility was “highly agile” while a single machine setup took six hours of frantic, uncoordinated wrench-turning. He had a shiny brochure promising rapid response times, but his reality was a different story entirely. The truth that no […]

Kanban Is a Limit, Not a Board

Kanban Is a Limit, Not a Board

17 Jul , 2026 - Manufacturing

I once sat in a humid, overcrowded factory in Shenzhen, watching a floor manager proudly display a bright, multi-colored Kanban board that looked like a work of art. He was convinced he had mastered production, but the reality was a mountain of half-finished components choking the aisles and a mounting pile of “urgent” emails from […]

Lean Beyond the Posters

Lean Beyond the Posters

12 Jul , 2026 - Manufacturing

I once sat in a humid, sweltering factory in Vietnam, watching a floor manager proudly point to a colorful “Lean Management” poster on the wall while three different operators struggled to find a single, misplaced component in a mountain of unorganized scrap. It was a perfect, infuriating example of why most people get it wrong; […]

Work in Progress Is Money Standing Still

Work in Progress Is Money Standing Still

3 Jul , 2026 - Manufacturing

I remember standing on a humid factory floor in Guangzhou back in 2008, watching a mountain of half-finished components gather dust in a corner. The production manager was smiling, telling me they were “scaling up,” but all I saw was a graveyard of capital. It’s a common delusion in procurement: the idea that having more […]

Expediting Moves Your Order and Somebody Else’s

Expediting Moves Your Order and Somebody Else’s

26 Jun , 2026 - Manufacturing

I once sat in a humid, dimly lit factory office in Shenzhen, watching a production manager smile warmly while assuring me that our delayed components were “just being packed” for shipment. I knew better. I could hear the silence from the actual production floor behind him, a silence that told me the machines had been […]

Shortening Lead Time Without Paying Expedite Fees

Shortening Lead Time Without Paying Expedite Fees

24 Jun , 2026 - Manufacturing

I once stood on a humid factory floor in Guangzhou, watching a production manager promise me that we could shave three weeks off our schedule just by “working harder.” He was smiling, but I was looking at the empty racks of raw material in the corner and the exhausted look in the operators’ eyes. That’s […]

Where the Weeks Actually Go in a Lead Time

Where the Weeks Actually Go in a Lead Time

11 Jun , 2026 - Manufacturing

I once sat in a humid, windowless factory office in Vietnam, watching a production manager swear on his mother’s life that our components were “on the line.” Two weeks later, I found out the “line” was actually a pile of unallocated raw material sitting in a warehouse three towns over because someone forgot to trigger […]

Oee Above Ninety Usually Means Bad Measurement

Oee Above Ninety Usually Means Bad Measurement

8 Jun , 2026 - Manufacturing

I once sat in a humid, windowless factory office in Vietnam, staring at a colorful dashboard that claimed 85% efficiency while the scrap bin in the corner was literally overflowing with rejected parts. The plant manager was beaming, pointing at his “optimized” metrics as if they were gospel, but I could smell the burnt plastic […]

The Capacity Number Factories Quote Is Theoretical

The Capacity Number Factories Quote Is Theoretical

28 May , 2026 - Manufacturing

I once sat in a humid, sweltering factory office in Vietnam, watching a production manager tap a calculator with supreme confidence while pointing to a glossy spreadsheet that claimed they could triple our order by next month. He was smiling, but the machines on the floor were silent, and the raw material pile was suspiciously […]

Planning Production Around the Bottleneck

Planning Production Around the Bottleneck

21 May , 2026 - Manufacturing

I once sat in a humid, windowless factory office in Vietnam, staring at a production schedule that looked like a work of art—perfectly balanced, color-coded, and utterly delusional. The plant manager was beaming, showing me a digital dashboard that promised 98% efficiency, but when I walked the floor ten minutes later, I saw three different […]