Share a quick assessment of the production capacity and strength of a clothing factory

Share a quick assessment of the production capacity and strength of a clothing factory

2、 The working atmosphere on site in the workshop

On site, one can first visually see the true mental state of employees, with high morale employees contrasting sharply with loose and indifferent employees. Talking to the on-site workers for a few words can also give important first impressions from their facial expressions and body language, as these directly reflect their emotions and satisfaction with the factory. In a factory we visited, most of the workshops were playing cheerful music. At first glance, the workers were chasing after each other and had a high enthusiasm for labor. Working in such a relaxed and pleasant environment, efficiency was relatively higher, and the quality of the products also gave people more confidence.

When walking in the workshop, one can pay attention to observing whether there is any unevenness in busy schedules or stacking of goods. For example, most of the workers in the group are very busy, but there are some workers who are idle for a long time, or some workers in certain workstations are waiting for materials for a long time. The existence of this phenomenon indicates that factories lack lean management, low personnel utilization, and idle employees can also affect the working atmosphere of others, resulting in overall low work efficiency and inevitably higher costs.

Attention should be paid to whether the lighting in the workshop is sufficient, whether the air circulation is smooth, whether there is any odor on site, whether the noise is too loud, and whether the workshop is clean, as these can directly affect the mood of workers, thereby affecting production efficiency and product quality. It's hard to imagine a factory with a lazy, low atmosphere, employees or those who harbor resentment or are idle can produce good products and create benefits.

3、 Space utilization and layout

Some factory managers may believe that the larger the production workshop, the better, resulting in low utilization rates, scattered equipment and process layouts, and in addition to wasting space, a large amount of unnecessary handling of surface and auxiliary materials is also carried out in the factory. However, most factories in countries such as Japan may not appear as spectacular or even somewhat cramped, but they have high space utilization and circulation efficiency.

Transportation vehicles not only occupy space and have high operating costs, but also encourage unnecessary material movement. We saw many carts shuttling busily at a customer's factory, but there was a lot of unnecessary handling involved. For example, the same batch of fabric is moved from Zone A to Zone B for processing, then returned to Zone A for further processing, then moved to Zone C for processing, and finally moved back to Zone B, which wastes too much time in handling.

In principle, the production fabrics used on the day should be stored along the production line, rather than separated by several inventory areas. Tools and fixtures should be placed as close to the machine as possible. The factory layout should ensure smooth product flow and avoid any partitions as much as possible. If you see fabrics with long handling distances, repetitive handling routes, or multiple handling times in a factory, it indicates that the layout is unreasonable, the space utilization is not ideal, and it also indicates that the production line has not been able to gather as much as possible.

4、 On site standardization

A standard is a good state and a unified execution reference. Without standards, there is no way to execute, and there is no focus for improvement. The production site should

There are many standards, including homework and quality standards, 6S and safety standards, operation and maintenance standards, process and rework standards, safety stock standards, and so on.

By observing the specific operation processes of different employees in the same process, it can be found whether there are differences, including the order of actions, the intensity of operations, and whether there are omissions. If there are differences, it indicates that the lack of standardized operation training for the lathe workers greatly increases the possibility of product variation. When we were inspecting a supplier's factory, we found that different machinists have different hand gestures and sequences for zippers, and there is no standard action video reference. It is entirely based on the experience of the machinists themselves. When using such products, users may inevitably experience chain drops.

5、 Control of production quality

On site observation should focus on the workshop's handling of defective products. A good factory will expose problems instead of covering up defective and scrap products. For example, if there is rework in a certain process, the managed factory will use red labels to highlight it, which can immediately determine whether rework is increasing or whether a certain workstation on the assembly line is producing defective products.

6、 Visual inspection of the production site

Kanban management and visual management are the foundation of on-site management and the intuitive communication of the management level of a production enterprise. In well managed factories, visual tools are ubiquitous. This includes the organization and standardization of the workplace, visualization of outcome indicators, visualization of standard operations, visualization of control indicators, visualization of automatic error prevention and correction, and alarm mechanisms. When visiting, attention should be paid to finding various visual tools.

Visual management dashboards can be divided into static and dynamic management dashboards. Static kanban mainly conveys the long-term management philosophy of the organization, while dynamic kanban is the management information that managers need to grasp at any time, which can better reflect the management level and ability of a factory.

7、 Tool and equipment status

In a good factory, the equipment is clean and well maintained, and the relevant information about the equipment is clear and updated in real-time. In addition, the daily inspection form should also be recorded completely. Some inspection forms clearly record the hidden dangers discovered by the operators, as well as the signatures and handling plans of the equipment department. This indicates that equipment management and maintenance have formed a sound system.