Production Scheduling for the Process Industries : Strategies, Systems, and Culture

This book is aimed at manufacturing and planning managers who struggle to bring a greater degree of stability and more effective use of assets to their operations, not realizing the degree to which production scheduling affects those objectives. It has been reported that 75% of the problems on the manufacturing floor are caused by activities outside the plant floor. Poor production scheduling strategies and systems are often the biggest contributors to the 75%.

The book explains in detail that no scheduling strategy, and especially no transition to a different and better scheduling strategy, will succeed without strong commitment and guidance from senior leadership. Leadership must understand their active role in the transition, that people will feel uncomfortable and even threatened by change, and that they will need to be measured by different standards. Effective scheduling requires that following the schedule and production to plan is more important than trying to maximize each day’s throughput.

The book explains the advantages of a structured, regularly repeating schedule: how it can increase throughput, right-size inventory based on cycles and variabilities and therefore make it more usable, and improve customer delivery. It will explain the trade-offs between throughput, inventory, and delivery performance, how those trade-offs are actually decided in production scheduling, and how an appropriate scheduling strategy can make the trade-offs and their ramifications visible. It discusses several popular structured scheduling concepts, their similarities, and differences, to allow the readers to decide which might fit best in their environments.

In addition, the authors discuss what makes an appropriate scheduling software system, and why a package designed for structured scheduling offers capabilities well beyond the Excel workbooks used by many companies, and how it offers much more design capability and ease of use than the finite scheduling modules in SAP or Oracle.

Finally, the authors offer a proven roadmap for implementation, critical success factors necessary to achieve the full potential, and give examples of operations that have done this well. In addition, a guide for leaders and managers post-implementation is provided to help them fully exploit the advantages of a structured, repeating scheduling strategy.

Acknowledgments
About the Authors
Preface

Section 1 : Introduction
Chapter 1 : Business Imperatives : Why Scheduling Matters
Chapter 2 : Characteristics of Process Operations - And Scheduling Challenges%u3000
Chapter 3 : Overview of Production Strategies
Chapter 4 : Scheduling Processes and Software
Chapter 5 : Example Process

Section 2 : Scheduling Strategies
Chapter 6 : Repetitive Scheduling Strategies
Chapter 7 : Dealing With Disruption

Section 3 : Scheduling Processes, Systems, and Software
Chapter 8 : The Role of Forecasting
Chapter 9 : The Role of Inventory
Chapter 10 : Typical Scheduling Process Steps
Chapter 11 : Multi-Level Scheduling
Chapter 12 : Tanks, Bins, and Flow Paths
Chapter 13 : The Role of ERP Systems in Planning and Scheduling
Chapter 14 : Excel as a Finite Scheduling Tool
Chapter 15 : Software Designed for Production Scheduling
Chapter 16 : Critical Ingredients, Raw Materials, and Components
Chapter 17 : Scheduling Software : Security and Privacy

Section 4 : Prerequisites to Good Scheduling
Chapter 18 : The Role of the Plant Leader
Chapter 19 : Scheduling Readiness Criteria
Chapter 20 : Accessible, Accurate, and Complete Data
Chapter 21 : Effective Production and Capacity Planning
Chapter 22 : Workforce Engagement
Chapter 23 : Changeover Reduction - SMED
Chapter 24 : Production Stability
Chapter 25 : Cellular Manufacturing
Chapter 26 : Managing Bottlenecks and Constraints

Section 5 : Getting to Success
Chapter 27 : Leading Scheduling Improvements to Drive Value : Five Steps for Leaders
Chapter 28 : Where to Begin : A Roadmap to Project Success
Chapter 29 : Critical Success Factors
Chapter 30 : Success Stories : Examples Of Scheduling Best Practices

Index