"Zero is a beautiful number," says Todd Seeley, director of operations and plant manager at Case New Holland's Wichita, Kan., manufacturing plant.
It is the number of quality losses his facility and its people aspire to, the number of accidents they like to see, and the number of problems they want to occur. Seeley describes it as the Zero Optimum Concept.
"Our goal is not to be 20% better or 50% better," he says, "We want a zero-problem" site.
World Class Manufacturing (WCM) is how the manufacturer aims to get there, explains Humberto Del Rio, continuous improvement manager at the facility, which is located on an 80-acre site not far from the Wichita Mid-Continent Airport. It is the sole manufacturing plant for CNH's skid steer loaders, and employs 472 plant employees (639 overall).
Recently it was the site of an IndustryWeek Excellence in Action plant tour.
Like the Toyota Production System, WCM is a system for continuous improvement. The two methodologies share many similar tools and concepts, including just-in-time, autonomous maintenance, yamazumi boards (used to balance processes), the 5 Whys problem-solving technique and extensive employee involvement to drive improvements.
The Wichita plant's introduction to WCM is by way of Fiat Industrial, of which Case New Holland (IW 1000/259) is a majority-owned subsidiary.
Unlike Toyota, WCM's approach to improvement is built on a structure of 10 technical pillars, including logistics, people development and early equipment management, among others. Another component of World Class Manufacturing is semi-annual external audits to measure improvement against WCM standards. Indeed, Seeley serves as an auditor at other sites implementing World Class Manufacturing.
