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Metal fabrication management: Voices from the shop

Are you hearing or just listening

p>Most readers of The FABRICATOR love the sounds of metal being transformed into something useful and (they hope) profitable. When everything is working smoothly, the rhythm and tempo of production are truly fascinating.

But sometimes the sounds of production mask other sounds that we need to hear, sounds that indicate trouble, or something that I call “shop floor friction.” If we can’t detect those sounds, or we choose to ignore them (“hey, just turn the radio up”), we miss chances to correct chronic performance problems, remove obstacles to improvement initiatives, and generally maximize the organization’s competitive advantage.

Some of those missed sounds are the voices of the people who actually live in the place where value is either created or destroyed. Missing these sounds is the one common denominator that appears every time in an otherwise diverse list of ills that I find when solving company performance problems. People have difficulty hearing, even though they may be listening.

Listening and Hearing

We all have been taught (and sometimes badgered) to listen to what others are saying. Sometimes this is a matter of politeness, sometimes it is simply a means of learning. In any case, listening, and observational competence in general, is an extraordinarily important component of success. It’s hard to disagree with that.

But in many cases, listening (or in the modern syntax, “really” listening) is hardly sufficient to make proper judgments or choices. I could sit silent for hours really listening to two theoretical particle physicists discussing two competing views of the mathematical bases of M-theory, but there is no way I could make an informed judgment about what I was listening to, because I couldn’t really understand it. They may as well have been talking to the wall. I didn’t hear them.

The single most common feedback I get from people on the shop floor is that no one hears them. This is the case even where there is strong evidence that people are indeed listening to them. Weird, huh?

I have seen umpteen cases where managers and supervisors actually do listen through a variety of means, such as daily huddles, regular and frequent walkarounds, and even regular surveys. But amazingly, they hear very little, nothing changes, and eventually a deep-rooted cynicism sets in. Good luck making improvements in that environment.

So how is it that we can listen but not hear? By hearing, I mean fully understanding not just what is being said, but also the possible impacts and consequences. I have observed several reasons:

  • Listening is just a formalism that one checks off as being a “modern” manager or supervisor. There is little or no intention to hear what is being said.
  • Those listening have no way of understanding the impacts and consequences of what’s being said. Even if action is taken, it’s usually the wrong action.
  • Those listening actually do hear but deliberately or inadvertently underestimate the impacts and consequences and so take no action.
  • Those listening actually do hear and properly gauge the impacts or consequences, but they have no means to act upon what is heard.

To the person doing the talking, yeah, someone is listening, but no one is hearing, and he has proof, because nothing is done. Senior managers become frustrated because they feel they’re doing all the right things—but this frustration pales in comparison to that found on the shop floor.

What I Hear

I have a log and database of feedback from shop floor interviews I have accumulated over the years. Reviewing this reveals a number of common threads that I have categorized, and each affects shop floor performance. How much each affects performance depends on the company and exact circumstances.

By far the most common issue is “communication” to and from the shop floor. However, this single category is far too nebulous to drive any direct improvement action. Drilling down, I find related categories that are far more useful.

In order of frequency of occurrence, I hear the following as maladies that directly affect performance:

1. Poor communication. Information may be missing, wrong, contradictory, or confusing. This category can be further broken down into information relating to:

  • Expectations of output; erroneous or unrealistic standards and estimates.
  • Measures and metrics of performance that are either nonexistent or wrong.
  • Where things are and who knows what. This includes everything from materials to tools to how materials and tools are moved.
  • Procedures. How to do things and how to understand and process the necessary information.

2. Lack of accountability. This usually refers to upstream work, either from a previous shop operation or output from front-office departments such as scheduling and engineering. The work may be late, require frequent rework, or cause unnecessary interruptions. Recurrent issues are never really addressed beyond lip service. This apparent lack of accountability is a common cause of flow disruption and chronic substandard shop floor performance.

3. Inadequate training and best practices. This category includes everything from poor training to highly varying output and quality, because people are doing the same task differently. The organization lacks standardization and fails to train to current best practices.

4. No methods for improvement and management. Shop floor ideas and solutions are either ignored or shoved aside because of more pressing issues. These issues become chronic, of course, and add to shop floor friction. In many cases, the organization has no systemic means for action.

5. Poor environment or infrastructure. This includes machine capability, space, lighting, dust, and other factors that cause erratic output performance.

Even though it ranks fourth in occurrence, lacking a systemic means for improvement is actually the greatest barrier to hearing the shop floor effectively. Without a method for action, improvement from listening and hearing becomes highly tenuous.

Learning to Hear

To learn to hear the shop floor, first learn how to understand and categorize the often highly disparate ways that people can say the same thing. Rarely do people speak about problems in the same way, and they aren’t going to put them into terms that conveniently fit into whatever actionable categories you choose.

Someone might say, “Those grinders are terrible, except for Jim.” You might hear this expressed in many ways. Too often this becomes a cacophony that is easily dismissed as normal complaining. In the day-to-day pressures of getting things done, this noise eventually goes in one ear and out the other. This behavior is understandable to an extent, but disastrous to improvement.

I recommend that managers and supervisors carry a paper or electronic notepad to record all of the comments, complaints, and suggestions they listen to every day. At the end of every day, spend some time translating what was said into a common language.

For example, a possible translation to the previous comment may be, “We need to train these guys to a common, best practice. For now it looks like Jim’s methods are best.”

Doing this will give you a categorized pattern of actionable items for real improvement. It’s a great way to separate real issues from random “complaint noise.” It also serves as a powerful symbol that managers and supervisors are actually hearing what the shop floor employees are saying.

But again, there must be a means of improvement, including a means of determining relative impact and prioritization. Without this, listening and hearing become the same thing: effectively meaningless.

Two last things on hearing: Communicate the timing and prioritization of what improvements are coming as a result of what you heard on the shop floor, and take the time to say thank you. It’s remarkable what can be done when you learn to hear and not just listen.

About the Author

Dick Kallage

Dick Kallage was a management consultant to the metal fabricating industry. Kallage was the author of The FABRICATOR's "Improvement Insights" column from May 2012 to March 2016.