ConAgra Shares Roadmap To Operational Excellence
With increasing global competition, evolving consumer and regulatory demands, and shrinking profit margins, there is intense pressure for consumer goods manufacturers to optimize production efficiency. So how do you address these imperatives and drive continuous improvements without the cost burden of large capital investments?
During a recent CGT web seminar, titled “Operational Excellence: A Foundation the Supports Critical Business Strategies”, ConAgra’s Senior Director of Continuous Improvement, Peter T. Hock, candidly revealed details behind its strategy, deployment and lessons learned from a large-scale Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) roll out across multiple plants. Barry Lynch, global industry manager, Consumer Packaged Goods, GE Intelligent Platforms, was also present to share how a proven approach for Operational Excellence can be used as a strategic asset in a highly competitive marketplace.
Here is a brief recap of the event’s highlights:
• GE has enabled manufacturers around the world to increase OEE by as much as 20 percent — maximizing the utilization of their equipment to improve production capacity, reduce running costs, and offset capital expenditures for new equipment. Barry Lynch drew from his company’s vast experience in this area to first review global challenges in the industry: “2011 was a challenge for a lot of manufacturers, and 2012 looks as tough if not tougher…It’s a global world we’re working today, and if someone catches a cold, we all sneeze.” He next revealed how implementing focused Operational Excellence strategies can help to alleviate stress on the business. “All in all, when we look at the things impacting CG manufacturers today, a lot of things are outside the sphere of our control... What savvy manufacturers are doing is focusing on the things that are within their control within the four walls of the plant. Operational Excellence programs allow manufacturers to focus on reducing manufacturing costs, reducing the risk and positioning themselves in the best place possible to ride the swarm of factors that they have no control over.” He then shared the five simple steps of the Operational Excellence journey as well as resources that CG manufacturers can tap to learn more before embarking on their own project. “We do recommend that manufacturers start out with a focus around process visibility and structured OEE because they are the two things that drive the fastest return on investment, and become a platform that enables the other strategies to be successful.”
• Next, Peter T. Hock took the microphone to explain why ConAgra Foods landed on OEE visibility as a crucial enabler for competitive improvement in its consumer operations, an $8 million business with many leading brands, like Healthy Choice, Hunt’s and Marie Callender’s. “ConAgra’s ultimate goal is to increase shareholder wealth through top- and bottom-line growth,” said Hock. To continue down this path, ConAgra completed a rigorous self-assessment of its strengths and opportunities. “Through this self-assessment, it was clear that a great deal of the cash needed to fund growth could be generated through improvement of manufacturing and supply chain processes.” Thus, ConAgra’s leadership formed a vision and committed resources to turn supply chain opportunity, and manufacturing liability in particular, into fuel for business growth. Hock then shared the company’s OEE journey map, which leverages OEE as a central business performance metric. “We have linked it with broader supply chain databases to evaluate opportunities in sourcing decisions, supply planning optimization and distribution network improvements,” he said. In recent years, ConAgra has even expanded the use of OEE as a metric to gauge the effectiveness of its capital equipment and product innovation initiatives.
Click here to listen to this event in its entirety.
During a recent CGT web seminar, titled “Operational Excellence: A Foundation the Supports Critical Business Strategies”, ConAgra’s Senior Director of Continuous Improvement, Peter T. Hock, candidly revealed details behind its strategy, deployment and lessons learned from a large-scale Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) roll out across multiple plants. Barry Lynch, global industry manager, Consumer Packaged Goods, GE Intelligent Platforms, was also present to share how a proven approach for Operational Excellence can be used as a strategic asset in a highly competitive marketplace.
Here is a brief recap of the event’s highlights:
• GE has enabled manufacturers around the world to increase OEE by as much as 20 percent — maximizing the utilization of their equipment to improve production capacity, reduce running costs, and offset capital expenditures for new equipment. Barry Lynch drew from his company’s vast experience in this area to first review global challenges in the industry: “2011 was a challenge for a lot of manufacturers, and 2012 looks as tough if not tougher…It’s a global world we’re working today, and if someone catches a cold, we all sneeze.” He next revealed how implementing focused Operational Excellence strategies can help to alleviate stress on the business. “All in all, when we look at the things impacting CG manufacturers today, a lot of things are outside the sphere of our control... What savvy manufacturers are doing is focusing on the things that are within their control within the four walls of the plant. Operational Excellence programs allow manufacturers to focus on reducing manufacturing costs, reducing the risk and positioning themselves in the best place possible to ride the swarm of factors that they have no control over.” He then shared the five simple steps of the Operational Excellence journey as well as resources that CG manufacturers can tap to learn more before embarking on their own project. “We do recommend that manufacturers start out with a focus around process visibility and structured OEE because they are the two things that drive the fastest return on investment, and become a platform that enables the other strategies to be successful.”
• Next, Peter T. Hock took the microphone to explain why ConAgra Foods landed on OEE visibility as a crucial enabler for competitive improvement in its consumer operations, an $8 million business with many leading brands, like Healthy Choice, Hunt’s and Marie Callender’s. “ConAgra’s ultimate goal is to increase shareholder wealth through top- and bottom-line growth,” said Hock. To continue down this path, ConAgra completed a rigorous self-assessment of its strengths and opportunities. “Through this self-assessment, it was clear that a great deal of the cash needed to fund growth could be generated through improvement of manufacturing and supply chain processes.” Thus, ConAgra’s leadership formed a vision and committed resources to turn supply chain opportunity, and manufacturing liability in particular, into fuel for business growth. Hock then shared the company’s OEE journey map, which leverages OEE as a central business performance metric. “We have linked it with broader supply chain databases to evaluate opportunities in sourcing decisions, supply planning optimization and distribution network improvements,” he said. In recent years, ConAgra has even expanded the use of OEE as a metric to gauge the effectiveness of its capital equipment and product innovation initiatives.
Click here to listen to this event in its entirety.