Primus Lean Six Sigma discipline is our ongoing effort to enhance our integrated system of people, process and technology, referred to as the Primus Production System (PPS). It is with this system thinking Primus has created a world class manufacturing process that differentiates us in the industry.
PPS has at its foundation a must have for Lean Six Sigma, standard work, which is successfully achieved by leveraging the Primus standardized quality management system AS9100. This enables us to sustain the changes made after continuous improvement work is accomplished.
A key support for Standard Work is Workplace Organization (5S) which is critical to any operations for many reasons. 5S creates a visual factory and not just to have tools and supplies well-organized and easy to find but as an example it also supports our uncompressing work to eliminate foreign object debris (FOD).
Building on this foundation, the continuous improvement culture is based on understanding he current condition, keeping one eye on the future or long-term target and then establishing the next condition for improvement. This creates the bias for action to progress quickly forward. This enables lean agile thinking of learning by doing; fail fast, fail often, fail cheap, fail forward. This is where we are creating a learning organization, there are no failures but only learning opportunities within a controlled environment to manage risk.
To enable the organization to make the most important improvements every day Primus Aerospace utilizes the kaizen method of “Manage for Daily Improvement” (MDI) approach. This creates an environment of continuous improvement that starts at the shop floor and is supported by the leadership team. This is the belief in the “inverted pyramid” where key decisions are made by the employees, where the true value is added, in direct contact with the specific process. The result is an engaged workforce, thus a self-managed change management method. The inverted hierarchy is supported through 3-Tier meetings where support is escalated to resolve issues or implement changes quickly. Our focus is on a balance score card using SQDC KPI’s for the driver metrics.
Primus Lean Thinking embraces a focus on the elimination of the 8 wastes in our business while our Six Sigma focuses on the elimination of variation. By combining both we create robust processes of continuous improvement.
Safety is our first concern, both internally with our employees and externally with our suppliers and customers. This not with the products we build but also with the information we manage to produce and delivery our products. All of the prior building blocks in the PPS lead up to the enablement of safety.
Quality is driven by the “quality at the source” thinking; through mistake proofing, controlling CTQ’s and building in the shortest possible lead-time from first step to the last for rapid feedback. From time of defect created, to detected to correct is established to be as-fast-as-possible. In our Lean Thinking, it is about mistake proofing first then enabling rapid response to issues.
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Primus Logistics is about having the right part, at the right place, at the right time and it goes beyond the final product that we manufacture. Our logistics includes all the supplies, tools and equipment required to produce to customer demand. While the lean program manages to the takt time/beat of the customer demand it also creates a flow within the entire value stream. With the rapidly changing customer demands, Primus Aerospace is able to react to the needs by acquiring all of the requirements to meet this demand.
With a Customer Centric business, we think of everyone in the value stream as the customer, all the way to the end user of the product. Primus Lean process goal is to have an innovative review each customer’s Job-To-Be-Done (JTBD) which requires we consider all of the outcome expectations, both desired and undesired.
Primus Lean Six Sigma program supports the planning of a good strategy and manages the execution as well. Both are required to have the real strategic advantage. By formalizing the strategic thinking, strategy planning and strategy execution process we know we are always able to adjust quickly to market/customer demands.
Primus Production System (PPS) is a systems thinking approach to the Primus Lean Six Sigma program we continue the development of the Primus Production System by embracing the concept of the whole being greater than the sum of the parts that delivers great customer value.
