0757: JSW s mantra for quality improvement at shop floor.

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1 0757: JSW s mantra for quality improvement at shop floor. Pankaj Lochan 1, Vice President HR & BE, JSW Steel, Vijayanagar Works, pankaj.lochan@jsw.in Praveen Hadagal 2, Asst Manager, TQM, JSW Steel, Vijayanagar Works, praveen.hadagal@jsw.in Dinesh Rout 3, Dy General Manager, Quality Assurance, JSW Steel, Vijayanagar Works, dinesh.rout@jsw.in Varun Sharma 4, Sr Manager, TQM, JSW Steel, Vijayanagar Works, varun.sharma@jsw.in Abstract With knowledge economy becoming more prominent, strategy development process has taken the centre stage in many of the business operations. This has helped organisations to develop firm plans, take proactive decisions and allocate necessary resources to achieve the business goals in today s dynamic business environment. However, deployment of the strategies up to the grass root level employees, taking their ownership and commitment on various improvement plans and process improvements require a focussed engagement program for the masses. For many manufacturing industries with a larger employee base having diversified levels of knowledge and competency, design of such mass engagement programs is often a challenge. JSW Steel, Vijayanagar has designed a unique campaign titled 0757 to drive improvements at shop floor through better engagement of grass root employees. Built on fundamental improvement concepts (0: Zero Injury, Zero Defect, Zero Waste, 7: Basic problem solving tools, 5: concept of 5S, 7: seven types of waste described in Lean), it helps the employees not only to visualise gaps in their current work system, but also guides them on tools and techniques to solve them. The propagation of 0757 to the shop floor was carried out through mass scale capability building on 7 basic problem solving tools, 5S, Lean wastes. The training helped the employees to improve their problem solving skills, understand workplace management and various types of wastes at shop floor. Mass communication by senior leaders and external consultants were conducted to promote discussions on the subject and facilitate projects based on Activities like online quiz, group discussions, panel discussions and theme based brainstorming sessions were done to engage the workforce to the theme. These initiatives enabled the shop floor employees to identify problems which were previously recognized though KKD (Experience, Intuition and Guts). Problems were identified in small groups and ideas were captured from shop-floor employees based on the theme. The existing improvement forums like Quality Circles and suggestion management system were brought under the single umbrella of 0757.

2 The campaign received a wide-spread acceptance among the employees and generated large number of improvement ideas in various forms within a short span of six months. Feedback from all stakeholders were collected and acted upon. The theme of 0757 is institutionalized at JSW Vijayanagar and is being used to drive all shop-floor improvements under one common umbrella. Background In today s dynamic business environment, it is imperative for an organisation to constantly improve on its systems and processes in all aspects of business in order to be prominent in a competitive market. Organisational quality is considered as a critical differentiator for a business to succeed. Establishing culture of Total Quality and embedding in the DNA of the organisation is a focal point for top executives in growing organisations. Organisations with diversified workforce in terms of skills and competencies face challenges to drive cultural change. They often fail to deliver results because they lack in developing a comprehensive improvement strategy with clear objectives and end up focusing on doing improvements in pockets. Assimilating employees to a common theme of quality improvement and empowering them with more knowledge to identify and solve problems in their own area are important strategies to embed a Quality Culture at the grass root level. The need to bring this cultural change is often triggered by situations which challenge the organisation s survival and sustenance in long run. To overcome such situations, successful organisations have always focussed on building fundamental quality concepts at the grass root level. This requires a well-conceived deployment strategy based on the profile of the organisation. The organisation will gain less benefit from the improvement program if it fails to empower and connect the employees. Driving a cultural change towards developing and implementing quality systems require assessment of current state and identifying issues prevailing in the organization. Preliminary investigation revealed the following: Analytical Skills: Organisation Capability to tackle and manage challenges depend on the skill and competencies possessed by the employees. While being extremely quality conscious, the natural inclination of the shop-floor supervisors was mostly on reactive problem solving or running around resolving one daily fire to another. Employees, in general, lacked understanding the importance of addressing the root cause and abstained from structured problem solving approach. This was reflected in the way employees addressed the problems at the shop floor which resulted in repetitive issues. This lack of Problem Solving capabilities was identified as one of the major concerns.

3 Process efficiency: Waste, as understood by many, was only restricted to what was physically visible. Much emphasis was laid upon significance of keeping the shop floor clean and tidy, however, the understanding of concepts of workplace management and improvement was missing which was hampering the overall productivity of the shops. The concept of Lean, Lean wastes and the philosophy of stratifying wastes and developing plans for improvement was not in place. This meant the organisation will now have to learn to identify hidden wastes in several processes so that the same can be eliminated. JSW chose to build its improvement strategy by targeting Zero Injury (Excellence in safety), Zero Defect (Effectiveness of Quality Assurance System) and Zero waste (Efficiency of the process) at grass root level by following fundamental concepts like a) Structured way of identifying and solving problems with Data & Analytics b) Workplace management c) Identifying and eliminating all types of wastes at every level Zero Injury, Zero Defect and Zero Waste. JSW, known for its rapid growth couldn t have gone with the conventional path of setting easy targets. The same was reflected again as there was a concurrence at all levels to work towards elimination of all the issues and not just reduction. Among all improvements, improvement in Safe work practices was given a priority as in the case of any manufacturing unit with complex processes. JSW believes that a safe work environment and working practice are the basic requirements for any organisation to drive improvement in any other area. An employee who feels unsafe can never work towards improving the efficiency of his/her process through waste reduction. Program Design The management felt the need to develop and drive Shop Floor Campaign which would set the pace to attain Zero Injury, Zero Defect and Zero Waste. During one of the strategic meetings chaired by the Top management, it was decided to prepare a campaign based on the fundamental improvement themes of 7 basic quality tools, 5S work place management and lean management targeting 7 lean wastes. Among many suggested names, 0757 was chosen as the name of the campaign keeping Safety and Process efficiency at its core. 0 symbolizes an effort to achieve Zero Injury, Zero Defect and Zero Waste 7 indicates use of 7 basic quality Tools, 5 reflects 5S workplace management technique. 7 refers to eliminating 7 Lean Wastes.

4 Any campaign designed with a purpose of driving shop-floor improvement demands support of all the grass root level employees so it becomes imperative to spread the word among the mass. Strategically, large scale promotional activities were planned and carried out to communicate about 0757 campaign to all. Various steps were undertaken: - Visual Communications of the Campaign Posters were developed and displayed at the plant to educate people on theme of 0757, a sample of which is shown in figure 1. A3 size posters were displayed in all daily management boards in the plant and the contents were discussed during the daily discussions. A large number of employees from shop floor sought clarification on the subject and debated on some of the fundamental mistakes that they have been doing in their day to day job by not addressing the Figure 1: Campaign poster for wastes and difficulties they face in maintaining 5S in their area. Daily dossiers were sent through s to the employees for engaging them to the campaign, Online quizzes were conducted on various aspects of waste management, process efficiency, analytical tools to create a competitive learning atmosphere. These discussions helped in generating the initial momentum of engagement which was needed for the campaign. Leveraging existing multi-level communication forums JSW has thoughtfully developed multi-level communication strategy in which Senior Management addresses employees of all levels. In each of these communication forums, much emphasis was laid on the importance of the campaign. This communication strategy worked out well and the entire campaign received widespread support. The details of the campaign, challenges for the organisation and shining cases from different departments were shared in all these forums to make it talk of the town. In monthly DMD Live which is a forum where the Deputy Managing Director of the company directly connects to all the employees through a live program, 0757 campaign were made a subject of discussion.

5 Figure 2: Showing the various communication forums across all levels in JSW Vijayanagar which helped to communicate about 0757 campaign to masses Capability Building of employees on Analytical Problem Solving: One of the first steps to set the pace was to train people. Hence, a multi-layered capability building program was designed. The 3-tier capability building program is called J1, J2 and J3. These are 3 levels of Certification Programs indicating 3 levels of knowledge and facilitation skills for Improvement Projects. The following figure 3 below depicts the Vijayanagar works Capability building Model. Figure 3: Depicting the Capability building Model of JSW Steel, Vijayanagar Works J1 was the first initiative designed to cater to the learning needs of all the employees. The J1 training had three sections, with the first section focusing on introducing the participants to the world of quality. The second section had trainings on Basic Problem Solving tools and Management tools. Concepts of Quality circle formation and functioning were discussed in third section to seed the thought of Employee engagement activities. With a humble beginning of one batch consisting of 25 employees per week, the numbers gradually improved to covering 100 employees in four batches per week. The success of trainings was attributed to the extensive use of case studies derived from the real issues from

6 the plant. The participants were also encouraged to apply the tools for addressing operational issues. Within 18 months of rolling out the training model, approximately 100% of targeted employee base had been trained on various Quality Management philosophies and Problem Solving Tools to facilitate the QC culture at Shop-floor. Over and above the J1 program, two more programs were launched namely J2 and J3 certification Programs both focusing on various analytical tools and Lean methodologies. These certifications were extended to J1 certified employees handpicked to drive improvement at the shop floor. Online Training Modules: In order to further foster learning, comprehensive training modules on various tools were developed in-house. These training modules covered the entire gamut of various Problem Solving methodologies and tools. Improvement by Employee Engagement Activities: The J1 program helped JSW Vijayanagar create a pool of employees equipped with an understanding of problem solving tools and methodologies for carrying out improvements. These employees became instrumental in initiating and driving Quality circles (QCs) at their respective work areas. In a span of 24 months, JSW Vijayanagar had 600+ QCs covering around 60% of the total employee base. The central TQM team ensured that the coverage was also in terms of work areas at the shop floor. The sole objective of the Quality Circles was to work on improving Productivity, Quality, Cost, Delivery, Safety, Morale and Environment in their respective areas. Each of these QCs worked on the various problems faced in their daily routine activities, thus contributing to the overall improvement of their departmental KPIs. The initiative started with QC facilitators driving safe and efficient workplace management practices using 5S and lean concepts. These QCs were guided by Area champions who were trained separately on J2 level - Statistical and Lean concepts. To check the effectiveness of the idea, this was first taken up on a pilot basis at one of the Blast Furnaces at JSW Vijayanagar. 5S Implementation: 5S has been proven as an effective methodology to prepare the foundation for lean manufacturing. Orderly management of work place and usage of visual clues helps to reduce waste and improve productivity, in addition to enhancing employee engagement and morale. JSW considered 5S as a vital step towards driving improvements in shop floor and moving towards achieving its goal. Implementation of 5S started with the departments being segregated into several areas with the unique element of QCs owning their areas for all improvement initiatives from 5S to Basic Improvement Projects. The Area Champions played a vital role in defining the objectives for

7 carrying out improvement drive. Pilot 5S implementation was started at Blast Furnace area and then extended to other parts of the plant. During the pilot implementation phase, it was observed that the understanding of 5S was limited to housekeeping and the overall perspective of 5S as a lean management tool was not understood by all. The journey started by conducting formal 5S workshop with the identified facilitators. These facilitators in turn trained employees on shop floor. This model of training the Facilitators (i.e. training the trainers) and these facilitators further training the employees at shop-floor ensured that the practical applicability of Problem solving tools are widely understood by all employees. As envisaged, the successful implementation in the model area was able to create the required traction to go for full scale implementation. Full Scale Implementation: Driving this initiative at the plant level required a robust system which is guided and owned by the Senior Management. This led to the involvement of Employee Engagement Council and development of a formal structure with clear roles and responsibilities, as mentioned in figure 4 Figure 4: Functioning of Employee Engagement council to drive 0757 Institutionalising: Highly successful plant improvement campaigns often fail to sustain in the long run unless a set of measures are taken to ensure sustenance. Institutionalising the practices requires a robust review structure which helps in maintaining the momentum in long run. The practices

8 adopted during 0757 campaign have been strengthened by integrating the same in day to day working in the departments. Some key measures to institutionalise the initiatives are: Sustenance Audits: The functioning of the quality circles is closely monitored by respective Area Champions and is supported by Zonal Heads. A cross functional audit mechanism has been deployed in which the QCs are audited by a team comprising of members from different departments and central TQM team. These audits help the quality circles to elevate further with respect to their problem solving capabilities along with workplace management as they understand the gaps, opportunities for improvements. Also, the audit provides a platform for cross learning wherein the auditors carry learning from respective departments. Figure 5: Snapshots of QC activity audit and concluding session Need Based Training Sessions: The J1 training program conducted over a span of 20 months equipped employees with knowledge of Problem Solving tools and shop-floor Improvement methodologies. However, there was a section of mass who missed out on an opportunity to attend the sessions, there was another section demanding additional inputs/retraining. The online TQM portal also provided with a link where any employee can request for a training and book the calendar. To cater to all these requirements, a dedicated team comprising of two members started visiting respective departments to conduct trainings. These Figure 6: TQM Website - Learning Platform trainings are conducted on need basis, the employees from the plant can visit the TQM website and demand for trainings. The training team arranges for the same based on the number of requests on weekly basis. This exercise has kept the learning process alive.

9 Rewards and Recognitions: To boost the morale of the employees participating in Quality Circle and improvement activities and to further enhance the level of participation, a robust rewards and recognition policy was set up and institutionalized by Employee Engagement committee. The reward and recognition scheme is segregated into categories based on the type of improvement activities being carried out. To motivate the grass root level Figure 7: Reward & Recognition System in JSW employees, instant awards in the form of Steel, Vijayanagar Works cash coupons is given to small improvements such as Sudhaar (small improvements also known as kaizens), OPLs (One Point Lessons), Poka Yoke, Suggestions etc. Further, on a monthly basis, rewards and recognitions for the efforts of employees is done by HODs (Head of Departments) at departmental level and by President at works level. A team comprising of Middle and Seniors Management as decided by Employee Engagement committee reviews and selects the best projects based on the approach, complexities involved in resolving, understanding of Problem solving methodology and application of tools as reflected by the respective teams work. An annual rewards and recognition night, known as Quality and Innovation night is conducted to felicitate employees. Amongst other awards, the best QC teams who have excelled and have been recognized at National and International forums (NCQC/ ICQCC) are rewarded for their efforts by Top Management. Rewards and recognition system has been instrumental in keeping the competitive spirit amongst the employees to stretch further and do better. Figure 8: Ms Sangeeta Jindal, Chairperson JSW Foundation felicitating the teams in Annual Quality & Innovation night 0757 Booklet: To further reinforce the learning process and keep the campaign going, an innovative way of disseminating knowledge was devised in the form of 0757 booklet. The booklet consists of six pages and has been carefully designed to be carried in shirt pockets by individuals. The

10 first page talks about the 0757 campaign, followed by brief description about seven basic problem solving tools, workplace management using 5S methodology and elimination of seven types of waste. The booklet also has a section wherein individuals define their KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) along with targets, based on which Improvement projects are undertaken by them for the Financial year. This small booklet has been instrumental in spreading the word regarding the campaign as it has integrated the learning aspect with daily management. Figure 9: 0757 Booklet Conclusion 0757 Campaign has been successful in bringing a sense of ownership amongst the shop-floor employees in JSW, Vijayanagar works. The training sessions conducted helped in developing Area Champions who are now acting as change agents for facilitation & handholding to others. Support from senior management has empowered these employees to carry out

11 improvements. The bigger success of the campaign, as envisaged by management, is the elevation in the knowledge level with respect to Analytical skills and Problem Solving Capability of employees. From a humble beginning of 18 QCs in the FY 2013, today we have 600+ QCs. Some other metrics which justify our effort include increase in Improvement Projects which has also made a substantial impact on the bottom-line.