Efficient Plant June 2023 - 4

column | editorial
Everything's
A Journey
Gary L. Parr
Editorial Director
T
HE OPENING MORNING
session of the 2023 Schneider
Electric Innovation Days event,
held in May 2023, was an excellent look
at the current state of manufacturing. As I
listened to the presentations, I kept hearing
the phrase, " it's a journey. " That raised two
questions: What isn't a journey? and How
many journeys are manufacturing enterprises
currently traveling?
The first question was relatively easy to
answer. While I'm sure there are one or two
impactful one-and-done things you can do
to improve maintenance and reliability, I
couldn't identify any.
Then I started listing the journeys that
manufacturers are and should be traveling.
The first, and likely most important, is safety.
It's not tough to conclude that any operation
that treats safety as a one-time effort is
experiencing ongoing issues and/or is headed
toward significant trouble. Sustaining a safe
working environment, as everyone knows, is
a constant battle that allows no relaxation.
Another journey everyone should be on is
How many journeys are you traveling in your
efforts to improve enterprise reliability?
the effort to move from reactive to proactive
maintenance practices. While it would
be great if the majority
of " travelers " would
be bunched up at the
proactive end of that trip,
the reality is companies
are spread out across
the spectrum and too
many are still operating
at the reactive end of the
journey.
My " journey list " grew
to include sustainability
at all levels from raw
materials to supply chain,
manufacturing efficiency
and energy consumption,
packaging materials,
4 | EFFICIENTPLANTMAG.COM
shipping methods, and product-end-of-life
environmental impact. Basically, the cradleto-grave
practices that were at the core of
the green movement, i.e., nothing new here
other than intensified commitment.
Then I added efforts to automate systems,
driven by the skilled-worker shortage; Industry
4.0/digital transformation and its thirst
to acquire and analyze data that actually
matter; cybersecurity, which is an everyminute-of-every-hour,
never-ending journey
(Can cybersecurity be considered part of
safety?); and the efforts to acquire, train and/
or retain skilled personnel who don't exist
in sufficient numbers. I'm sure there are
more journeys that can be added to the list,
but those seemed like more than enough for
most operations.
Another journey that's starting to have
a real presence on the near horizon is
Industry 5.0, which will involve artificial
intelligence, man-machine cooperation/
interaction (cobots), more customization and
personalization for customers, and doubtless
other developments. A couple of years ago,
Industry 5.0 seemed like it was in the distant
future. It's not.
There's one more journey, and it's the one
that makes all of the other journeys produce
positive results and, without which, none
of them have long-term effectiveness. That
overriding factor is your company culture.
Without a collaborative approach that keeps
workers at all levels engaged, informed
about operations, aware of the impact of
their efforts on overall plant performance,
and confident that their input is valued and
sincerely considered, travel on all of those
other roads grinds to a halt. One could make
a strong argument that, before you invest in
any of those other journeys, it's best to make
sure your culture traveling vehicle is operating
on all cylinders. EP
gparr@efficientplantmag.com
JUNE 2023
http://www.EFFICIENTPLANTMAG.COM
Efficient Plant June 2023

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