In our last post, we discussed the concept of the triad, a model used to show us the basic objectives of the manufacturing control system and its relationship to Customer Service. In this second post, we'll dive into the next components: Inventory and Productivity. Inventory APICS defines Inventory as: “1) Those stocks of items used to support production (raw materials and work in process items) supporting activities (maintenance, repair and operating supplies), and customer service (finished goods and spare parts) …” Generally, the lower the inventory, the bett ..read more

Back in the late 1990’s, I was teaching an Introduction to Supply Chain Management course at the Malvern, PA manufacturing facility of the Invisible Fence Company. Throughout the course, we kept coming back to fundamental objectives found throughout the material. Those objectives, and the discussions about them which occurred during that course, ended up on a whiteboard in the form of the following model. The model became known as “The Triad” after its triangular shape.  We recently introduced that model, which was designed to logically connect strategic, but often conflicting ..read more

Shopping for gifts for anyone you care about can be stressful, so we've put together a handy list of gifts for manufacturing professionals to help you find that perfect present. We hope this relieves some of the stress of the holiday season so you can nail your last-minute shopping. 1. Moleskin Graph Any manufacturing professional will need a place to jot down notes, so why not do it in style? Despite most of us taking notes on our computer and cellphone, there's still something handy about being able to whip out a high-quality notebook to create a sketch or work out a concept. And ..read more

In our last post on MCS, we reviewed the Planning side of the Manufacturing Control System (MCS) model, which is the foundation for properly implementing modern Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) packages. We will revisit the MCS model, which is divided into the planning side and execution side. We discussed the planning side, reviewing Bills of Material and Rough Cut Capacity Planning. In this post, we will continue this discussion, focusing on execution of plans. Purchasing PUR Planned orders for purchased material are converted to purchase requisitions as they are released from the MR ..read more