From: Quality World 29(3) March 2003 pp.

27-30

Smooth and Lean

An Engineering Employers Federation report recently stated that US-owned
manufacturers in the UK are gaining a competitive advantage through greater
application of lean manufacturing. Brian Swain and Alan Mossman of Rubicon
Associates describe an effective lean transformation at Hathaway Roofing in
County Durham

Hathaway Roofing is one of the largest metal roofing and cladding companies in the UK.
Starting in early 1998 they undertook a lean transformation of their manufacturing
processes that was substantially self-financing and improved factory productivity by around
35%. Since the conclusion of the physical and process changes in mid 1999, a more subtle
change has occurred in the culture of the organisation that has in turn supported further
improvements in results.
Hathaway is a vertically integrated roofing company – it takes sheet steel and other raw
materials in and installs roofs, walls, windows and gutters on construction sites – it has
recently won the contract for the roof of Terminal 5 at Heathrow. The physical change at
Hathaway was focussed on the factory –
the results were felt throughout the Goods packing welding
inwards
company and on customer sites. and
finished
The way we were goods
loading quality
Stores
bay control and
In 1998 the 3300m2 factory was holding bay
functionally organised with 60-65% of
insula
the space devoted to storage and -tion
circulation to allow forklift trucks to windows
move large sheets around the plant.
The big pressing, punching, bending cutting
and cutting machines were all in a row
punching
against a wall at one end of the
factory. A number of workbenches gutters pressing
were in front of them so that whatever fabrication
had just been cut, pressed, bent and bending
punched could be assembled.
Stretching off to the other end of the
factory were storage racks. They were Engineering doors
workshop
full of work-in-progress kits and an Production
Figure 1: Hathaway before
office
enormous array of materials that were
waiting for jobs or had been left over raw material work in progress finished goods
from jobs (or were just there because
Figure 0: Hathaway before
they were a good buy at one time or
other). Even the wide aisles were often
blocked by work in progress because of the many physical bottlenecks in the process.
Smaller pieces of equipment were scattered around the site.
Because the factory’s machines — great and small — were all used at various times by
many different people for every kind of job, there was no overall logic to their placement.
The factory turnover in 1998 was ~£3m and employed 50 staff. The company was doing
relatively well at the time.
Fixing it
A lean transformation is based around the application of lean thinking and the
underpinning principles [see box] to all the activities and processes in the organisation.

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 Swain & Mossman: Smooth and Lean

The five principles in the box are the ones identified

by Womak and Jones1. Systems thinking is a meta- Lean Principles
principle that informs all the others and involvement • optimise the whole system
is key to the successful implementation of lean.
1. identify value for each customer.
These principles are just as applicable in service and 2. show the value stream — how
government operations as in manufacturing. Rubicon customer value is created for
is applying them in accounts and insurance, in each product/service.
housing, construction and in education. 3. ensure that value creation flows.
Hathaway managers learnt of lean at a Rubicon Lean 4. allow customers to pull value
Thinking workshop organised by Business Link County 5. pursue perfection — continually
Durham. Even though the factory wasn’t “broke”, improve
they decided to fix it. It took vision and courage to
attempt to change well-entrenched practices in a • involve everyone in improving
the value creation process
traditional industry as well as the physical structures
that held them in place.
With support from Rubicon, senior managers led the company through:
• Value Stream mapping – an end to end study of the value creation processes within
the company
• Factory redesign
• Getting everyone on-board
• Making the change
Challenges
The first step in the transformation2 was to understand what currently happens. It was
important that Hathaway staff understand this for themselves. Working alongside Rubicon
consultants they learnt how to follow a piece of metal noting delays, basic transformation
times.
These tracking and mapping projects brought home to Examples
staff the amount of work in progress and the
• Aluminium louvers that travelled
unnecessary delays3 in work processes, set a baseline 1km from stores to the final
for factory performance before the transformation, shipping dock — moved-held-
and both hardened the factory manager’s resolve for moved-cut-moved-held-moved-
change and demonstrated the common sense of lean to held-moved-pressed-held-moved-
stored-moved-held-assembled-
still sceptical. moved-held-moved-punched-held-
Through this study staff came to recognise four etc-etc [words in bold are basic
transformations customers value]
different families of processes within the factory:
• Three hours of processing for a
• Flashings, standard flashing included less than
one minute of actual supplementary
• Gutters, and basic transformation time to
• Glazing and cut the required piece from a sheet
of metal and then press it.
• Fabrication.
The next step was to redesign the factory layout to
create a flow of transformations with as little storage, transport and ancillary operations
as possible. The factory Manager had the existing layout drawn to scale. This was then cut
up so that the elements could be moved about to explore different layout possibilities.
Various design ideas and combinations were discussed in this way. Management eventually

1
Jim Womack and Dan Jones (1996) Lean Thinking Touchstone
2
This project is part financed by the European Community, European Regional Development
3
With obvious exceptions like whiskey, Christmas pudding and some cheeses, storage, delay and movement
within the production process create no value for the customer. They only add cost to the producer.

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 Swain & Mossman: Smooth and Lean

agreed to present the following to operators and other stakeholders for criticism and
feedback:
• four dedicated production cells with their own goods inwards, set of consecutively
integrated transformations, packing and shipping area and access to waiting
delivery lorries;
• dedicated machines and equipment for each production cell
• dedicated team of operators for each cell
• Operators trained in machine changeover, set-up and maintenance;
• Just-in-time delivery of materials
• Co-location of production control and maintenance at the heart of production
activities.
Selling the idea
Although staff had been informed that Rubicon would be doing some investigations at the
plant, lean wasn’t explained to them prior to the value stream mapping and plant layout
meetings. This was done in four groups in July 1998 and at the same time the Factory
Manager presented the new layout and production ideas. Each group spent half a day with
a Rubicon consultant and their managers discussing their questions, concerns and the
implications of such a major change. All the issues were listed as they arose — many of
which were practical problems seen from the operators’ perspectives — so that they could
be worked through.
As time progressed, attitudes among the work force changed from scepticism to
enthusiasm, and they began to generate their own ideas for improvements — mostly small
practical things which would make their lives easier, as well as the work more efficient.
Following these initial presentations and discussions, cell teams were defined and each
chose a spokesperson. These Spokesmen met with their managers every fortnight to report
on team progress with ideas and proposals. By October the stage was set, many of the
plant transformations were already
well underway and everyone was on Goods bits and
pieces welding
board for change. inwards
and
stores
A miraculous transformation Fabrications

By the spring of 1999 the Hathaway

factory was completely transformed.
The plant is now clean, spacious and
Flashings
humming with co-ordinated activity.
This impression is obvious to anyone Engineering Production
who had previously visited the factory Goods
workshop office

as soon as they turn off the main road inwards

loading
to enter the plant. No longer is there a bays
queue of lorries waiting to collect from
or deliver to the only dock. Now raw Gutters
materials are delivered on one side of
the building and finished goods
collected from the other.
meeting
Inside literally everything has changed rooms & Glazing (windows, doors, curtain walls)
improve-
(see diagram). The old, congested ment
loading bay is now a much reduced centre

stores area. The rest of the factory is raw material work in progress finished goods

divided into four main east-west Figure 2: Hathaway afterwards

oriented manufacturing cells each with
its own supply and shipping area, the equipment it needs [much of it specially adapted by
the operators within he cell] to move, cut, bend, punch, weld, assemble, finish or pack its
own family of products in a continuous flow of integrated activities. Much equipment is
now on wheels so it can be moved into the correct sequence.

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 Swain & Mossman: Smooth and Lean

The small Bits & Pieces fifth cell makes ‘orphan’ products that were lost or damaged on
site, forgotten at design stage or changed by the customer.

Figure 2: Hathaway Roofing early in the transformation - access road to the west side
of the site under construction, shipping dock still open

Figure 3: Hathaway Roofing after the transformation - factory on the left and design
and admin offices in the U-shaped building on the right
What is particularly striking is the layout and efficiency of the Glazing line. It is now a fully
integrated door, window and curtain-wall manufacturing cell. Once considered
experimental and squeezed into two corners of the plant, it is now able to offer a new
product range to customers and make a substantial contribution to the company.
On the glazing line as elsewhere in the factory, materials and parts are now moved by cell
team members themselves on specially designed push trolleys and roller lines, rather than
forklifts. Most work is done at a standard height so that materials can flow on rollers from
one operation to the next. There is a small packing area at the end of the line so that the
team can pack their own product in reusable boxes and stillages that allow components to
be moved to position on site and removed in installation order.

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 Swain & Mossman: Smooth and Lean

Increased manufacturing efficiencies and capacities, jobs can now be planned so that they
rarely compete with each other and can therefore be
processed to completion without stops and starts. This Instant improvement
has been greatly facilitated by a production control
system that focuses on completing jobs on a first-in- When an assembler in the Glazing cell
realised how much time and energy it
first-out basis. took to turn a large window frame
Equipment set-up and maintenance time has been round so that he could work on each
edge, he went to his manager with a
greatly reduced because the cell teams are now solution. Together they designed it
trained to be much more engaged in their own with a craftsman in the Fabrications
change-overs, set-ups and routine machine cell. Two hours later the new table
maintenance — therefore freeing the engineering was in place and the assembler was
easily turning his window frames.
team to concentrate on major breakdowns and
projects; a new job ticketing method clearly lists what
is needed for a complete job — so that the set of transformations required for each job can
be seen at a glance and quickly set up by the cell team.
Although some of these innovations were discussed in the planning phase, many of them —
and many more refinements — came from operator team meetings, helped by the practice
of noting anything that impedes a process. Now the drive for improvement is so strong,
that sometimes innovations are put together on the spot, because someone has highlighted
a problem [see box].
Bringing Hathaway operators into the process was vital. Hathaway Production Director,
Derek Mitchell, says “We were set in our ways. We needed Rubicon to start the ideas
flowing, but we also needed them to help us — all of us together — step back from a
process we had become so familiar with and take the time to talk about what we were
doing and how we could do it better. I’d say communication was the big change. Then,
because we know how to make things, we just made all the other changes.”
Results
Before(1998) After (1999) Now (2003)
Inventory £300K £100K 75K
Lead times 4 weeks 3 days ??
Machine set-up 3 hours 30 minutes ??
Productivity index 100 135 ??
2
Storage & circulation area ~2000m ~?? ~??

The factory is now able to deliver to site just in time, just what is needed. This reduces
the likelihood of damage on site and increases the profitability of the overall job.
Rather than laying people off, the increased productivity has enabled the factory to both
reduce overtime and bring back in-house some activities that had been outsourced.
Operatives share in the increased profitability of the plant.
Hathaway today
Four years on, the changes are still working and there has been another subtler and
altogether more important change in the factory. A culture of continual improvement
exists. Back in 1999 continual improvement was still very much a conscious competence,
managers and operatives had to work at it to make it happen. Now it is just there. Lean
thinking is replacing other ways of thinking and continual improvement is the norm.
Each cell now has its own information board. Among other things this details who is skilled
to work in that cell. Many staff have learnt how to contribute to activities in all the cells
so that there is enormous flexibility in the factory.

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 Swain & Mossman: Smooth and Lean

There are a number of interesting challenges, which

Hathaway Roofing will meet in the future. These The logic of lean
broadly come under the headings, innovation, new 1. stripping a production
product development and sustainability. Stimulated process of waste — non-value
creating activities;
by the Latham & Egan Reports and accelerated by
pressure from Government, the construction industry 2. creating a seamless flow of
is beginning to put its house in order. Concurrently, a transformations through
physical and procedural
leading group of serial clients, like BAA, ASDA, the alignments and integrations
MOD, and MacDonalds have and are radically
redefining their use of construction in their 3. allowing customers to pull
what they want from the
businesses. This means that there will be a factory
continuous requirement for change and development
4. only producing what the
from constructors and suppliers to meet the pressure customer orders
for shorter lead times, higher quality and lower prices
increases. This reduces work-in-process and
inventory and makes the process
For Hathaway shorter lead times for their products are transparent and highly flexible.
already a reality and they have to ability to decrease
them even more. Their ability to produce new solutions/products for the industry, like
their new project with modular roof sections, is well underway. They have an excellent
design department, which is capable to working creatively with clients to produce
innovative solutions to questions of short lead times and quick installation. And, they have
a Lean factory, which is eager for new challenges and capable of delivering solutions. The
organisational challenges will come in their ability to sustain their current level of
capability over time while they take improvement and innovation to their site construction
side. Both of these areas depend heavily on their ability to hire, develop and retain new
and existing staff, while maintaining focussed and aggressive leadership over time.
Complacency could cause a company like Hathaway to lose their leading position very
quickly. Conversely, if they stay awake and continue improving, it will be very difficult for
competitors to catch up.
This is the future into which the Hathaway Roofing organisation is heading. If it can
achieve it soon, it will be an outstanding leader in the country’s construction industry.
Hopefully all the pieces will come together — as for the factory, it is already well on its
way towards playing its part.
Rubicon Associates are organisation and development consultants who have been working with lean thinking
and lean principles and their application in service construction and manufacturing organisations for a number
of years. Organisational development through the process of the Lean Transformation has been a key feature
for Rubicon Associates approach to help organisations become healthy and sustainable enterprises, who
effectively meet the needs of all stakeholders — customers, employees, shareholders, suppliers and the
community. www.rubiconassociates.com
Brian Swain is an organisational development consultant. He has been using the principles of quality and Lean
management as key concepts and development frameworks for helping companies and their people to
transform themselves into healthy, world-class performers for the last 15 years. He works regularly with
companies in the three sectors of manufacturing, service and construction and has developed effect
translations and adaptations of the Lean approach in each of these sectors. His work is focussed in the UK and
Western Europe. Current clients include GE, Vertex, Corus, Pilkington's Tile, and Mace.
Alan Mossman is a socio technical systems consultant interested in the way people systems and technology
interact. He has been working with quality and lean ideas for the last 8 years. Recent clients include Pearce,
Mace, Welsh Open College Networks, Gital, Shell, Petronas, National Grid, and SoftPro. He is Editor of the UK
Deming Newsletter.
A longer report on the change at Hathaway is available from info@rubiconassociates.com 01892 771042

© Rubicon Associates 2003 – 01892 771042 6 www.rubiconassociates.com