Increasing Productivity in Four STEPs

By Bob Neubauer

In a new blog on the Rochester Software Associates site, Consultant Howie Fenton discusses how to analyze your in-plant’s workflow, identify issues, analyze different solutions, and make a change using what he calls the “Four STEPS” to help you increase productivity.

“There are different workflows for different products … but most share common steps such as estimating, customer service, prepress, delivery, and billing,” Fenton writes. “When we analyze each of these workflows, we typically find steps where the work sits in piles longer than in other steps. These are called bottlenecks, which means that the demand for that step is greater than the capacity.”

The four STEPs to overcoming bottlenecks, he continues, are staff, training, equipment, and procedures. He goes over these in his blog and offers a cost-benefit analysis of potential solutions. Read the full blog here.

0 Comments

View Comments

People:
Howie Fenton

Bob Neubauer Author's page

Bob has served as editor of In-plant Impressions since October of 1994. Prior to that he served for three years as managing editor of Printing Impressions, a commercial printing publication. Mr. Neubauer is very active in the U.S. in-plant industry. He attends all the major in-plant conferences and has visited more than 170 in-plant operations around the world. He has given presentations to numerous in-plant groups in the U.S., Canada and Australia, including the Association of College and University Printers and the In-plant Printing and Mailing Association. He also coordinates the annual In-Print contest, co-sponsored by IPMA and In-plant Impressions.