TABLE OF CONTENTS Industries, firms, and plants have different personalities and profiles, and this suggests different tools and methods. There is a manufacturing evolution as the industry and factory matures.
You cannot naively copy another plant s methods without first understanding why they are doing what they are doing, what the interdependent factors are, and how the methods are actually used.
Mechanical or automatic scheduling and dispatching is the ideal and it can be achieved in certain factories.
If you use methods appropriate for one stage of evolution in another, you might achieve effective production control with a bulldozer when a shovel would work, or you might be laying the foundation for ineffective production control that will fail and might cause your plant to close.
Firms go through a number of phases or eras as they, and the industry in which they exist, evolve. The firms go from a start-up or Wild West phase, to one of systemization, to a focus on quality and proliferation of features, followed by periods of internal and external efficiency efforts. This affects how you plan and schedule. It affects what you should do.
Obviously, there are different styles and approaches to production control suitable for each of the situations, and discrete manufacturing will be different than process industries. There is no one production control approach that is appropriate for any firm in all situations. You must review your production control practices periodically and reflect on their suitability. A set of processes,...
