Overview

Why become a world-class manufacturer? What is the purpose? Aren't other manufacturing technologies and philosophies acceptable? The global competitive reasons for converting to world-class Demand Flow manufacturing technology are outlined in the beginning of this book. The individual company reasons for implementing Demand Flow manufacturing are simple:

• Greater customer responsiveness

• Quality improvement

• Overall cost reduction

• Survival

Actually, many companies are becoming proficient at reducing costs. However, they achieve many of those cost reductions by meeting an arbitrary percentage cut to maintain profitability rather than through productivity, quality, and process improvements. Demand Flow manufacturing cost reductions are true improvements. Expected improvements in cost control can be substantial and dramatic. An average company's Demand Flow manufacturing results can be as impressive as the actual statistics in Figure 10.1 shown.

These results and goals are realistic for the manufacturer who implements Demand Flow Technology in an organized, uncompromising manner. Demand Flow manufacturing should never be sold as a work-force reduction program. While it is true that the Demand Flow manufacturer requires a significantly smaller number of resources in some areas, other...