Just in Time at Jimmy’s

CHAPTER 15 Lean operations and JIT succinct case Just-in-time at Jimmys St mobs Hospital, in Leeds in the north of the UK, affectionately cognise as Jimmys, is Europes largest t separatelying hospital. It employs almost 4500 people to support the 90 000 in-patient treatments per year and everyplace 450 000 total admissions. chthonic increasing pressure to reduce damages, to contain inventory and to improve service, the Supplies division has undertaken a major analysis of its activities, to try and adopt around of the ideas from the JIT approach.The initial review highlighted that Jimmys had near 1500 suppliers of 15 000 different reapings at a total cost of ? 15 million. Tradition whollyy, the Supplies Department ordered what the doctors asked for, with many a(prenominal) cases of similar items supplied by six or more firms. Under a cross-functional task force, comprising both medical and supply staff, a major broadcast of supplier and product rationalization was underta ken, which also revealed many sources of waste. For example, the team gear up that wards used as many as 20 different types of gloves, most of which were expensive surgeons gloves costing around ? per pair, yet in almost all cases these could be replaced by fewer and cheaper (20 pence) alternatives. Similarly, anaesthetic items which were previously bought from six suppliers, were single-sourced.The nest egg in purchasing costs, inventory costs and general administration were massive in themselves, but the higher-order quite a littles also helped the hospital negotiate for lower prices. Suppliers ar also much more willing to deliver frequently in small quantities w hen they go that they argon the sole supplier. Peter Beeston, the Supplies Manager, said Weve been goaded by suppliers for years hey would insist that we could only purchase in thousands, that we would harbor to wait weeks, or that they would only deliver on W ednesdays Now, our selected suppliers k instanter th at if they perform well, we will assure them of a long-term commitment. I like to buy 80 per cent of our requirements from 20 or 30 suppliers, whereas previously, it gnarled over a hundred. The streamlining of the admissions work out also proved fertile reasonableness for improvement along JIT principles. For example, in the Urology Department, one-third of patients for non-urgent surgery lay down their appointments were being can jail celled.One reason for this was that in the time between the consultant express that an operation was required and the patient arriving at the operating theatre, there were 59 changes in responsibility for the process. The hospital re springd the process to form a cell of quaternity people who were given arrant(a) responsibility for admissions to Urology. The cell was located next to the ward and made responsible for all enrol keeping, planning all operations, ensuring that beds were available as needed, and telling the patient when to arrive . As a result, the 59 handovers argon now down to 13 and the process is faster, cheaper and more reliable.Jimmys also introduced a simple kanban system for some of its local inventory. In Ward 9s storeroom, for example, there are provided two boxes of 10 mm syringes on the shelf. W hen the first is exhaust, the other is moved forward and the Ward Sister therefore orders another. The next stage will be to simplify the reordering empty boxes will be posted outside the store, where codes will be sporadically read by the Supplies Department, using a mobile data recorder. Chapter 15 unforesightful case study 1 secure 2006 Pearson Education especial(a) unlax Operations Management, 5th editionThe hospitals management are convinced of the benefits of their changes. Value for money, not cost cutting, is what this is all about. We are standardizing on buying quality products and now also cook more curve on the buying decision from being previously functionally oriented with a num ber of buyers, we now concentrate on materials management for complete product ranges. The project has been an unmitigated success and although we are only just starting to see the benefits, I would expect savings in cost and in excess inventory to spiralThe report on uninspired Wound Care Packs shows the potential that our team has identified. The old herd consisted of four pairs of plastic forceps, cotton wool balls and a plastic pot, which were used with or without additional gloves. This get cost approximately 60 pence excluding the gloves. The new pack consists of a plastic pot, swabs, etc. , and one pair of latex gloves only. This pack costs approximately 33 pence including gloves. Total target saving is approximately ? 20 000. Chapter 15 Short case study 2 Copyright 2006 Pearson Education Limitedquag Operations Management, 5th edition Questions 1. List the elements in St Jamess new approach which could be seen as deriving from JIT principles of manufacturing. 2. What pu sh ideas from JIT manufacturing do you think could be applied in a hospital setting such as St Jamess? Chapter 15 Short case study 3 Copyright 2006 Pearson Education Limited Slack Operations Management, 5th edition Short case Flexibility helps JIT at LOreal LOreal cosmetics is now the worlds largest toiletries and cosmetics group, with a posture in over 140 different countries.In the UK, the 45 000 square metre purpose-built facility in mid-Wales produces 1300 product types in a spotlessly clean environment, which is akin to a pharmaceutical plant in scathe of hygiene, safety and quality. The plant has 55 toil short letters and 45 different product processes, and the manufacturing systems employed are of a flexibility that allows them to run each of the 1300 product types every two months that means over 150 different products each week. But the plant was not always as flexible as this.It has been forced to enhance its flexibility by the requirement to ship over 80 million i tems each year. The sheer logistics involved in purchasing, producing, storing and distributing the volume and variety of goods has led to its current focus on introducing JIT principles into the manufacturing process. To help come upon its drive for flexibility and for JIT production, LOreal organized the site into three production centres, each autonomous and focused at bottom technical families of products. Their processes and production lines are then further focused within product sub-divisions.Responsible for all the activities within his area, from pre-weighing to dispatch, is the Production Centre Manager, whose role also encompasses staff development, training and motivation. in spite of appearance the focused production centres, improvement groups have been working on better shop-floor flexibility, quality and efficiency. One of the projects reduced the setup time on the line which produces hair colourants from 2. 5 hours to only eight minutes. These new changeover ti mes mean that the company can now justify even smaller batches, and may give the company the flexibility to meet market call for just-in-time.Prior to the change in setup time, batch size was 30 000 units now batches as small as 2000 3000 units can be produced costeffectively. Chapter 15 Short case study 4 Copyright 2006 Pearson Education Limited Slack Operations Management, 5th edition Questions 1. What did LOreal do to help it organize the process of setup reduction? 2. What do you think LOreal gained from doing each of these things? 3. If we could halve all changeover times in the factory, what effect would this have on inventory? Chapter 15 Short case study 5 Copyright 2006 Pearson Education Limited