Production
scheduling is essential in organizing your production processes to ensure
maximum efficiency. It requires accounting for an array of moving parts,
therefore it is absolutely necessary to use proper techniques and technology to
do it.
What is production scheduling?
Scheduling refers to the arrangement and planning of various processes involved in the production process or manufacturing process which includes the arrangement, control, and optimization of work, labor allocation and workloads.
Scheduling
exists for the purpose of allocating general resources within
factories, as well as managing and allocating resources for machines, the
planning of human resources, the planning of production processes, and the
purchasing of materials used for production.
What is production planning?
Production planning refers to the planning of manufacturing and production within a manufacturing firm. It ensures that the company has enough raw materials, human resources, etc. to make sure that they are able to develop and finalize products within a predefined and agreed schedule.
Production planning involves making deciding and figuring out what
types of products need to be produced for a given period, the amount of a
product that needs to be produced, the time-frame for when this production
needs to occur (and the length of it), which raw materials are required to
achieve this, an then scheduling the production once all of the aforementioned
things have been established.
Production
planning and scheduling exist so that manufacturers could optimize their
process flows, ensuring that they achieve the maximum level of efficiency while
minimizing or eliminating any chance of delays or potential interruptions.
Scheduling
is an important stage when planning a production process. By using production
scheduling, organizations can allocate resources within a given timeframe in
the most efficient way.
The
raw materials, inputs and spare parts are appropriately distributed within a
timeframe. Production needs and available resources are balanced so that shop
floor workers have everything they need at hand when they need it. Unexpected
downtime and bottlenecks are brought to a bare minimum.
The
labor is distributed evenly along a month, a week and a day, according to
the production needs and production volumes. You can better manage the working
hours and assign overtime in advance. You can assign more workers to a shift
when the company foresees increasing product demand. When demand decreases, you
can take this opportunity to provide training to the excess staff, assign them
to other tasks, or make them redundant.
The
warehouses and distribution centers have the right amount of stock. The stock levels
won't be too low to cause a stock-out nor too high to cause excessive inventory
costs. All the materials, parts, and products will be in the right place at the
right time. Your warehouse spaces will not be full of obstacles and you won’t
be having to store the incoming goods in random places.
There’s
room for R&D and Marketing to introduce innovative products. Operations can
coordinate with them to find the most suitable time to make tests, use the
production lines and give space for the innovation.
The
financial resources and investments are assigned correctly to the right
project or the right product. By considering this, you will ensure the highest
return. At the same time, it allows the organization to have enough financial
resources to afford day-to-day functioning. That will prevent the company from
falling into a lack of funds or relenting to high-interest loans.
Aspects of production scheduling
When
scheduling your production, consider the following points:
Labor. Ensure that your
labor is available in the needed volume. Ensure they have the proper training
and they know how to operate the machinery and the equipment.
Material. Ensure that you have
all the raw materials and sub-assemblies on hand, in the right quality.
Spare
Parts.
The previous point considered the materials that make up the final product.
What about all the machinery spare parts and materials that your equipment
needs in order to run properly, like lubricants? Ensure all the spare parts and
materials are available in the quality and quantity required.
Machinery
and Equipment.
Is the machinery available and ready for use? An effective maintenance team has
to be in place to ensure the machinery runs when the company decides it should
and not vice versa. A proper mix of preventive and predictive maintenance may
help to reduce machinery failures and breakdowns. Ensure that the machinery is
available and operational.
The bearings are running properly
The equipment is clean
The filters are clean
Lubrication maintenance is done
The wearable parts have been changed
Good maintenance management practices are
invaluable!
Energy. The machinery runs with
compressed air, but the compressor is broken. There are continuous blackouts
and a lack of electricity or not enough gas pressure in the pipelines. These
are simple examples of undesired situations that often occur. A mix of correct
maintenance and engineering planning needs to be in place to ensure all the
energy services are available.
Management. It is very important
to consider this point. Many times, the machinery, the staff, and the materials
are waiting behind the management’s decision.
Space. Ensure that the
spaces within and around the workstations are free of obstacles. This is part
of the good manufacturing practices that every organization needs to have in
place. It means that the machinery and the work-in-process materials are in the
right place, and the materials as well as the finished goods are stored in the
warehouse.
Time. Time is the heart of
the production scheduling process and, by taking this into consideration,
organizations will gain in productivity and efficiency. How much time does an
operation take? When does an operation finish so that another one can begin?
How much time does it take to set up the workstation? These are only some of
the questions you need to answer in order to manage the time in your production
schedule wisely.
Why is Excel & spreadsheet-based
software inefficient for production planning and scheduling?
Excel
is a very well-known tool used for production planning and scheduling. But when
you go deeper into the planning and scheduling process, you’ll figure out that
there are some disadvantages. The software becomes more inefficient the more
you use it. Here are some of the highlighted disadvantages:
Files
become too bulky
You
will see Excel becoming heavier and bulkier when adding more functions. You may
have lots of lookups and macros and due to this, you’ll see your Excel file
sizing tons of megabytes or even gigabytes. This makes production planning and
scheduling difficult to handle. Finally, the file could take a long time to
open, or it may become unable to open because of its size. This is a clear sign
that you have outgrown Excel and need to look for more sophisticated
manufacturing software.
There’s
a lack of functionality integration
Let’s
say that the Manufacturing Planning Team is running the Materials Requirements
Planning. They expect to get the material explosion and to release the work
orders. However, communication with Purchasing and Production is not functional
since the data tends to go in a one-way direction. Both the Purchasing
department and the Production department are active planning members whose
real-time input is fundamental for achieving the best production output.
Difficulties
when many people manage the software
Let’s assume that you don’t struggle with the file size or with the lack of integration, but with an even simpler problem. Two different members cannot see the software updated in real-time as they need the other to save and close the file. When more than two members take part in this, synchronization becomes a crucial problem. It eats up valuable time of managers and planners. In turn, the organization will lose time and the outdated information will lead to erroneous results.
Integrated Manufacturing Software for Business Growth
Production Planning
Accurate automatic planning and realistic production schedule. Reschedule dynamically by just dragging and dropping manufacturing orders and operations in the calendar or Gantt chart.
Stock
Inventory management, stock movements, batch and serial number tracking. Set and optimize stock levels and avoid stock-outs. Have a clear history of your stock operations.
CRM (Sales Management)
Just a few clicks to calculate the product cost and the best delivery time. Send quotations and invoices, prepare shipments. Send confirmed customer order to production. Track the sales process all the way from quotation right down to delivery using a simple pipeline view.
Team
Simple environment for line workers to follow tasks on desktop or mobile device. Real-time shop floor reporting. Real-time overview of the need and availability of human resources.
Purchasing
Manage purchases and raise pre-filled purchase orders with a single click. Vendors, prices, lead times, it’s all there. Manage your supply chain with the help of accurate statistics. Forecast your procurement needs.
Accounting
Enjoy clear visibility to your business performance. Follow your cash flow, balance sheet and profit/loss in real time. Understand the profitability of the business, and more.
More than 700 manufacturers trust MRPeasy
Reviews
Brandon Ames
CEO, Anicell Biotech
MRPeasy gives us the ability to track all of our manufacturing lot costs right down to the individual serial number of our products. MRPeasy provides the software as a remote service and has never been unavailable to us except in very rare maintenance windows.
Tim Grant
CEO, Business Solution Providers, Inc
“Ahead of its time” Easy of use and simplicity to understand. This is one of the best programmed software out there for this industry. We setup, train and implement manufacturing software for multiple companies, and clients find it easy to understand and operate.
Benjamin Raffiani
CEO, Sox Trot LLC
Best value in the small manufacturing space by far. With MRPeasy our capacity doubled. It streamlined our production, and procurement so well that I’m now able to spend a lot more time on growth and sales. Extremely comprehensive and works seamlessly with Xero and Shopify.
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