From the cafeteria to the production floor in a JIT set-up, what is the one thing that can increase operations' efficiency? It can collect and analyze data in real-time; monitor production, equipment, and inventory; and share information, announcements, and news with your employees in seconds.
Best bit? It can prevent those seemingly small disruptions that can bring a JIT model crumbling down. Answer? AI-driven digital signage solutions for lean manufacturing.
Want to know how it benefits you and your business? Read on:
Benefits of Just-in-Time Manufacturing with Digital Signage
Digital signage can enhance worker engagement, boost productivity, and improve workflow. It can also benefit you by providing automation, quality control, inventory management, and predictive maintenance.
The following are some of the top benefits that manufacturers gain with the tool and the technology in their toolbox.
Real-time Data Collection and Analysis
Digital signage solutions for lean manufacturing can gather real-time data from various stages of production and display it on digital screens, allowing workers to stay up-to-date on things like each machine's performance, cycle times, downtime, and speed.
Imagine keeping track of this information so workers can identify machines that are not performing as they should or any maintenance issues before they can cause production delays. And, it does not stop here.
AI-driven signage solutions can help manufacturers identify when supplies are running low and monitor their inventory levels by tracking raw materials, work-in-progress goods, and finished products.
On top of it, the real-time analysis of consumer preferences can help manufacturers avoid overproduction or underproduction. The real ‘just’ in our ‘just-in-time’, isn’t it?
Employee Training and Development
Enhancing efficiency in JIT processes with digital signage has employee training and development as its cornerstone. And digital signage itself can be an effective and innovative tool for achieving employee growth.
How? AI-driven digital signage basically serves as an interactive medium for distributing training materials, onboarding resources, and creating instructional videos.
It also allows for the consistent delivery of training content across multiple locations, ensuring that all employees, regardless of where they are, receive the same quality of instruction. Plus, it allows for easy tracking of an employee's progress.
Quality Control
We know that a manufacturing lapse can cost big bucks. Remember Boeing's trouble with the law, the airlines, and customers in general, all because of bad designs?
But, what do you do and how can digital signage contribute positively? Well, real-time information delivery in JIT manufacturing via digital signage can help keep things in check by sending messages to the people who need to know if there is a problem. They can fix it right away and keep things running smoothly.
Digital signage can display essential metrics such as defect, reject, or compliance rates. This information is crucial in determining how much more production is needed.
For example, a food manufacturer specializing in fresh, ready-to-eat salads for grocery stores can use real-time signage displays to show the temperature and humidity levels in the production facility. They can also display product quality data such as pH levels or microbiological tests. This helps the team act quickly if any deviations from set standards are observed and can significantly reduce inventory wastage.
Performance Analysis
Digital signage solutions for lean manufacturing are an analytical powerhouse. In a lean manufacturing factory, digital boards display real-time data on production volume, quality control results, and efficiency ratings. Displaying performance metrics o promotes a culture of continuous improvement, enhancing JIT responsiveness with real-time digital signage updates.
Research indicates that visual real-time feedback can lead to JIT production optimization using digital displays, encouraging a direct connection between the daily activities and the facility's overall goals.
Safety and Compliance
Manufacturing facilities are subject to strict regulations, and one way they can achieve compliance is through the use of digital signage. By scheduling and displaying relevant content at the right time, digital signage can help ensure that employees remain informed and up-to-date.
Additionally, emergency preparedness plans are an essential part of workplace safety. And, alerting software can quickly roll out emergency messaging to all screens at the same time. It can display evacuation procedures and routes while sharing instant updates.
Therefore, digital signage can significantly enhance workplace safety in manufacturing facilities by providing information about conduct rules, broadcasting emergency alerts, and boosting safety-focused staff engagement. But the benefits of digital signage don't stop there. It can also help by increasing productivity and enhancing efficiency in JIT processes with digital signage. For these reasons, it is a tool that most employers cannot afford to overlook.
Read more on addressing safety and compliance in manufacturing through digital signage here.
Production-line Monitoring
Observing and analyzing various production line phases regularly is essential to ensuring productivity, accuracy, and standard compliance. JIT workflow coordination with digital signage solutions is crucial in this process as it provides real-time updates and visual representations of key metrics and performance indicators.
By adding signage as a feature to the production line, you can help workers easily access critical information and alarms. This also improves management’s decision-making and overall efficiency. Digital displays are typically used with sensors, cameras, and other monitoring devices to develop a comprehensive monitoring system.
Corporate Communications and Employee Engagement
Digital signage can do wonders for corporate communication and employee engagement.
With the help of digital signage solutions for lean manufacturing, company news, accomplishments, industry updates, and employee milestones can be shared in real-time.
You can also gamify waiting areas, recreational areas and cafeterias to keep employees engaged.
This helps keep the workforce well-informed, aligned, and motivated. Additionally, it can effectively convey organizational objectives and values, cultivating a sense of unity and inclusivity by delivering consistent and timely information to employees across various levels and locations.
Furthermore, interactive features can be seamlessly added to ask for employee feedback or conduct surveys. This deepens engagement and empowers employees to contribute their perspectives, making them feel valued and heard.
Address Your Challenges with a Vendor that Gets You
While implementing digital signage in JIT production workflows is not rocket science, we suggest you look for a vendor who can understand the unique challenges of your business and offer solutions that actually help you.
Vendors who understand and can work with both the technology and human aspects of solutions are rare but not impossible to find. You should target them to help you optimize production, improve engagement, and adapt to changing needs like pros.
At L Squared, we believe in making solutions simple, customizable and easy to deploy. The idea is to keep communication at the forefront of technology and surround it with industry-grade encryption. But, we don't just focus on technology, communication and safety. We focus on you, your needs and reaching your goals.
Your way, our expertise: paving the way to success, one brilliant decision at a time.
Know more about how to look for the right communication partner here.
