OEE Quality is a crucial metric for any Manufacturing company.  Tracking quality metrics in real time has proven to offer companies a 6% advantage in OEE score according to LNS Research. Companies in today’s competitive environment need to make sure that the products they create are high quality and contain no defects.  To do so they must make sure that their production line is optimized for efficiency and real time visibility.

Manufacturers are now increasingly looking to improve Overall Equipment Effectiveness or OEE metric. In this article we are going to look at why tracking the OEE Quality metric is important for the Manufacturing domain – and how a Connected Worker platform helps in improving quality and offers real time visibility.

What is OEE and why is it crucial in the manufacturing industry?

‍To achieve manufacturing efficiency, manufacturers need to regularly monitor their OEE quality. As an invaluable production metric, OEE is determined by three underlying factors namely, Availability, Performance, and Quality. In this article we’ll be looking specifically at Quality.

How does OEE measure Quality? Simply put, manufacturers need to measure the loss of quality in their operations – or the production of low-quality products that do not meet the expected standards. A quality loss can be measured by the production of scrap material or defective product parts that require major rework or must be fully discarded. Since this element is so crucial, as consumers won’t buy improperly made parts or products, this is the most difficult of all OEE factors to optimize.  

In this next section we will look at how a ConnectedWorker Platform can improve OEE quality.

How Connected Workforce Platforms Increase OEE quality

‍Here are some ways in which a technology-driven Front Line Workforce platform can upgrade OEE quality:

1. Standardizes all executed jobs

‍To adhere to production capacities, front line workers can often overlook rejection of low-quality parts during the production process, which can impact the overall quality. With Connected Worker platforms, factory managers can easily standardize all planned check-ups and processes. A step-by-step digital workflow ensures that workers get the job done right the first time without omitting any vital practices.

2.Identifies process deviations

‍Deviations in the manufacturing process are a major reason behind producing low-quality products. A Front Line Worker Platform automatically captures all process data and can help in easily identifying any process deviations from the standard and thus avoiding this quality loss.

3.Improves preventive maintenance

‍Manufacturers can’t produce high-quality products without optimizing their preventive maintenance tasks. With actionable data insights from front line platforms, maintenance operators now have the means to improve their preventive maintenance operations along with machine uptime.

4. Eliminates manual paperwork

‍If front line workers no longer have to spend time filling their daily paperwork, they can focus more time and resources on monitoring production lines and improving product quality. Front line worker platforms eliminate redundant manual paperwork by automatically generating a report at the end of job completion. This report is then instantly available to management to order preventive maintenance.

5.Training and onboarding new employees

‍The Great Crew Change Challenge faced by global manufacturers requires them to quickly train and onboard new employees into their workforce. Self-Assist tools (facilitated by Front Line platforms) enable faster learning for new  workers, thus enabling them to take over crucial services and keep the production line up and running. This increases the availability of workers for service tasks and increases uptime.

6. Improves worker knowledge

‍Connected workers are a workforce equipped with ample knowledge and expertise. With a Front Line Workforce platform, front line workers can now improve their operational knowledge with a range of digital resources including visual work instructions and remote assistance tools. This, in turn, improves machine availability as frontline workers can perform their assigned tasks more efficiently.

7. Enables remote assistance using Augmented Reality (AR)

‍Product quality is also impacted by repeated machine failures. AR-enabled remote assistance from experts is now available to front line operators through workforce platforms. Using this technology, real-time visual instructions can be delivered to assist machine technicians in their field of view and reduce problem resolution time for machine failure. Once the problem is solved the machines can continue producing quality products.

8. Assigns inspection tasks

‍Thanks to the use of the low-code/no-code development approach in Front Line Worker platforms, connected workers can be easily assigned planned machine check-ups and inspection-related tasks.

With its expertise in designing technology solutions for manufacturing companies, Atheer has a Front Line Worker Platform that can improve all OEE metrics including Quality.