SUCCESS STORIES IN THEIR OWN WORDS

throughput. So we looked at the failure at each time. So let's say you had 10 screens and one failed on the press, a lot of shops would consider that 90%. You had 90% good screens, we had one fail out of 10. But if you had one fail when you coated it, and one failed when you went to wash it out, and you had one fail on the press, you actually have a 70% roll throughput, because really only 70% of your screens made it. So that affects your profit margin differently than if you're just looking at "Did it fail when it was got to the press?" So that's the kind of data we collected. We figured out where failure points were. For us, it was really with the power wash with rinsing the screens out because our power washer was way too powerful. And then we were able to dial that in, fix that problem, now we don't have that failure point. We've got a better world through points. Better rolled throughput, I guess, slow down. Say that 10 times fast. Marshall Atkinson Yeah. So was it hard to get buy-in? Because it sounds like we're keeping lots of records, and we're measuring lots of stuff, and I don't really understand what we're doing with all this. So how hard was it to get your troops you know, your staff to really understand what you're doing, and what your goals are? Because, you know, I've done a lot of projects like this, and unless you really unpack the why behind you're doing it, it's real easy to get lost. And I think it's important for people to kind of hear your take on that. Ali Banholzer Yes. So twofold: one, if I can be more profitable, I can pay you more money. Money, you know, it is a motivator. But two, the frustration of the staff when a screen would get on press and would fail, or we delay production, you know, let's start with that we brainstormed and that was the first project they wanted to conquer was that we were having problems with our screens. So how do we -- you know, and we had already implemented a few simple things like checking Newtons and screen tension and different things this way. But, I have a very small staff. So the same people who are reclaiming and exposing screens are the same people who are on the press. So, they were frustrated -- they were frustrated with you know, not being able to just, you know, we had we already had a system in place for you know what time of day, we did reclaim on what time of day, we were exposing and doing all that. So we're all ready to go on press first thing in the morning when we got there and then they'd be frustrated because it wouldn't go or we'd have a screen not great and things. So, you know, that was we had a brainstorm, that was what they wanted to fix first. So we already had a buy-in there. And then it was my job to make it easy for them to track. And so you know, simple clipboards on walls with pen and paper right there. So nobody's having to go anywhere to find it, or a couple of columns, what's up? Marshall Atkinson Did you have a pen on a rope, so the pens are always there? Ali Banholzer It's always there, easy within reach. So if something fails, tick mark, you know. And then we use in our shop, a device called Timeular, which is an eight-sided dice. And whatever side of the dice is facing up, it is timing that activity. You assign the activity to the face of the dice. So whatever side is facing up, it assigns that activity. And so I'll literally tick mark on paper, flip the dice. That's all I asked them to do. And that gave me the data I needed. Marshall Atkinson And if they flipped the dice, they have to do the process over?

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