Introduction
With so many emerging technologies knocking at the door, Manufacturing professionals are overwhelmed. As Manufacturing leaders, their quest is to find better quality, cost efficiencies and more robust employee safety and health by leveraging these technologies.
However, with so many technologies on the horizon, leaders have many questions in their mind: How can they harness these technologies to improve the operation? How can they leverage technology that is still on the fringes to prove that it can deliver sustainable and best in class results in their manufacturing environment?
Evaluate the road map your Manufacturing 4.0 needs
Rather than trying to emulate what everyone is doing, assess your own road map by leveraging the following three questions:
(1) Where do you want to go with your Manufacturing 4.0 investment?
(2) Where you are right now and what are the gaps?
(3) What portfolio of tools and technologies will help you get to your desired state.
The “Goal >Problem>Tech (GPT)” process
Answering the three questions above can be translated into a standard framework. I call it GPT process, which is my own terminology but essentially the way I think about this is a template that captures business goals, Current state manufacturing challenges and the enabling technology (that will help alleviate manufacturing challenges to meet the business goal).
Below are few examples I have developed using the above framework that will help you understand how to leverage this template to assess your road map.
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