Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyze lean strategic practices being implemented in manufacturing facilities throughout Pennsylvania and West Virginia and identify the difficulty in implementing those lean practices. Design/methodology/approach A skip logic questionnaire was developed into multiple sections for analysis; demographics of respondents, identification of the knowledge and practice of lean methods, interpretation of lean application, strategic direction of lean methods, measurements of expertise, and difficulties for practicing lean. The questionnaire was sent to 327 manufacturing facilities where 51 usable responses were collected for the study. Findings Lean manufacturing is a widely recognized and practiced business philosophy as a significant percentage of manufacturers have implemented some variation of practice. However, the extent of knowledge does not mirror awareness. The application of lean manufacturing practices is not readily appropriate for every company, but adopting the concept of customer-focussed waste reduction to maximize value can be universally applied as waste reduction was the most prominent practice pursued. Lean practitioners found that poka-yoke and installing new process equipment have the highest degree of benefits from implementation while 5S and eliminating waste were the least difficult practices to implement. In general, the management personnel of the companies have an influential effect on lean manufacturing pursuance. This is illustrated by the fact of high agreement between facilities that resistance to change from employees is the most prominent difficulty for implementation followed by limited technical knowledge of lean manufacturing at operational and conceptual levels. Research limitations/implications The research findings are from a subset of manufacturing companies in Pennsylvania and West Virginia and may not represent all of the companies on a national level. The results must be interpreted in the context of the data acquisition approach due to the extent of the sample size involved, the procedure for how data were collected, and assuming that each lean strategic practice has the same weight to calculate the facility lean index. Practical implications The results provide insight about the effect of facility size and years of lean practicing for various lean strategic practices. The most beneficial and least difficult lean strategies, their implementation level, and the real challenges for implementing lean were also identified to help both lean practitioner and non-practitioner for the lean journey. Originality/value The research investigates current lean strategic practices pursued by manufacturers throughout Pennsylvania and West Virginia and identifies obstacles to implementation of lean practices. Lean manufacturing is widely sought after as a continuous improvement program, but success is divided. This study characterizes lean manufacturing comprehension while identifying knowledge areas of strengths and deficiencies. There lacks an established structure for lean practices to pursue. Therefore, this study provides manufacturers a measure for comparing their position for refined decision making.

Specification of Energy Assessment Methodologies to Satisfy Energy Management Standard Harish KannegantiEnergy management has become more crucial for industrial sector as a way to lower their cost of production and in reducing their carbon footprint. Environmental regulations also force the industrial sector to increase the efficiency of their energy usage. Hence industrial sector started relying on energy management consultancies for improvements in energy efficiency. With the development of ISO 50001 standard, the entire energy management took a new dimension involving top level management and getting their commitment on energy efficiency. One of the key requirements of ISO 50001 is to demonstrate continual improvement in their (industry) energy efficiency. The major aim of this work is to develop an energy assessment methodology and reporting format to tailor the needs of ISO 50001. The developed methodology integrates the energy reduction aspect of an energy assessment with the requirements of sections 4.4.3 (Energy Review) to 4.4.6 (Objectives, Targets and Action Plans) in ISO 50001 and thus helping the facilities in easy implementation of ISO 50001.iii

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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to identify effective factors, their impact, and find estimation models of the most well-known productivity measurement, hours-per-vehicle (HPV), in the automotive industry in North American manufacturing plants. Design/methodology/approach Data used in this study were from North American plants that participated in the Harbour’s survey from 2002 to 2006. Data are synthesized using a uniform methodology from information supplied by the plants and supplemented with plant visits by Harbour Consulting auditors. Overall, there are 355 manufacturing plants in the statistical sample from ten different automakers’ brands including DCX, Ford, GM, Honda, Cami, Nummi, Auto Alliance, Mitsubishi, Nissan, and Toyota. The multiple linear regression was used to analyze the data and derive the HPV regression equations. Findings HPV is a widely recognized production performance indicator that is used by a significant percentage of worldwide automakers. During the study period, the HPV was reduced 54.75 minutes on average in each year. Annual production volume, platform sharing (PS), and flexible manufacturing (FM) factors improve HPV. However, vehicle variety, salaried employees’ percentage of the workforce, available annual working days, and launching a new model penalize HPV. Launching a new model and adding a new variety in body styles or chassis configurations raise the HPV about 2.189 and 0.642 hours, respectively, depending on the car class; however, manufacturing plants compensate for this issue by using PS and FM strategies. Research limitations/implications The plants which stopped production of a specific product also are included in this study and were treated similar to the regular plants. The medium duty segment was excluded from the data set due to the fact that the number of observations available was too low. The study can be repeated with additional new factors such as the level of plants’ automation and lean manufacturing either for North American or European companies. Originality/value The research investigates current strategies that help automakers to enhance their production performance and reduce their productivity gap. HPV regression equations that are provided in this research may be used effectively to help car makers to set guidelines to improve their productivity with respect to internal and external constraints, strength, weakness, opportunities, and threats.

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