Moradian stressed on performance measurement law, which states that people will perform on what is measured and how frequently it is measured. Moradian said, “What gets measured gets analysed. And what gets analysed is performed upon.”

Moradian put forth a pertinent question for the audience of over 500 delegates: Do you deliver on time? “If you calculate manufacturing cycle time at your unit, you will find that the actual time of operations is negligible to the total cycle time,” added Moradian.

He further added, “In most cases, the efforts are put in to reduce the time of operations (which is negligible), whereas your customer suffers from the cycle time. It may include the time spent by the material in WIP state waiting for a decision to be taken or in movement of materials.”

Moradian also spoke on how plants need to be designed using material flow in mind by citing an instance of Toyota’s manufacturing practices. He stressed that systemic structures influence performance. “When placed in the same system, people however different, tend to produce similar results,” added Moradian.

“Increasing variability such as WIP, breakdowns, set-up times, material shortage among others, degrades performance of production system. Systems with variability require buffering,” said Moradian.

The gist of Moradian’s presentation was that if you cannot pay to reduce variability, you will pay in terms of WIP, underutilised capacity or high lead time.

Advising the print CEOs, Moradian said, “Don’t buy the latest technology, buy proven technology or second hand equipment after cautious testing.”