Designing metrics for the small manufacturing enterprise office based on process performance metrics methodology (PPMM)

To use the company resources more effectively and efficiently in the overall order fulfillment process, one must begin to understand office processes better. Some strategies that are currently used on the shop floor have been adopted with limited success. It has been difficult to continue to improve the office operations in the long term. One of the reasons has been the lack of measures that influence behavior of the people in the office and the lack of tools to control, monitor and manage performance of office processes. Measuring techniques and metrics are widely used in the continuous improvement efforts on the shop floor and as a result, the manufacturing processes have been studied and systematically improved. However, the idea of using metrics has not been rigorously applied to office operations in many manufacturing companies. By using Process Performance Metric Methodology (PPMM), a structured approach to design performance measure, metrics are assured relevance to the critical success factors of the process.; This dissertation is focused on the design of office performance metrics for quotation process and order processing process which tightly link a manufacturer with its customers. The generic critical success factors and process intent are used to establish relevance criteria. IDEF0 methodology is used as a modeling tool to analyze the functions that pertain to quotation processing and order processing. The "Operate Small Integrated Manufacturing Enterprise" IDEF0 model developed by the CIE Architecture Team at Automation & Robotics Research Institute is referenced and decomposed to provide context. Finally, a set of metrics is developed as well as a guideline to implement the metrics.