My role at Alpha Manufacturing is to ensure that all production teams work in harmony to meet production deadlines. Here’s an example of a what that looks like as a standard day as a Production Manager.
5.30am – Day Begins
My day begins with an early morning handover from my production supervisors who have worked the nightshift. A progress report along with any issues and actioned tasks is emailed to me at the end of the nightshift at around 4.30am. From this I get an overview of the progress of all parts and can begin to create an initial action plan for my day.
7.00am – Arrival at Alpha
Arriving at Alpha, I take a factory walk through all the sheet metal departments – laser, fold, punch, machining, weld, assembly and powder coating. The aim is to assess the movement of parts between departments overnight, identify any issues and ensure that all machines are manned and running.
8am – Meet the Team
My team and I start our day in earnest with a Supervisor meeting where we discuss any concerns arising from the nightshift, labour issues and set some immediate actions and priorities. This meeting is crucial in terms of sharing of important information and quickly addressing queries.
8.30am – Management Meeting
Every day we have a management meeting, attended by all heads of departments in which we give cross departmental updates and share company wide information. We also review the performance of each area against KPI’s and agree plans and actions for each.
8.30-9.30am – Planning the Day
This is my opportunity to respond to any emails, answer any queries and action any tasks arising from any of the morning meetings. I usually plan the rest of my day during this window, having gathered all relevant information from the various meetings.
10am – Order Book Review
This is an important meeting for production and sales to discuss the progress of every order currently on our system. We go through the plan line by line, giving real-time status updates and raising any concerns or issues. Sales will bring information from customers such as priority changes or requests for earlier delivery. From this, we agree on production prioritise and the sales representatives can feed back to customers.
12pm – Team Briefing
Everyday our Production Supervisors deliver a briefing to each of their teams including KPI performance, quality alerts, health and safety updates and any other relevant information. I try to take the lead in one of these briefings per week as well as delivering any updates from our Directors.
12pm – Onwards
The structure of my morning is pretty rigid, with this routine repeated each day. The afternoon is an opportunity to complete any project work and manage the team in a more flexible way. One such project I’m currently working on is a review and increase of our current capacity in order to meet the high demand we’re experiencing at the moment.
The plan is to implement a “4 on-4 off” days/ nights Rota which will effectively see us operating 24/7. To achieve this, we need to increase our manning levels, so a good portion of my time at the moment is spent reviewing CV’s, arranging and conducting interviews of potential Shopfloor Operatives.
Throughout the afternoon, I will stay in constant communication with all of the Production Supervisors, checking progress and addressing any issues. Strong communication between departments in manufacturing is crucial as there are so many deadlines and requirements running concurrently.
4pm – Nightshift Handover
At the end of each day, I prepare a detailed handover report for the nightshift supervisor with updates on the progress of all parts, advising of any issues/ concerns from the day and setting priorities and actions during the shift. I ensure that this report is as clear and thorough as possible and expect the same in return from my morning handover.
Although the structure of my day as a Production Manager rarely deviates, the challenges that I face are different every single day, which is what makes it so engaging and interesting. The fast-paced nature of the manufacturing environment, with so many moving parts is what I love most about the job.