Measures of quality for your role. (In the case that no clear quality-based KPIs are
defined, consider how you could define them.)
I’m currently a shift manager on a chemical plant that produces numerous lithium compounds that
are used within different industries. My role has various responsibilities that are vital for the quality
based KPIs to be met. Ensuring delivery of product is delivered to the customer on time and in full.
This KPI is relevant to my role as it is my job to ensure the production plan that is given to me by the
sales team is strictly followed by all shift personnel. The production plan will state all the different
products that need to be made within that week. Another quality based KPI that is set internally
within my organisation is, production plant outages due to critical raw material levels being too low.
Within my role it is my responsibility to communicate with procurement when raw materials need to
be reordered, to ensure our product plan can be adhered to within the correct amount of time.
Within my role I need to ensure that my team are conducting audits against safe working practices.
It is my duty to encourage them to report anything that isn’t right that could potentially impact
safety and also quality. If issues are reported, we can make them safe and then ensure our product is
within our customers’ requirements. Other quality based KPIs that have been set within my
organisation such as, dealing with customer complaints does not necessarily impact my role as this is
dealt within the sales department.
How does your output measure against the three key demands: delivery, cost
and quality?
Within my role I need to ensure that my production shift team are adhering to plans that have been
received by sales. If targets are not met, then the delivery time of product to the customer will not
be met within the required time. If targets are not met due to the wrong product being made usually
due to human error, then the cost to the company increases due to reworking the product. Not
being able to deliver the correct product to the customer within the agreed time frame could result
to a bigger loss in cost. The production plan that we follow is to of the customers specification and
so therefore if not correctly followed the quality of the product is not right first time. This is just one
of my responsibilities as a production shift manager and if not followed correctly could have
detrimental effects to the organisation.
I actively encourage all site personnel to report anything that isn’t operating normally. Reports range
from operating machinery to safe operating procedures. If issues aren’t raised at the source, then
this could result in downtime of the production plant and ultimately effect all three demands of a
successful business.
In terms of organisational culture, comment on the following and identify three
to five aspects that could be improved:
a. The overall organisational culture.
b. Culture within your department or work area.
c. Your personal view of culture.
The overall culture within my organisation is extremely safety driven. The plant is a lower tier
COMAH site and so therefore safety is at the forefront of everyone’s minds. Safety is instilled into all
employees frequently. The organisation requires all site personnel (including contractors) to submit
one near miss report per week minimum. This is a good way to be able to diagnose safety/quality
issues at the source. Although I do believe people seem to get fixated on submitting the near miss
instead of finding quality/safety issues that are more appropriate to report. Communication to the
people that may not quite understand that a quality near miss is more important than the number of
near misses they have raised within a week could be further improved within the organisation. Also,
within the organisation departments are very much kept within themselves. I feel as though
different departments coming together more and getting familiarised with different faces could
definitely help the departments when trying to communicate cross the company. Overall, there is a
very good safety culture within the organisation, but I do believe there are aspects that could be
worked on to benefit the business further.
Within the production department that I work within as addressed before safety is the most
important part in every aspect of the job closely followed by quality. My team and I are very aware
of what we need to do to ensure we are meeting the required safety and quality culture standards
that are required. I do believe that communication between process operators on different shifts
could be improved. This would enable different shifts to work as one big production team as well as
single shift teams, this would benefit the department in achieving goals more quickly.
Near miss reporting within my department as I spoke about before is required frequently. A goal
that my department is striving towards is to ensure these reports are beneficial towards the
company and not just operators chasing numbers as they know they need to submit at least one per
week.
I believe obtaining a high quality and safety-based culture within a working environment is a main
player in the success of a business. If employees are aware of all safe operating practices and apply
their job role correctly, then this will only move the business in a positive direction. I believe
communication between different departments and employees can help the culture of the
organisation move forward. To gain a high quality and safety based culture within an organisation
takes time and a change in mindset which needs to be heard from all levels within departments
across the business.