“If we train them, they will leave” – a well-recognised fear in many organisations. In fact, in most cases, they will stay and you get a great return on your training investment. However, if they do leave, that may not be such a bad thing. When someone leaves your organisation, it makes room for another member of staff to grow into the vacancy and perhaps for someone new to join your organisation. Furthermore, recruiters will now know that you are a company that invests in the development of its staff, which is great PR in return for which you begin to attract new and eager talent

Changeover reduction, also known as SMED (Single Minute Exchange of Die) is one of the great waste reducing tools in the Lean tool box.

WBS were contacted by Skillnets with a view to delivering a series of training courses which would introduce senior managers to the concept of lean thinking.

This leading UK manufacturer of vitamins and food supplements had been through a prolonged period of operational cost cutting including redundancies and organisational change. During this period WBS had already been retained to provide management training for the newly promoted Team Leaders and subsequently for the also newly promoted Crew Leaders.

After an initial assessment of the factory which identified a series of improvement opportunities, WBS were charged with delivering a training programme for 60 members of staff with participation of all levels from the Plant General Manager to Operators.