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Business Improvement - Business as Usual
One of Borax's enduring goals is to reduce costs by three percent each year in real terms. Faced with fast-growing competition and slow-growing economies, Borax is always on the lookout for ways to revitalize its business improvement efforts. Continuous improvement calls for continuous creativity.
For its first wave of business improvement in 2000, Borax tapped into employees' ideas to reach cost and productivity savings of more than US$60 million. Next, executives assumed responsibility for department-specific Business Improvement Plans to keep that momentum going. Last year, those plans generated gross savings of US$18 million, and featured various approaches to business improvement, one of which was the Integrated Process Management System (IPMS).
IPMS is a process that pinpoints the specific requirements a system is built to meet; and improves how people and processes are aligned to meet those requirements. Based on principles of statistics, the goal of IPMS is to understand, control and reduce variations that cost us time and money. In short, reducing variation creates a more stable, efficient system. Borax chose its primary boric acid plant at Boron Operations to pilot test IPMS. The process was kicked off by a team of experts - hourly and salaried experts from inside Borax, and an IPMS expert from the outside.
Through IPMS, the team pinpointed inconsistent outcomes resulting from inconsistent procedures, materials, equipment and measurements. Once the team understood what was unstable, they worked to reduce that instability through rigorous data collection and analysis, followed by corrective actions ranging from changes in system design to changes in training procedures.
The key to IPMS is to make changes based on data. While the explanation is simple, the data collection and analysis process has been intense - as have the results. The first application of IPMS at the boric acid plant was to increase crystallizer feed concentration to a level that was previously thought to be unsustainable. Lower variation allowed the feed concentration to be maintained at a higher level, resulting in higher production
Next, Borax will apply IPMS to other distinct systems, then to use it to review and improve the boric acid plant as a whole. A more efficient system translates to a safer work environment, more efficient use of natural resources and higher productivity - a business improvement project with benefits that go far beyond the bottom line.
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