TEAD achieves $2 million milestone in Lean Six Savings

By Ron SnyderJuly 28, 2009

TEAD achieves $2 million milestone in Lean Six Savings
(Photo Credit: U.S. Army) VIEW ORIGINAL

It all started with Glenda Bender on 13 June, 2006. On that date, Glenda completed the first Green Belt project to be conducted at Tooele. Her project was to Lean the Consolidated Ammunition Management (CAM) Office to increase efficiencies and to reduce shipment errors.

Three years and 85 completed projects later, Tooele has shown a total of $2,190,553 in savings. This comes to an average of 2.4 projects completed per month with an average monthly savings of $60,849 dollars.

These 85 projects have covered a wide range of operations. DALE has the biggest one-time savings: Kent Gressman's project on Milvan Repairs that realized savings of $288,000. Second is Robyn McCown's Energy Conservation project which saved $226,000. Other projects showing major savings were Jim Dobson's CC-F Asset Reduction which saved $162,000; Chad Zulich's Cartridge Actuated Device and Propellant Activated Devices (CADS/PADS) Consolidation saved $79,000; Chris Schurman's Right Size MHE saved $94,000; Richard Anderson's Water System Losses saved $70,000; and Roy Martinez's DCD Battery Shop Relocation saved $89,000.

Although cost savings are important, there were also numerous projects which showed no cost savings but improved the quality of life for our employees.

John Harvey and James Tarply completed projects to improve confined spaces identification and safety. John Daly's project on Material Safety Data Sheets developed a depot wide policy for training and record keeping for MSDSs. Craig Tate developed a 48 hour work schedule for the Fire Department. Floyd Bellinger's project refined the depots Trip Ticket Process. Mitch Blue detailed ways to reduce Slips, Trips and Falls.

Regardless of the size of the projects or dollar savings, all these projects have a common thread, employee's empowered to make a difference and improve their processes.

We as a depot could not have accomplished this without a trained and highly motivated workforce. With 111 personnel Green Belt trained and 40% of the total workforce working or having worked on Green Belt projects, Tooele is one of the Lean Six Sigma leaders in JMC. Tooele has shown a true commitment to integrating LSS concepts into the fabric of everyday operations to meet our customer's demands faster, better cheaper.

Congratulations on reaching this milestone.