TURNING IDEAS INTO ACTION

摘要

Who knows better the difficul-ties that plague production than the hourly workforce? Nobody, believes Monarch Marking Systems Inc., a Miamisburg, Ohio-based manufacturer of mechanical price-marking "guns," electronic bar-code printers, and the labels used by both product lines. Furthermore, Monarch figures, if plant-floor employees know the problems, they likely are the best source for solutions. Employee Vicki Stewart and her teammates, who assemble a family of portable electronic bar-code printers at Monarch's 234,000-sq-ft headquarters location, would agree. Three years after the fact, they still are aglow when they reflect on a continuous-improvement project they undertook that not only improved their cell's productivity but also garnered them a national award. "We were like roosters with our chests sticking out" after the honor, Stewart admits.