The plan changes every day
Find whether it comes from material, machines, people or priority changes.
01 · What is usually happening?
The plan is made on Monday and torn up by Tuesday. A material is late, a machine is down, a customer calls. Each change is sensible, and together they leave nobody sure what the plan is.
Supervisors stop following the plan and start following whoever shouted last.
The question people usually ask“Why is there no stable plan?”
The more useful question“Which changes are real, which could have been avoided, and who is allowed to change the plan?”
02 · Common causes
- 01Planning is done without confirmed material and capacity
- 02Anyone can ask for a change, with no rule
- 03Urgent orders are accepted without showing what they push back
- 04Breakdowns and absences are not planned for
- 05The plan lives in one person's Excel file
- 06Changes are not recorded, so the same ones repeat
03 · What to check now0 of 6 checked
04 · What good looks like
- 01A short fixed plan for the next two days, a flexible one beyond.
- 02Material and capacity are checked before release.
- 03One named person approves a change.
- 04Each change is recorded with its reason.
- 05The floor sees the same plan as the office.
05 · Where this connects
This rarely stays in one department
What it can lead to: People work to whoever shouts, and the real priorities are lost.
Start from a problem
Work flows left to right, top to bottomKEYMost important for manufacturing
These support every part of the business
Problem
The plan changes every day
Usually connected to
How it spreads
- Production
What it can lead to: People work to whoever shouts, and the real priorities are lost.
lamplamp could check material and capacity before a plan is released.
06 · Related processesProduction plan to output
07 · Useful toolsDiagnosticLate Order Root Cause CheckCalculatorMaterial Shortage Risk CheckCheckDispatch Readiness Check
Related guidesHow to identify production bottlenecks
08 · lamp
lamp could keep this moving
lamp is not available yet. These are things it is being built to do.
- lamp could check material and capacity before a plan is released.
- lamp could show what an urgent order would push back.
- lamp could tell the floor the same plan the office has.
- lamp could list the reasons the plan changed this week.
Does your business handle this differently?Tell us what we have missed: a cause, a check, or a better way of handling it.
Suggest an addition