Cranfield University

Practices Matter

The Cranfield University School of Management, located in Bedfordshire, UK, conducted a study to determine if there was a correlation between a plant site's level of maturity on the TRACC best practices -  Teamwork, 5S, Visual Management, Focused Improvement, Autonomous Maintenance, Asset Care, Set-up Time Reduction, and Quality - and their operational performance. 

Cranfield's Center for Business Performance analyzed maturity scores and performance outcomes for more than 200 packaging lines in the beer industry and discovered the following results:

  • A strong positive correlation between practice maturity and factory efficiency
  • A decrease in performance dispersion as practice maturity increases
  • A strong positive correlation between practice maturity and machine efficiency

To further illustrate the relationship between practices and performance, Cranfield compared two identical can lines - same country, same line configuration, and staffed similarly.  The can line with the higher overall practice maturity score also maintained a better Overall Equipment Effectiveness and did so despite being tasked with managing a higher number of SKUs.

Click here to download full case study (.pdf)