15 replies to this topic

[ChristinaK]

Hello everyone!

 

I had a recent discussion with upper management, and we're increasing our GMP inspections to a weekly basis, performed in a different area of the plant each week, on a rotating schedule. I'll be the one doing them, which I don't mind, because I like walking around the plant (plus, as Doc Control, I know almost every procedure and GMP by heart now). So that's great!

 

But! We were discussing what to do with people who are either A) GMP and Food Safety Superstars who should be recognized or B) GMP Violators. Well, I should say that we've come up with an idea to issue "tickets" to both parties, one being positive and the other not.

 

My big question is, does anyone know of any pre-made "good job" vs "violation" type tickets or slips that can be ordered via a supply company? I tried searching our usual sources and haven't found anything, but I figured I'd check here before seeing if I should just create our own and have them printed en masse.

Ideally they'd have a space for name, shift, date, and what the employee did well/poorly. Carbon copy forms would be best, but I'm flexible.

 

Thanks!

-Christina

[Charles.C]

Hi ChristinaG,

 

 A potentially rather confrontational project perhaps.

 

Sounds like some significant GMP problems somewhere ?

[ChristinaK]

Hi ChristinaG,

 

 A potentially rather confrontational project perhaps.

 

Sounds like some significant GMP problems somewhere ?

 

Yes...it was the Ops. Manager's idea for the "tickets," since there are frequent violators who don't get properly reported or written up, so it's hard to keep track and therefore, hard to discipline. 

 

We're a packaging plant, so it's very low-risk, but people seem to take that as "we don't have to wear our PPE properly" or "I can walk to the restroom and wash my hands instead of doing it before I leave the lunchroom." Three of our NC's during our last certification audit were basic GMP's. With the weekly inspections I'm hoping to make people more aware of what they should be doing, even if it makes me the "bad guy" for a while. 

 

I also work at a plant where the management culture doesn't like firing official employees, but is fine letting temps go for the smallest things, or blaming the temps for any problems. *sigh* I'm hoping that I can use this as an opportunity to at least give our temps and regular employees some recognition for doing things correctly, and to have written evidence on few who perform consistently poorly. And to get some of the company employees to set a better example for temps to follow. It's hard to enforce rules when some people seem to get away with everything (also bad for morale).

 

It feels a bit like putting a bandage on a dam, but I'm hoping that stricter enforcement might lead to better performance, because it's very loose right now. 

[GMO]

Hello everyone!

 

I had a recent discussion with upper management, and we're increasing our GMP inspections to a weekly basis, performed in a different area of the plant each week, on a rotating schedule. I'll be the one doing them, which I don't mind, because I like walking around the plant (plus, as Doc Control, I know almost every procedure and GMP by heart now). So that's great!

 

But! We were discussing what to do with people who are either A) GMP and Food Safety Superstars who should be recognized or B) GMP Violators. Well, I should say that we've come up with an idea to issue "tickets" to both parties, one being positive and the other not.

 

My big question is, does anyone know of any pre-made "good job" vs "violation" type tickets or slips that can be ordered via a supply company? I tried searching our usual sources and haven't found anything, but I figured I'd check here before seeing if I should just create our own and have them printed en masse.

Ideally they'd have a space for name, shift, date, and what the employee did well/poorly. Carbon copy forms would be best, but I'm flexible.

 

Thanks!

-Christina

 

Ok to start with your specific question; it sounds like some initiatives which have happened on behavioural safety so have a look for examples for that and change the wording to food safety and quality.

 

BUT... I would question if this is the right thing to do.  This is very "top down" management.  It is treating people like children, they aren't children.  I would say the key thing is to find out why (i.e. root cause) the issue occurred the first time.  Do you make it harder for them to do it right?  E.g. not providing the resources or putting them in the wrong place?  If it's genuinely "I couldn't be bothered" then why?  Why are their supervisors not picking them up for these violations?  Why is it waiting for you to find them?  Is there tacit acceptance for these things when you're not in the room?

If you just keep hitting the small guy without addressing the causes, you will just demotivate the staff.

[GMO]

Yes...it was the Ops. Manager's idea for the "tickets," since there are frequent violators who don't get properly reported or written up, so it's hard to keep track and therefore, hard to discipline. 

 

We're a packaging plant, so it's very low-risk, but people seem to take that as "we don't have to wear our PPE properly" or "I can walk to the restroom and wash my hands instead of doing it before I leave the lunchroom." Three of our NC's during our last certification audit were basic GMP's. With the weekly inspections I'm hoping to make people more aware of what they should be doing, even if it makes me the "bad guy" for a while. 

 

I also work at a plant where the management culture doesn't like firing official employees, but is fine letting temps go for the smallest things, or blaming the temps for any problems. *sigh* I'm hoping that I can use this as an opportunity to at least give our temps and regular employees some recognition for doing things correctly, and to have written evidence on few who perform consistently poorly. And to get some of the company employees to set a better example for temps to follow. It's hard to enforce rules when some people seem to get away with everything (also bad for morale).

 

It feels a bit like putting a bandage on a dam, but I'm hoping that stricter enforcement might lead to better performance, because it's very loose right now. 

 

I like the idea of praising the positive but you are admitting yourself, that the root cause of these issues are management culture.  Address that first otherwise anything else you put in place will fail.

[ChristinaK]

I like the idea of praising the positive but you are admitting yourself, that the root cause of these issues are management culture.  Address that first otherwise anything else you put in place will fail.

 

Thanks, GMO. I know that management wants to improve our issues, but I don't think they know how. My Ops. Manager is a pretty open guy, so I'll try to take "ticketing" concerns to him. I almost know that people may not like it because they see me as more of "Mr Ops' Assistant" than Ms. Document Control/Food Safety or as a Supervisor. :-(

 

Do you think a form that Supervisors fill out may work better? Like a shift summary report of people who did things well or employee GMP-/Food Safety-related issues that occurred and how they were addressed during the shift? And then maybe using that to determine something like "Shift MVP of the month" to encourage morale and food safety? 

[GMO]

Thanks, GMO. I know that management wants to improve our issues, but I don't think they know how. My Ops. Manager is a pretty open guy, so I'll try to take "ticketing" concerns to him. I almost know that people may not like it because they see me as more of "Mr Ops' Assistant" than Ms. Document Control/Food Safety or as a Supervisor. :-(

 

Do you think a form that Supervisors fill out may work better? Like a shift summary report of people who did things well or employee GMP-/Food Safety-related issues that occurred and how they were addressed during the shift? And then maybe using that to determine something like "Shift MVP of the month" to encourage morale and food safety? 

 

I would start with the ops team and work through a programme with them which will take a long time to address the following:

 

Food safety and quality on their shift is just as much their responsibility as operational efficiency, health and safety etc.

They need to talk about food safety and quality regularly to their teams but they also need to live it.  If they are contradictory in their actions compared with their words, they lose credibility.  At least on a weekly basis but ideally daily they should be saying something as a group or individually to each team member which encourages good food safety and quality behaviours.  This includes being prepared to discipline people for poor behaviours.

When an issue happens on their shift, if they walk past it, they're condoning it.  I sometimes use Health and Safety examples for this where challenging behaviours is now pretty well built in to the management consciousness but I'm not sure what it's like in the US.

Introduce the concept of root cause analysis and how it can help reduce issues and make their time better spent.

Ensure the person who manages an area (or their deputy) accompanies you in all GMP audits.

Make sure you identify and praise good practice to the manager and to staff directly and encourage the manager to do the same.

Whenever you find an issue at audit, explain why it's a problem, what could happen next, e.g. "that person didn't wash their hands entering production.  They are then going to handle food eaten by customers like our kids / grandparents" etc.  

Then on the first few NCs or CARs whatever you call them, work on the root cause with them, talk to the staff as part of this to find out why things are happening.  I like fish bone diagrams for this.

 

In all of the above, the system i.e. what the form looks like is actually a really, really minor point IMO.

[Charles.C]

Hi Christina,

 

As per previous post, the documentation detail is probably the least of yr priorities. And I echo the root cause aspect already mentioned.

 

It is possible that yr problems may require a think/re-think around the formal "Training" Program/Procedure which doesn't seem to have been mentioned as yet. I wondered how the workers are actually introduced/inducted to basic GMP/hygienic requirements ? IMEX, a short pictorial booklet containing key elements of employee hygienic responsibilities is a "must" within an induction package and as a precursor to formal training sessions. Again, it may depend on what you are actually doing.

 

The magnitude of yr task may also relate to the specific deviations being encountered / their sources, eg whether accentuated due to certain individual foci or from numerous people simply not understanding why the GMP requirements exist (= Training).

 

Another factor can be actual numbers, a group of 50 people may pose different characteristics as compared to 500.

[ChristinaK]

Thanks again Charles and GMO. I really, really appreciate your advice and feedback.

 

I have been, over the last few weeks, looking over our training and the quality of training we provide. We're making improvements, but they come slowly. We're a plant with less than 100 employees, so a lot of people, like myself, have multiple job duties (Documentation Control, GMP, SQF, Internal Audits, and now Training). There's also the issue of what kinds of training people receive upon start, like Charles pointed out. 

 

I haven't been here long (<1 year), but I've noticed that their training before was just barely meeting requirements and had fallen a bit to the wayside in favor of focusing on production. It's a bit of a..."wait until there is a problem, wait until last-minute" place sometimes.

 

My last few months has involved destroying and rebuilding our old training program (the "wait too long and then retrain all at once" program) to bring it into the 21st century. One of the things I did was schedule out various training to be held throughout the year, instead of their old method of "gauntlet style" training, which cost too much in overtime and left us with zombified and exhausted employees after (very ineffective). I've also got plans for new and fun safety signs and exercises, it's just the waiting game of getting it all approved because it isn't all free. We've also begun creating our own in-house training videos for equipment where written instructions aren't sufficient enough (eventually every process will have instructional video). And I've watched at least half a dozen free webinars on training effectiveness and knowledge retention, so hopefully I've got everything in my toolbox to build an awesome training program (or at least a pretty nice one).

 

I did not think about training Supervisors on how to handle food safety culture on their shift, but now you've definitely got me thinking that's a training day I need to have scheduled soon. And I do like Charles' idea of a handbook...I'll have to see if that's something I could create and we could get printed for everyone to have...

 

As for the "ticketing," I think I'm going to try to implement an MVP-type program in its place, but that will be on the backburner for a while.

[Notsewb]

Hey Christina I read the feed and I was wondering what the outcome of your situation was. 

[BrummyJim]

Hi Christina,

 

I agree that a MVP approach would be good. Praise the one who do well, keep the misbehavior in your little black book and speak to the repeat offenders privately with your ops manager. You will open a complete can of worms by publicly listing the ones who don't care as it might encourage them to see how often they can appear on the list, especially if their job's safe!

[ChristinaK]

Hey Christina I read the feed and I was wondering what the outcome of your situation was. 

 

Well...since the last post I've had a training day on GMP's, Sanitation, and our Glass/BP procedure, which seemed to go well (although some people were grumpy that they came in for only 2 hours of training on their off day. I can't win here!). I had slide shows and quizzes after each, and the Ops Manager came in to talk on some topics, too (our new smoking policy went over SO well </sarcasm>). The average quiz score was 9.7/10 across all 4 shifts, so I'm satisfied with that. 

 

I've also given the above-mentioned training to a small handful of employees we've hired since then. So it's slowly becoming a standard. I've more training topics to cover for all employees, but they're spanned out over the rest of the year: SQF, HACCP, food security, etc. My next one is for our HACCP Team, because we added a new machine, which means a new evaluation...and I've discovered that half of our team has no idea how to conduct one (please, pray for my sanity).

 

And then, after I've finished making the presentations for all of that training, I'm slamming them into a new employee training manual so that every new employee will start with the same basic food safety knowledge, and can then be trained on their specific job duties from there. But their first day is pretty much full of fun training with me and HR! :-D

 

Supervisors have been instructed to talk about safety topics (including PPE) each shift, and on a weekly basis they're to show a safety card and discuss it with their crew (it's a giant poster with a cartoon on it regarding some kind of food or plant safety issue).

 

As far as the weekly inspection...that is caught up in some red tape at the moment (I can't start until all the documents and checksheets for it are approved). But that's the story of my life here: I have to keep badgering people until something gets done. Once those get going, I'll have trend reports and all sorts of fun stuff.

 

I can't even begin an MVP program because I don't have the time. And there is no one else willing or able to work on it. Gah.

 

-Christina

[Notsewb]

Sounds very promising once you have established your rhythm of the program you will be able to implement the MVP program. Wish you the best 

[ChristinaK]

Sounds very promising once you have established your rhythm of the program you will be able to implement the MVP program. Wish you the best 

 

Thank you! It's a big transition to "formal" training from the on-the-job training format the company's been using for the last 3 decades!

 

Fortunately, I like puzzles and challenges, so this entire process--while sometimes very trying--is a great experience. And I'm given a lot of freedom in terms of format and presentation, as long as I can prove that each meets and/or exceeds requirements established by SQF/FDA/HACCP/etc.

 

-Christina

[elvap]

Supervisors have been instructed to talk about safety topics (including PPE) each shift, and on a weekly basis they're to show a safety card and discuss it with their crew (it's a giant poster with a cartoon on it regarding some kind of food or plant safety issue).

 

Where can I get some of these safety Cards?  This is a great idea.

[ChristinaK]

Supervisors have been instructed to talk about safety topics (including PPE) each shift, and on a weekly basis they're to show a safety card and discuss it with their crew (it's a giant poster with a cartoon on it regarding some kind of food or plant safety issue).

 

Where can I get some of these safety Cards?  This is a great idea.

 

We received them from our parent company. I think they were custom-created, because I haven't seen anything else like them.

 

I bet you could make a set that would work for your plant by posing employees, taking pictures, then blowing them up into poster-sized prints. You may be also able to find some generic ones by searching online.