5 replies to this topic

[Montana Milling Inc]

Greetings all.  Looking for some ideas on methods for continuous improvement in Quality & Food Safety.  I currently have a questionnaire that is provided to employees with a series of questions with answers of 1 to 5; with 1 being bad and 5 being great. 

 

I know I can compare data from year to year...but what are some other ideas for the continuous improvement of  weaknesses or opportunities for improvement in Quality // Food Safety Culture?  

 

Thanks ahead of time for your insight!

[SoupsNStuff]

Tracking things like internal audit non-conformances (how many employees not properly wearing PPE, how often raw materials stored improperly, etc) on a monthly/quarterly/annually basis could be an option. If you notice a trend, develop a goal (25% reduction in PPE NCs in 1 year, or something like that) and a way of achieving that (re-training, posted signage around the facility, more focus on that during inspections, etc.) Post the goals, or at least a general idea of them if you don't want people knowing your exact numbers, where the general employees can see so they know what the company is actively working towards. 

 

I've also seen people having a section on their internal audits where they interview a few employees each time on relevant food safety topics to see if they retain information from trainings.

[kingstudruler1]

i am guessing that the quesitonaire you are giving is to measure food safety culture.   I have set action level  for each question.   if the score falls below that level you can / should develop improvements that can be made to raise that particular score.  You can also increase the action level as you improve.   my plants struggle with questions regarding employee recognition, so we have developed some things to try and improve in this area.   

 

like soup said, the objectives that you develop are also a way to improve.  IMO these objectives should be developed for items that your plant struggles with (internal audit scores, first time pass, cleaning completion rate, complaints etc).    

 

you could develop a program where you evaluate different programs each year and research best practices.  for example automated continuous monitoring instead of manual (like weight control, time and temp monitoring, vision technology) , improved training and monitoring , increased environmental monitoring / better zoning, etc

 

you could also research Kaizen, 5s, poke yoke, etc and see if those make sense in your organization.   

[Montana Milling Inc]

Thank you both very much.  I really appreciate the insight into this.  Very good approaches.

[ehintze731]

A simple way to show continuous improvement that we use is, in your reviews annually of customer complaints or Corrective actions, non conformances make a Trend graph for each one so you can visually see that the customer complaints are improving or if they are getting worse then you know you need to implement some changes for continuous improvement.

 

I am a picture person so being able to see that actual bar graph of how things are going monthly or yearly is easier for me to decide where changes need to take place or how to improve. In my personal graph I have them sorted by what reason for each complaint or each CA that way I can see exactly how many of my (example) 6 CAs were simply oversight by management or if there were quality concerns that could be improved for the future

 

Just a thought!

[MMKlein]

You can work with KPI's.

 

Try to define and measure your KPI's and compare them monthly or annualy always seeking the continues improvement.

 

For example: RFT (Right first time), CAPA's (Corrective Action Prevent Action). Non Conformances, Customers Compliant, Training...