Welding-managementMeans Being in Charge.SOLUTIONS with Effective, Practical AdviceShould Welding-management allow welders weld "their own way"? No, private ways of welding should never be allowed. Welding should be a controlled operation, if it is expected to give reliable results. Therefore discipline must be enforced to make sure welding is performed only per approved Welding Procedures Specifications (WPS). Welding-management is often, unfortunately, a badly dealt with operation. This is an amazing conclusion, if it is accepted that the most important purpose of management is to maximize the bottom line, the essential expression of success of the enterprise. Who should care for the adequate functioning of all Welding-management functions? In principle the owners, that is whoever has an interest in the profits, should be interested in the health and prosperity of the enterprise, chiefly as a protection in times of economic unrest and of volatile markets. Cost estimate may be requested for bidding purposes. Officials may have developed an empirical formula (based on previous experience, taking into account total construction weight with a few qualifiers) that will give an indication of a suitable price to quote, without causal relation to the difficulty of the job and to the resources to be dedicated to the job. The quest for truth may be opposed, quite often, by entrenched personal positions that are too deeply rooted to be subverted. Welding-management may prefer, in these cases, to pay an unknown price in lack of efficiency in exchange for organizational rest. Such an attitude could be called a breach of trust. Many executive officers are probably considering the whole of welding operations in their company as a big black box, wherefrom it is difficult if not absolutely impossible to extract useful indications for controlling the efficiency of operations. While other manufacturing facilities like machining are tightly monitored for productivity, welding operations are deemed too complex to be analyzed properly. Therefore, unless the case is unbearable, an inadequate Welding-management will prefer to justify its inactivity with a groundless acceptable cost estimate. In preparation for thorough investigation of the real state of affairs, all involved should be motivated by Welding-management to be cooperative for the interest of the enterprise and for their own advancement. Unless properly advised and motivated, welders and supervisors alike may tend to hide real facts except if actively questioned, for fear of losing their status, their position or even their job. Uncooperative attitude should not be tolerated. It should be understood that, in order to improve, the baseline of the present situation should be known. A thorough investigation will probably reveal that nobody had, up to that point, a correct idea of the actual costs involved in welding operations. While it may be difficult to examine hypothetical options of change, the calculation of the costs of a running operation should be quite easy to perform by accounting for each of the intervening factors. This part of the cost estimate should be quite straightforward for anyone having received a minimum of training and enjoying full cooperation at all levels. The potential savings of establishing such a function should be probably valued at many times its cost, in that the analysis will put forward possible action items suitable for generating material savings and gains. The faulty perception that the easiest way to economy in production is to look for the cheapest consumables should be contrasted with factual tests that take into account all factors, like increased production and decreased rework, achievable with improved and costlier quality consumables. The decisions of what to buy and wherefrom should never be left in the hands of purchasing clerks. For examining other possibilities like a change in process, introduction of fixtures, positioners, robotic cells, one should either dedicate the necessary resources to this important task or, from time to time, employ the services of experienced consultants capable of providing accurate and verifiable cost estimates. One way of obtaining welding cost estimates is that of placing tenders for subcontracted work to compare the required expenses against the internal costs originating from in house operations.
Other items of activity for a distinguished Welding-management are:
On the problems dealt with in this page read also my article of May 27, 2008 A few of the factors that must be included in any realistic evaluation are listed in our page on Welding Cost Estimate. Another reliable source of information about the Economics of Welding and Cutting is found in Chapter 12, from page 483 to 531 of the AWS Welding Handbook, 9th Edition, Volume 1. AWS WHB-1.9
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