Where The Data Comes From
Before diving into the 'How To' of L2L reports, it is important to fully understand where the data on these charts come from. Once you have a better understanding of this, using the different filtering features to pull your data will become easier as you have a clearer idea of how to get the data you want. There are three main areas to understand when looking for data in L2L. These are:
- Hierarchy
- Dispatch Data
- Production Data
Hierarchy
If you were part of the initial installation of L2L you will already have a knowledge of the Hierarchy structure, but if not, here is a quick understanding of how the system is set up at your site. Each site within your company may have different names for the Hierarchy, but the concept is the same.
L2L is designed on a 3-level hierarchical platform (you could consider tooling as a 4th, but that is a discussion for another day). What this means is that your site is broken down into three tiers of Hierarchy. We call these three levels:
- Areas
- Lines
- Machines
Below is a diagram we use to explain the hierarchy.
There is a good catchphrase to remember here that best describes how the Hierarchy works.
"Every machine must belong to a Line and every Line must belong to an Area"
What this means is that a Machine cannot belong to more than one Line and a Line cannot belong to more than one Area. What this does is give a clear path for the data to be entered and pulled for reports.
Insight - Machines and Lines can be reassigned to other Lines and Areas. The data attached to that Line or Machine will still be intact within L2L.
Sub-category Features For Data
What we are talking about here is tools and features within L2L that allow for the horizontal grouping of data. These sub-categories include:
- Value Stream
- Technologies
- Cost Centers
These sub-categories allow for segments of the hierarchy to be placed within their own sub-category for simple data analysis.
Examples:
Value Stream - A factory produces a particular product that travels from one line to another in order to bring it to completion. A custom-named Value Stream category can be created in L2L. All of the Machines that produce that particular product, regardless of line, can be attached to that Value Stream. Data for the overall performance of the process to produce that product can be pulled into reports.
Technologies - A factory has several production lines that produce products with labels attached. The engineering department has chosen to use the exact same make and model of label machine across all lines. A custom-named Technology category can be created in L2L. All of the data to identify the performance and reliability of that Make and Model of labeler can be pulled in reports.
Cost Centers - A factory has multiple lines within one department. For accounting reasons, all cost data needs to be identified and compiled into a single cost for all of these lines. A custom-named or numbered Cost Center can be created in L2L. All cost data can be pulled for this single or multiple cost centers in Reports.
Dispatch Data
Dispatches are the very underpinning of the entire L2L system. As a matter of fact, our entire mission relies on dispatches.
"L2L eliminates shop floor disruptions that harm production throughput"
The goal is to help our clients identify every single disruption that happens throughout their entire process. The tool used to do that is CloudDispatch. It is good to understand that the clock resides in CloudDispatch. What this means is that everything captured in a Dispatch is captured with a time stamp to it. This helps answer a bunch of data questions like "How long did this event happen?" "When did it happen?" "What is the total time?" etc.
The following diagram illustrates the many areas of data taken when a dispatch is created.
Production Data
When a company uses L2L's Production Module in conjunction with CloudDispatch, the amount of combined data that can be accessed and pulled through reports expands tremendously. Understanding that almost all Manufacturing metrics we use today in our factories can be boiled down to five main inputs gives L2L the ability to take these five inputs and manipulate them into all well-known manufacturing KPIs. These five main inputs are:
- Time (Downtime, Cycle-time, Scheduled Time, etc)
- Demand (Customer Demand, Daily Demand, Pitch Demand, etc)
- Actual (Production actuals through the process)
- Scrap & Rework (Product lost through waste)
- Labor (Maintenance Techs, Operators, etc)
The following diagram shows where L2L captures these critical inputs within the Production Module.
The key to pulling the right data within your reports is to have an understanding of where that data comes from. Once this is understood, then the next step is to have a good idea of how to extract that data within a report.
Three Main Types of Reports
