“A philosophy of the workplace where problem-solving, teamwork, and leadership results in the ongoing improvement in an organisation. The process involves focusing on the customers’ needs, keeping the employees positive and empowered, and continually improving the current activities in the workplace.”

Operational excellence is a topic close to the heart of GFC that forms part of the VKB group. Investing in their employees and focusing on continuous improvement at all levels, are but a few of many of their core values that support VKB’s vision.

ODI’s Mbali Tshabalala is facilitating this group of GFC learners completing their NQF2 in Production Technology learnership.

ODI is a globally represented productivity and management consulting company. We support organisations to bring about a revolution with productivity of people, processes, and technology, by engaging all their people. To read more about us, click here.

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ODI’s Mbali Tshabalala is facilitating this group of GFC learners on their drive to operational excellence.

Our Supervision for Energised Work Teams programme has been offered since 1989. It was always used to strengthen the implementation of a structured CI programme. With the introduction of accredited learning, ODI leaped at the opportunity to give people who do all this hard work credits, and an actual qualification (National Certificate: Generic Management – Supervisory NQF3).

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The SAIIE Award for Best Industrial Engineering project was open to all Industrial Engineering professionals working/consulting at an industry in South Africa. This award rewards innovative, fresh and interesting thinking in solving problems. The award was awarded to the most exciting project conducted by an Industrial Engineering practitioner and was also open to teams.

Grain Field Chickens (GFC), is a member of the VKB group, part of Agri Processors. The processing plant, situated in Reitz, Eastern Free state, is a high throughput poultry processing facility where 180 000 birds are processed daily. GFC employs 1,300 people.

GFC started in October 2016 with embarking on a journey of continuous operations improvement. Since that time, they have been using the Japanese based system, 20 Keys for Productivity Improvement, supported in South Africa by Organisation Development International (ODI).

GFC opted to implement a structured and holistic management system for continuously improving operations, rather than just doing a once-off project. The approach is based on the principles that there is no silver bullet, but rather hard work to strengthen the basics of operations and engage all people, in all functions and at all levels of the organisation. The 20 Keys systems is very similar to the well-known Toyota Production System, and is based on industrial engineering principles and techniques for operations improvement. At GFC two industrial engineers supported the implementation, for doing training, and providing in the workplace implementation and coaching support, with Johan Benadie, Director at ODI, as their coach.

A baseline assessment was done of all 20 Keys, priorities selected, and implementation action plans drawn up. With the implementation roles were allocated with line management and teams being the implementers, and Key Leaders (on site experts) for each Key as well as a site facilitator providing training and implementation support. Overall business key performance indicators were defined as well as for each Key. Implementation started towards the end of 2016 and is still done in all functions, in production and support functions. GFC initially had one Industrial Engineer as site Facilitator, another one joined about 1,5 years ago. ODI acted as external coaches to especially the site Facilitators and Key Leaders to help ensure that GFC establish inhouse knowledge and experience, which is an important factor in terms of sustainability of operations improvement.

About two years ago the decision was made to compete for the International Excellence Award. This award is awarded jointly by PDI, Japan, the developers of the 20 Keys system and their South African partners ODI. The requirements are tough, apart for achieving high, best practice, levels with processes, systems, people and technology maturity and capability, there are also specific requirements in terms of business key performance indicators, for example, improvements since the start of the system need to achieve, amongst other, the following:

• Overall quality improvement, as measured externally by customer satisfaction as well as internally in terms of product and process quality have to be at east 50%

• Overall productivity performance must be 50% more since the start of 20 Keys

• Cost effectiveness improvement by 20%

• Inventory must have been reduced by 25%

• A sustainable level of profitability.

With the such a big organisation, and an intense production process where every minute matters, the challenge was to engage all people, through training and practical implementation in all workplaces. With a highly committed management team as well as excellent support from Key Leaders and the Facilitators, there was a focused effort, with regular progress reviews for achieving the Excellence Award. People development was also a priority and a number of supervisors and production team member completed learnerships in production technology and management through ODI.

With a journey like this it is easy to become overwhelmed and lose focus, also given that the plant went through some expansion and technology upgrades during the last few years. Implementation support is critical, and both facilitators spent a lot of time on the floor with in-the-workplace training and implementation coaching. Supervisors and team members were trained in basic industrial engineering concepts and techniques and how to implement it. ODI supported with monthly visits during which implementation support was given to management, Facilitators and Key Leaders. They provided an outside perspective and also did regular progress review against the Excellence Award targets, after which all Keys action plans were updated, together with the Key Leaders. Operations KPIs were also reviewed regularly, with actions defined where targets were not met. As the saying goes, what gets measured gets done.

Towards the end of 2019 a preliminary Excellence Award progress review was done by ODI, gaps were identified, and action plans updated. This was followed by a preliminary review in January 2020 and the final review in March 2020. Results were compiled by ODI and discussed with their Japanese partners. GFC passed with flying colours. After the award was presented GFC had a function with personnel to give recognition as, in the end, all the results were due to their efforts. Significant results were achieved since the system was kick off at the end of 2016:

• 50% reduction in customer complaints

• 3% reduction in Food Safety findings

• 43% improvement with having less production plan changes during a week

• 64% Improvement in Dispatch Man Hour Productivity

• 14% Increase in Value Adding Activities being done in the Plant

• 7% Improvement in Tertiary Yield

• 23% Improvement in Employee Morale

• 39% Improvement in Engineering Stock Turn

• 23% Reduction in Packaging Material Store Value

• 35% Reduction in Sweepings generated in the poultry process

• 57% Reduction in Packaging Waste

• 6 ideas implemented for improvement per person (with a workforce of 1,300 people)

• A significant increase with energising the workforce and their knowledge about operations and improvement.

The story does not end with the Award – the GFC management team has already been setting next targets, which include more people development through learnerships as well as operations improvements.

To read more about GFC receiving the 20 Keys International Excellence Award, click here.

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An established poultry-abattoir in Reitz in the Eastern Free State, Grainfield Chickens (GFC), is an international pioneer in terms of the continuous improvement of an industry by involvement at all levels of an organisation. René Janse van Rensburg, an industrial engineer at GFC (formed in 2010 under the guidance of the age-old enterprise VKB), says the organisation recently received the prestigious International 20 Keys Excellence Award from PDI (Japan) and ODI (South Africa). The 20 Keys system consists of 20 elements or keys that unlock value in the organisation. She says the improvement of five goals is this system’s main focus, while there are also certain requirements and criteria to be met. According to René, a company culture should be created where people think about what they are doing and then improve on that. Regular progress is measured towards world-class and best practices. She says the requirements to achieve this award, amongst others,

• a 50% improvement in productivity,
• a 20% equipment availability and
• cost improvement of 20%, must also be proved.

According to her, all the industries of VKB, are implementing the system. Rene says maize and soybeans produced in the Eastern Free State form part of the food composition for broiler chickens and it has made sense to boost the value chain with the construction of a livestock plant. Hence, GFC has gone from strength-to-strength and about 900,000 chickens are slaughtered per week.

To read more about GFC receiving the 20 Keys Excellence Award, click here.

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• a smooth, fast process,
• product and information flow,
• with low inventory levels, and
• effective communication between the different up- and downstream processes/functions.

It is also applicable to administration and other supporting functions.

At Grain Field Chickens, a large chicken processing plant in the Free State, which recently received the International 20 Keys Excellence Award from PDI (Japan) and ODI (South Africa), the implementation of Key 8 focuses on strengthening coupling in terms of 3 issues:

• Implementing service level agreements between all first-line teams, in production and all supporting functions, including Sales
• Implementing the concept of Goldfish Bowl Meetings between functions
• Identify all coupling points in Production, from the farms delivering chicken, to Despatch of product and based on that drawing up a coupling strategy for ensuring a fast, smooth flow of products to the market

It is often not realised that there are large amounts of waste in an organisation between the different functions/processes producing products and services. The wastes between the links of such a supply chain can be of many different forms, and manifest itself in cost effectiveness, productivity and delivery performance, leading to the organisation being less competitive in the market.

Service level agreements serve the purpose of clarifying expectations between processes/functions in terms of requirements how they will work together and supply each other with materials, products and information. This is especially important at first-line team level as it is here where day to day work is done, which directly affects

• cost,
• productivity,
• quality and
• delivery.

The agreement should be a practical one with regular discussions and measurements to evaluate performance, with quick corrective actions. At GFC this has been implemented between all first-line teams, or Mini Businesses, resulting in many improvements where different types of waste were eliminated.

Goldfish Bowl Meetings help to get functions to effectively discuss issues between them which are hindering optimum performance. We all know that when two or more parties discuss issues that the discussion can quickly deteriorate into a blaming, hiding of issues and emotional session. This often leads to an issue just being argued away.

One of the first Goldfish Bowl Meetings we had was a discussion between the Farms Logistics team (catching and delivering chickens to the Plant) and the Plant Production team. The link between these two teams is a crucial one, as the efficiency and quality of production starts with the input it receives. They have, of course, discussed issues between them before, but the meeting provided a different format to assist with more effectively identifying and defining actions to be taken.

Every point where

• materials,
• information,
• documents,
• work-in-process and
• finished products are stored, is defined as coupling points (in this case mostly physical things).

Rene Janse van Rensburg, onsite 20 Keys Facilitator, supported the Key 8 Leader – Wessel Smal, with drawing up a detailed process flow map of the plant. All coupling points were identified and together they drew up a coupling strategy whereby the rules for how each coupling point will work, was defined – also with support from shop floor, supervisors.

As part of the Excellence Award review, all coupling points were regularly visited and evaluated in terms of its effectiveness, practicality and whether the rules are being adhered to. The strategy is evaluated on a regular basis, as it determines the flow, in terms of eliminating disruptions as well as the amount of materials and inventory in the system.

Implementation of 20 Keys is a never-ending journey, as there is always opportunity for doing things safer, different, better, smarter and more cost effectively. The aim is to establish a mindset and culture for continuous improvement, at all organisation levels. Without a structured approach, many  opportunities are lost due to an exclusive focus on day to day issues and pressures.

Author: Johan Benadie – Director at ODI

To read more about GFC’s structured approach for capturing and supporting the implementation of ideas, click here.

Organisation Development International (ODI) is a globally represented productivity and management consulting company, focusing on operational excellence.

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Because they’re the ones actually doing the day-to-day work, employees are in the best position to come up with ideas for operations improvement. They know first-hand what’s working and what’s not, and they see all kinds of ways to improve performance, from simple, common-sense ideas for saving time and money, improve quality and safety, to entirely new ways of doing operations. A good start is to coach first-line managers for creating an environment within which their teams are encouraged and motivated to provide innovations and improvement ideas.

At Grain Field Chickens (GFC), who was recently awarded the PDI (Japan) and ODI (South Africa) 20 Keys International Excellence Award, the focus was on strengthening the workplace to have thinking people, with the mindset that innovations and ideas for improvement can, and should, exist at all levels of the organisation.

GFC implemented a structured approach for capturing and supporting the implementation of ideas. Wally Kok, the Key 3 Leader’s role is to support line functions and administer the suggestions tracking system. The line managers are the owners of the system and need to engage team members and stimulate them to think about their workplace, processes and activities in terms of

• safety,
• quality,
• cost,
• productivity and
• delivery.

GFC received 3,065 ideas for improvement over the last year!

Implementing Key 3 is not a once-off project but a never-ending journey of strengthening the maturity where everyone in the organisation, literally every day, is thinking about operations improvement.

Below is a very good example of an idea for improvement, submitted by an employee in the IQF department of the plant – a clear understanding and engagement of staff that is evident in an organisation that enjoys a mature level of the 20 Keys system.

Author: Johan Benadie: Director at ODI, and a 20 Keys practitioner for 24 years.

To read more about Theo van Strijp’s (Managing Director at GFC) topic of discussion at last year’s one-day conference where we celebrated 30 years of operations excellence – “Grain Field Chickens: Road to Excellence Award”, click here.

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GFC started their 20 Keys journey in March 2016, when Theo van Strijp, currently MD, asked me to present the 20 Keys system to him and the rest of the management team.

Theo is no newcomer to the 20 Keys, also having achieved the Award in 2006, while he was a manager and 20 Keys Facilitator at the Earlybird Processing Plant in Standerton.

I did the final Award review on Thursday and Friday, following a gap analysis and pre-review earlier this year. Detailed and thorough reviews were done, and the final review satisfied all the requirements for the award; both in terms of the required maturity levels for the 20 Keys, as well as improvements required, in terms of:

• quality,
• cost,
• productivity,
• delivery,
• safety, and
• morale.

Over the period of implementation, GFC went through rapid expansion and equipment upgrades. Throughout this time, Theo stuck to the implementations, and actively supported it – a best practice example of the role of senior management. I consulted monthly with a 2-day visit each time.

An important success requirement is that adequate resources and support need to be provided for the implementation. This is even more important in a high-speed industry like chicken processing, as there is very little time available to have first-line team members in training and discussion sessions. The process is finely balanced, and when someone is not at a workstation, the production flow is affected.

Landi van der Merwe started off as the 20 Keys Facilitator for the first few years, and was joined in 2019 by Rene Janse van Rensburg; both of them are Industrial Engineers. They did an excellent job of supporting the production and supporting functions with:

• training,
• effective use of tools and techniques, and
• implementation advice.

I am impressed by their eagerness to learn, and their patience to help first-line teams to understand and implement the concepts. The role of Key Leaders is also important; Theo took the responsibility as Key Leader for Key 2 (Goal Alignment) and Key 20 (Technology), while the other Keys were allocated to people involved with the particular functions.

Without exception, a great job was done by the Key Leaders, supporting the implementation based on action plans which were regularly reviewed and updated in line with the requirements of the different levels for the Keys. The system was implemented in all production and supporting functions at the Processing Plant, as well as at GFC Head Office.

Special mention must be made of people in first-line teams. The success of the implementation, results and sustainability are very much determined at this level, where people directly interact with machines, other teams and information. Without their active participation and willingness to learn, an implementation will not be sustainable.

Well done to Theo and the GFC team, from all of us at ODI!

“Dear Theo, I am Yoshi Kobayashi of PDI Japan. I remember meeting you in 2006 in Japan and again in 2008 in South Africa. Thank you very much for all your hard work with 20 Keys. I hope that you will sustain the level and also improve further. Please extend my thanks to the two 20 Keys facilitators – Landi (I met Landi at the last Japan tour) and Rene. Best regards.”

Yoshi Kobayashi :  PDI

Theo van Strijp: MD, replied:

“Good day Dr Kobayashi, Thank you so much for the kind words. I remember you very well and have such respect for you and your knowledge on 20 Keys and continuous improvement. Indeed – the 2^nd Excellence Award for me; with the first one, I did all the hard work as 20 Keys facilitator but this time I was lucky to have people that is committed to do the hard work, and I just gave guidance. I’m looking forward to the day that we meet again, and definitely another picture!”

Theo to Johan Benadie:

“Johan, you made such a big impact on my career when we met many years ago and I have learned so much from you over the years.”

Author: Johan Benadie – Director at ODI

To read more about ODI’s Continuous Operations Improvement System, click here.

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On completion of the NQF 2 National Certificate in Production Technology, learners will be able to:

• Effectively communicate information to relevant stakeholders.
• Contribute to the achievement of strategic goals in the business.
• Optimise processes, functions and organisational structures, in order to contribute towards the achievement of production requirements.
• Maintain a safe and well organised work environment, through improvements made to production activities.
• Focus on the effectiveness of equipment.
• Implement quality standards and procedures in the workplace.

To view the album of learners completing this qualification, click here.

Comprising of 8 modules, NQF 3 in Generic Management aims at equipping every first-line manager with the essential knowledge and skills necessary to:
• Develop, lead and inspire productive workplace teams.
• Ensure that all team members are developed to their full potential

To view the album of learners completing this qualification, click here.

At a recent multi-level meeting, learners had the opportunity to give feedback as to what they’ve learned and how the 20 Keys system for continuous improvement, influence and make an impact on their daily working activities, their departments and the company as a whole. A prize-giving ceremony was held afterwards.

The VKB Group is a modern, dynamic and leading agricultural enterprise that has, since its establishment almost a century ago, constantly focused on progressively managing solutions for the changing and various needs of agricultural producers and related stakeholders.

To read more about Grain Field Chickens: Road to Excellence Award, click here.

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The VKB Group is a modern, dynamic and leading agricultural enterprise that has, since its establishment almost a century ago, constantly focused on progressively managing solutions for the changing and various needs of agricultural producers and related stakeholders.

Today the VKB Group can be esteemed to be a “house of brands” with a unique composition of brands of companies and products that makes the group one of the leaders in the agricultural environment.

The investment in Grain Field Chickens supported sustainable diversification strategies for producers. Currently the average weekly consumers’ demand for chicken in South Africa stands on 22 million broilers.

ODI’s Mbali Tshabala recently facilitated a group of GFC learners doing their NQF3 National Certificate in General Management.

Comprising of 8 modules, this qualification aims at equipping every first-line manager with the essential knowledge and skills necessary to:

• Develop, lead and inspire productive workplace teams.
• Ensure that all team members are developed to their full potential

To read more about obtaining a national qualification with ODI, click here.

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