Waterfall vs Agile MES?

Описание: For the doubters, MES/MOM implementations can be Agile!

MOM as we like to call, it's all part of manufacturing not just the production piece that people are used to in MES, but more around the warehouse the quality supply chain, (Yup) time and labor maintenance everything that goes into producing the right part

Okay, and what do you think are the key benefits for the business of implementing the MES solution?
Visibility and control, breaking stuff down into manageable chunks, having visibility to floor, making sure you can see what you're doing, integrating with like the machines making sure things are being done correctly.
OK and if you were then to take all of those integrations on the shop floor level, how important is it to integrate within the product life cycle within the ERP within supply chain applications as well?
Super important, they’re the major building blocks of your manufacturing thing, right you got to make sure you have all of those things, it's the skeleton to build the execution upon having that is super important, getting that stuff down from the PLM the characteristics that can help you define your manufacturing process is super important, at the same time having it feedback like feeding the real-time information back is super important keeping your ERP up-to-date so that your MRP runs scheduling demand, making sure that is all real time or as real time as possible means that you're more accurate and you're getting stuff done more accurately.

So, James, what is agile and how do you relate that to MES implementations specifically?

Agile is basically a stall of development, software development that's been around for many, many years. Basically, a lot of people think it's a guideline or set of rules it's actually just a way of thinking about doing software development following basically 12 core principles and maybe we could put something on the screen here to show you those 12 core, but basically it's about making, getting stuff done fast being agile inhale of getting stuff out to the business and the MES to get something that's valuable and usable to the business as fast as possible .

Right, and why would you use agile for an MES implementation specifically?

100% that benefit right, the sooner you get something in someone's hands the more they can understand how it works, the feedback you can do it some people are just touch people, right, they like to get their hands on it they want to see it working and then they start understanding how it works and start giving you the real requirements and moving it in a way that's going to move the needle for them.

That's great, and who do you see has been the key people involved, who's part of that team in this whole MES implementation?

It depends like a lot of people are scrum masters and all that you need that project managers style person that can do it, it's all about key people it's roles that are fulfilled. Some people can do multiple roles, the most important thing is you have the developers, some QA, always quality forward, right, you got to make sure what you're producing is high quality, but having a scrum master having the devs QA internally, right, but then externally making sure you have the key business personnel all there. Having someone that can make sure the business is ready to move forward is super important, keeping making sure that what you’re producing is going to be used, making sure you've got the right people for the business having them there, if they're there and they are helping you get that, you're going to have the best system in the world, but if you don't have the business behind it and some representatives, hopefully at a higher level, that help make the changes then you're in trouble. So you having that have to have the key business person is, or key business people is essential.

How successful have agile projects been in your experience in MES?
How successful?
Mhm.
Initially not so much (OK) it was (When did you first start?) probably about 7 years ago, 8 years ago (OK)

It was kind of forced on me by my last company they said you got to start following agile. It was done in a very hesid way, they just told us to read some books on agile that was utilizing Jira to do it they were giving us the tools, it was very ‘follow the rules of agile’ and the first project I was frustrated, we were using story points instead of estimates completely what against the way I was doing things and the end result was that project went way. I was frustrated the business siders were frustrated, the developers were frustrated, everyone was frustrated.
OK.
So 'cause you know I meet a lot of manufacturing guys, and the vast majority go ‘You can't get too Agile with MES’.

So, what is the key benefit of MES agile? What are you doing right now to really bring a benefit to the business?