Protect, produce and adapt with a connected workforce during the pandemic

Posted on 1 Jun 2020 by The Manufacturer

Connected worker platform provider, Zaptic, has helped essential manufactures adopt new digital ways of working during lockdown.

Now the company is offering a Covid-19 Safe Workplace Package with a 24-hour deployment time. The package provides rapid deployment of new safety, sanitation and distancing measures, and enables operational teams to quickly build new digital ways of working for the future. 

“We’ve used the Zaptic tool and had practically no change to our day in, day out business operations. I don’t even know how we would be able to manage the several documents, spreadsheets and various forms everyone would have to access without it”, says Gary Baltrami,  senior operations manager for a large US wine producer.

Gary is like many plant managers who have witnessed a rise in virtual workloads as manufacturing teams turn to digital collaboration tools in response to remote working and social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic.

One category of digital collaboration which Zaptic believes is key to the ‘new normal’ is the connected worker platform.


connected workforce - Zaptic - Covid-19 Safe Workplace Package - Banner


Established in 2015, Zaptic provides operational teams with a no-code platform to digitise shop floor workflows and daily management systems in a user friendly mobile environment.

“Not only does this unlock a huge wealth of process data which was previously trapped in paper, spreadsheets or tribal knowledge” says Reid, Chief Customer Officer at Zaptic, but it also “drives real time, virtual information flows around daily problem solving which has quickly become a ‘must have’ as opposed to a nice to have in the new environment”.

‘PROTECT, PRODUCE AND ADAPT!’ has become Zaptic’s mantra with its customers since the start of the crisis.

We took a deeper look at how the ‘connected worker platform’ has helped manufacturers in each of these vital areas:

PROTECT!

COVID-19 Safe Workplace Package:

Recognising that employee health was the number one priority, Zaptic’s customers – which includes essential manufactures like P&G, CSL, Hovis and more, were able to very quickly make adjustments to their HSE procedures using Zaptic’s no-code platform.

As such they were able to rapidly deploy new hygiene, sanitation and distancing measures in response to the pandemic.

Zaptic’s Covid-19 Safe Workplace package now makes these capabilities available to other sites with a 24-hour deployment time. In addition to providing trial access to Zaptic’s no-code authoring capability, the package provides the following preconfigured workflows for an accelerated path to digitalisation and a COVID-19 secure operation:

  • Site entry health survey and compliance dashboard.
  • COVID-19 safe workspace audit and dashboard.
  • COVID-19 cleaning guidance, scheduling and tracking.
  • Virtual COVID-19 hygiene and safety training.
  • COVID-19 near miss and hazard reporting with analytics.
  • Ability to customise digital workflows for your site.

The package is free of charge to existing customers of Zaptic, and comes with a small one time fee for new customers, with no long-term commitment.

To take advantage of this offer, you can book a meeting with Zaptic’s deployment team here, or download the solution overview pdf.


PRODUCE!

With a safe workplace secured, Zaptic gives operational teams the digital powers to create new ways of working for continuous production:

Digital job sheets, work instructions and troubleshooting guides:

Zaptic provides a single point of guidance and data capture for frontline teams. Interactive work instruction can be integrated into process sheets such as digital batch cards, providing real-time updates and full process traceability as line teams execute their work .

“Troubleshooting information can also be accessed with just a swipe of a tablet to the point of use on a specific area and specific production line, helping to reduce downtime during the crisis and beyond to ensure strong business continuity and delivery of essential products to our consumers in the UK”, says Gary Manchester, a senior engineering manager at P&G’s Pampers factory.

“With restrictions on peer to peer shadowing and classroom training likely to remain for some time, virtual training and on the job learning is on the rise in manufacturing as it is in other industries.

Virtual shift changeovers and gemba boards:

“The operators fill out their changeovers and digitally meet to go through their shift passdowns”, says Gary Baltrami, Senior Operations Manager at a large US wine producer.

In a similar vein, Rob Jones, Operations Manager at Berry Global Llantrisant, explains that one of their key goals in using Zaptic is to go “paperless in the way we escalate and resolve issues to speed up problem solving so that we avoid downtime, customer quality concerns or even worse, accidents and injury.

“There will be less face to face engagement as issues will be reported at point of capture, resulting in less time away from the process”.


ADAPT!

Accelerate digital transformation in daily operations:

“While there is a lot of focus on IoT, robotics, edge computing and the like in the Industry 4.0 discussion, there are still many factory workforces relying on paper and spreadsheet procedures”, says Reid. “By digitising these daily workflows, a no-code platform like Zaptic can greatly accelerate digital transformation”.

The platform can also be deployed remotely at a time when site visits are restricted. Rob Jones, who has overseen the initial deployment at Berry’s factory in Llantrisant during lockdown, says that despite “three of the four project leaders working remotely, we are ahead of schedule in terms of the roll out”.

Closing the Industry 4.0 blindspot 

Zaptic believes that the detailed data about human work processes which their platform unlocks is an “Industry 4.0 blindspot”.

“This is data which was previously trapped in paper, spreadsheets and people’s heads,” says Reid, “But which can now be used for better decision making on shift, for continuous improvement and to drive AI/machine learning solutions such as predictive maintenance”.

The COVID-19 Safe Workplace package is a limited time offer available until the end of August. Book a meeting with Zaptic’s team HERE to initiate your deployment, or to discuss new ways of working with a connected workforce.