---

Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) for Auto Industry

30 March 1998

Auto Industry Executives Learn How to Make Equipment More Reliable With Total Productive Maintenance (TPM)

    NORWALK, Conn., March 30 -- The automobile has arguably had a
bigger impact on people's lives and on the global economy than any other
manufactured product.  Now, a changing world makes it necessary to change the
way we make the automobile.  The auto industry is feeling constant pressure to
become more "lean."  Total Productive Maintenance (TPM), with its emphasis on
education and training, makes it one of the most important on-ramps to lean
production.  On May 5-7, Connecticut-based Productivity, Inc. is offering its
second annual TPM in the Auto Industry Forum in Indianapolis, Indiana.  During
those three days, participants will have the opportunity to attend TPM
workshops, hear multiple case studies on TPM implementation and tour the
Subaru-Isuzu Automotive plant, a facility that has embraced TPM as its major
manufacturing improvement strategy.
    To implement TPM successfully it requires a dramatic shift in an
organization's collective mindset.  Winning people's hearts and minds is the
hardest part of implementing TPM.  During the TPM in the Auto Industry Forum
attendees will hear specific examples of how organizations have successfully
made the change to TPM.  Presentations from such companies as TRW, Ford Motor
Company, Diesel Technology Company, Hitachi Cable Indiana, Inc. and
Subaru-Isuzu Automotive will underscore how Total Productive Maintenance is
working, for auto manufacturers and suppliers.
    TPM challenges everyone to become a multi-talented person, to search for
ways to eliminate waste, and to discover better ways of doing things.  At the
Subaru-Isuzu Automotive (SIA) plant, the hourly and salaried employees take
the Total in TPM literally.  Those attending the Plant Tour will see how SIA
uses TPM to help them achieve total alignment of plant targets from top to
bottom, and see what teams are doing to improve equipment and processes -- to
support reliability and maintenance prevention in the long run.
    Productivity, Inc., the sponsor of the TPM in the Auto Industry event, is
dedicated to educating industry in principles and practices of lean thinking,
lean management, and lean production.  Products and services include books,
newsletters, conferences, plant tours, seminars, in-house training and
consulting.  For more information about the TPM in the Auto Industry event, or
other events planned through Productivity, call - 800-966-5423,
fax - 203-846-6883, email - service@prodinc.com,  or
http://www.productivity-inc.com.

SOURCE  Productivity, Inc.