The field of military strategy may seem like an odd place for the manufacturing industry to find inspiration. But manufacturing and war go hand-in-hand because you can’t win the battle unless the troops have the weapons and supplies that they need to succeed on the front lines.
The lessons for manufacturing from the military revolve around testing, innovation and training that can make manufacturing better.
Testing Makes Perfect
During the Normandy landings in June 1944, the famed “D-Day” landings, were set to free Europe from Nazi Germany. There were both negative and positive innovation examples.
Two negative examples of innovation stand out due to their failures in testing under real world conditions. Airborne parachute forces were issued a new “leg bag” for soldiers to carry critical supplies that attached to their parachute harness and then hung off their legs.
The beach landing forces had a “swimmable” tank that was supposed to provide critical firepower on the beaches to allow infantry forces to quickly and decisively win in beach landing assaults. However, both the “swimmable” tanks and the airborne leg bags were last-minute good ideas that were never sufficiently tested. Because of a lack of testing, the leg bags ripped off in the dark during the parachute drops and the “swimming” tanks sank in the rough waves and heavy seas during the beach landings.
A few weeks later, innovative mechanics and engineers created steel “teeth” to attach to the front of tanks to allow the tanks to cut through the thick trees and dirt of the Normandy hedgerows. The engineers and mechanics created several prototypes and tested them thoroughly before issuing them to frontline troops. These tanks with their steel teeth were highly effective in cutting weeks off the fighting in the Normandy hedgerows. Realistic testing and prototype analysis are critical aspects of innovation that manufacturing can learn from the military.
When it comes to pallet designs, you can run computer analysis to test various designs. You can also provide customers with samples that they can test in real-world environments. Looking at your plant operations, a team member may get a bright idea about how to remove waste or do things simpler or better. Testing the concept is a must before you roll out a major change.
Sometimes the Old Ways Still Work
The military loves innovation. But sometimes new things just don’t work as well as the old design. While seeking to innovate, you have to be careful with development for development’s sake.
The U.S. military’s heavy machine gun, the M2 Browning .50 caliber machine gun, has maintained essentially the same design and operational characteristics since the early 1930s. There probably have been hundreds of proposed designs to produce a “better” heavy machine gun. What stops the development and fielding of a new heavy machine gun is that the old one still works very well. The M2 .50 caliber machine gun has served in combat through World War II, the Korean Conflict, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, and countless other small engagements.
The military’s lesson of the M2 is a great one for business and manufacturing. Are we making something new to solve either existing or emerging problems or a competitor’s new entrant? Or, are we trying to make something new that does not need to be new? Oh yes, the M2 machine gun remains in service across the globe today. Manufacturing effort needs to focus on areas that need to be improved as opposed to areas that can be improved.
When it comes to pallets, there have been hundreds of proposed designs to replace the standard wood pallet. But many of these designs had a fatal flaw that made them less desirable than the wood pallet. One of the most common problems is the issue of pallet logistics. If you design a better pallet but it costs a lot more, now you have an asset that you paid a lot more for, and you still have to get it back at the end of the pallet trip. This drives up pallet loss costs and forces the need for greater return logistics efforts.
True pallet innovation is best left to closed loops and captive systems. You need supply chains where you can ensure the pallet will collect in mass quantities at easy to identify collection points that won’t cost too much to retrieve.
Progressive Training & Cross Training
Military training in all services and in all military occupational specialties starts with learning the basics and then advancing your knowledge in your specific field. Manufacturing needs to take the lead from the Army Special Forces, the Green Berets, and focus on intense training and cross training to create highly trained and well-rounded teams.
In the Special Forces, everyone learns how to perform everyone else’s role. Soldiers also learn the most critical tasks by heart under the most adverse conditions. The reason the Special Forces undergo this arduous training is that combat requirements, like the orders from your best customer, never comes at you evenly. In the Special Forces, the medical sergeant may need to operate a machine gun on patrol, and the communications sergeant may need to help a village dig a well.
Industries that focus intensely on cross training their teams in different tasks and abilities will be able to create a higher level of performance and capabilities than other teams of greater size. What happens if a few critical employees get sick or go on vacation at once? These are great situations to assess your level of cross training and identify areas where you need to improve.
Are You Listening to The Quiet Voices on Your Team?
In late 1944, the U.S. Army sat in well prepared positions along the Nazi German frontier waiting for the winter weather to become spring so they could continue the invasion of Germany and end the war. Even though senior Army leaders believed all was quiet and well, junior officers and sergeants were capturing well rested, highly trained, and newly equipped German infantry forces that were diagraming and investigating the U.S. Army positions along the quiet front lines.
Dutifully, the quiet junior leaders were reporting these indicators that a major Nazi German attack was imminent and their reports were routinely disregarded because the senior leaders wanted to believe that all was well. In mid-December 1944, a major Nazi German attack began that became the Battle of the Bulge that caused tens of thousands of U.S. Army soldiers to retreat, major equipment losses, and thousands of killed and injured soldiers.
Manufacturing leaders need to listen to the quiet voices on their team discussing the competition, new innovations, and possible customer departures. Sometimes what we believe to be true and what is true are not the same. Listening to those closest to the action and to customers is a good way to stay on top of developments.
These military lessons for business are effective, timeless, and easy to implement. Follow the lead of the military and test prototypes realistically, retain the old ideas that still work, cross train your teams to build capability, and listen to the quiet voices on your team.
Editor’s Note: Chad Storlie is an author, marketing professional, special operations veteran, and Iraq combat veteran. For more information on how his expertise can help your business, e-mail Chad.Storlie@CombatToCorporate.com.
