Many skills, attitudes and behaviours are hard to “teach”

According to the UK National Careers Service, people working in manufacturing need to be thorough and pay attention to detail, while working well with others and remaining patient and calm in stressful situations.

The ability to work under pressure, accept (and respond to) criticism is also key. Many of these skills, attitudes, approaches and behaviours are hard to “teach” in the conventional sense. Learning on the job is important, but learning by failing can lead to costly downtime or, even worse, hazardous and dangerous situations.

Replicate the physical processes of manufacturing industries

Imagine if you could replicate the high-pressured environment of the production line to help your operatives develop team-working skills and process improvements while giving emerging leaders a chance to step back from the front-line and hone their supervisory and management skills.

MTa’s experiential learning kits can help you do that, with hands-on activities that replicate the physical processes of manufacturing industries. Using versatile kits to carry out short activities, participants gain skills to work on problem-solving, team-building and process improvements using LEAN principles.

You could use activities from MTA KanDo Lean to introduce fundamental concepts behind lean processing and bring lean theory to life by allowing participants to spot ways that lean processing can improve your workplace.

Learning in an immersive and reflective way

Business optimisation and process improvement experts Unleash Enterprises used Kan Do Lean in a learning activity for the top 50 executives from a global manufacturing client.

“Our goal was to reconnect the top 50 executives of this manufacturer to the importance of lean within 45 mins. Supporting that we were also asked to develop problem-solving, communication and collaboration skills,” explains Unleash MD Steve Burrell. Given the time constraints, MTa’s kit was the perfect solution to convey the key learnings in an immersive and reflective way.

Executives improved their planning, communication, clarity, customer service, problem-solving and customer service skills, which then translated to overall team success. And they got a stark reminder of the need to get things right first time when things went wrong: “Participants were accountable and had to take ownership of mistakes. When they came to run the activity again they improved upon mistakes and the team performed at a higher level,” Burrell explains.

How manufacturers use our training kits

Multinational dairy products group Muller also used Kan Do Lean to demonstrate “the advantages of visual systems and continuous improvement,” according to training consultant Arthur Pemberton.

Other manufacturers have used the versatile MTa Insights and MTa Team kits to help develop teamwork, change management, problem-solving and develop supervisory skills for those stepping up from the line.

ASSA ABLOY, manufacturers of locks, doors, gates and automated entrance systems, uses both Insights and Team kits for team development and communication. Service Operations and Training Manager Martin Cahill says the activities “encourage people to get to know each other better and increase awareness and perception of others … it brings out better communication between individuals and helps communication within the business.”

Our training kits can be used at all stages of people development

The Swedish multinational uses MTa across its organization, from engineers to office staff and management. A major benefit is that all staff understand and get to grips with activities straight away but results can be very different.

“It never fails to amaze me how we can get different results again and again from the same activity with a different group or people or even the same group of people,” Cahill explains.

MTa’s training kits can be used at all stages of the people development process from recruitment and selection through to executive leadership development.

Vehicle manufacturer Honda UK uses MTa Select in its assessment centres for all entry level jobs both on the frontline and in support and administrative roles. It then uses MTa Team Kit and Mta Insights as part of its people development programme. It even uses the MTa STEM kit in outreach work with schools and colleges: helping students understand the skills they would use and develop if they choose a career in manufacturing and engineering.

MTa experiential learning kits

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