Every Time a Problem Gets Blamed On Operator Error a Quality Consultant Dies

What do you see when you categorize the causes for your nonconformances?  Does operator error account for more than ten percent?  If so, you need to review your Root Cause Analysis system.  You are risking an FDA citation.  More than that, you are leaving money on the table.

Why?  Because blaming errors on your operators almost never corrects the real root cause.  That root cause is still lurking in your process, waiting to pop up and bite you again.  This situation is so common that it pains us quality consultants.  Every time you blame a nonconformance on operator error, you lose money.  Here’s why:

Ok, so you retrain one operator.  What makes you think that one particular operator is so different from everyone else?  How do you know the same event won’t happen to another operator the next day?  The answer is, of course, that you don’t.  Worse, think of the impact this display will have on the other operators.  When they see their colleague being perp-walked to the training room, you lose your best source of information about future problems.

So, you're going to recycle that operator through the same training system that allowed that error to happen in the first place and expect a different result?  What's that called?

Before you admit failure when searching for the root cause and blame the operator, let’s take a look at what you need to reject first.

Your nonconformance report had better explain why that operator is unique.  Why will retraining fix the problem this time?  And, by the way, why didn’t your training system work the last time that operator was trained?  Could it be that your training system is the cause, and not the employee?  You have to dig into your training system and justify why its failure didn’t cause the nonconformance.

All right, let’s assume for the moment that your training system isn’t the problem, what next?  The ultimate root cause analysis takes you back to your hiring system:

• Who makes your hiring decisions?  The ability to recognize talent is critical to good management.  Do you have the right people involved?  Are you measuring how your hiring process works?
• Do you have a rent to own system?  Why limit your interviews to a few hours?  Bring in operators as temps first and get a good look at them before bringing them on as permanent employees.
• Do you have to interview large numbers of candidates in order to get people who can do the job?  Do you spend endless hours sifting through lines of people before settling on lukewarm slot fillers?  Test the candidates beforehand for basic math, reading, and Bennet Mechanical.  Interview only those who passed the tests.

I know what you’re saying.  This all seems like a lot of work.  Really?  Compared to what?  I say that what you’re doing now is a lot of work.  Retraining operator after operator, interviewing an endless revolving door of candidates, cleaning up after the same, repeated errors day after day; that’s a lot of work.

Your employees are the company.  Any effort you put into hiring the right employees, and investing in them is money in the bank.