Production Scheduling for the Process Industries

Don't underestimate the revolutionary nature of the concepts described and recommended in this book. This should be required reading for leaders in operations roles. Had more of our manufacturing organizations been built on this structured scheduling methodology, I believe our [Covid] response would've been stronger, quicker, and far less painful to our manufacturing teams, sales teams, customers, and consumers.

-- Dave Rich, VP, Strategic Sourcing & Fulfillment, Litehouse Foods

Effective production scheduling is a critical tool to optimize product-to-product transitions and one of the most critical factors to achieve truly effective use of your production resources. Peter King made a significant contribution to understanding and improving production scheduling in his first book. I have personally used his concepts with great benefit. Peter, Mac, and Noel have continued that work in this fine new book that will surely be of great value to process operators.

-- Raymond Floyd, SVP Suncor Energy (Retired) Current member of Manufacturing Hall of Fame, The Shingo Academy and the Baldrige Award Board of Overseers

By implementing planning wheels we were able to move from fill rates of ~75% to over 99% reliably in a 3- month timeframe. The approach to working with people on the floor captured in this book is key to managing the change needed to stabilize manufacturing. Having a predictable cycle of changeovers is huge to improve performance and improve morale on the factory floor.

--David Kaissling, Chief Supply Chain Officer, Shearer's Snacks; and head of supply chain for several fortune 500 companies.

... a comprehensive resource on the "how" and "why" of production scheduling and how it enables improved manufacturing performance and business success.

-- Dave Rurak, Executive VP, Integrated Operations and Supply Chain, W. L. Gore & Associates

In my 35+ years in supply chain, it is rare to come across such an esteemed and knowledgeable group of practitioners in the area of production scheduling. This book is an outstanding reference and step by step guide on how to plan and schedule any repetitive manufacturing operation. ... a "must-read."

-- Paul Baris, VP Planning Strategy, enVista

The concept in this book along with the Phenix planning tools allowed us to move very complex scheduling rules from head knowledge into a cloud-based system. It has improved our speed of scheduling and the consistency of scheduling to our established rules.

-- Dave Stauffer, Director of Supply Chain, Advanced Food Products

This book is a wonderful overview of the benefits of Product Wheels including all the pressure testing our wheels have had in the most disruptive of environments. An international pandemic, labor compression, and record inflation have really made plant scheduling even more challenging than it has ever been. Product Wheels have been the backbone of which to "grab on to" for these difficult environments.

-- Mike Evans, Senior VP Operations, Bellisio Foods

Production scheduling has long been a massively neglected part of the equation for maximizing customer service and shop floor performance, while minimizing cost and capital. [This] is an exceptional read on the value, mechanisms and alternatives to optimize shop floor performance. Kudos! to King, Jacob and Peberdy for providing such a comprehensive and unbiased handbook to practitioners and leaders everywhere!

-- Mike Wittman, Formerly Chief Supply Chain Officer, Pinnacle Foods, now Senior Advisor, Boston Consulting Group