Puzzle

When I was a kid, I really enjoyed doing jigsaw puzzles with my mom on the kitchen table. 

Even though I haven't done a real jigsaw puzzle in years, I still enjoy trying to make all the pieces fit, but now I get to do it everyday in my day job working with production planning at FlexQube.

Production planning is a puzzle of trying to fit different orders into a limited space, that we call capacity.  The pieces are different sizes (based on order size and complexity) and different colors (based on priorities and ship dates).

To make it even more challenging, each puzzle piece is also made up of smaller pieces including purchased parts and subcomponents which have to be manufactured before the piece can go to production (you can think of those as other mini-puzzles within the pieces). 

Each puzzle piece also has stakeholders (Customers and Salesmen) who are interested in their pieces, but not really the board as a whole.  So even small pieces can change priority (color) at any time.

The board you build the puzzle on, the plant floor, also has sections with their own variables.  Each section, call them production cells, has its own capacity based on hours, staffing, and efficiency. You can increase the size of a section by adding additional staffing or hours (overtime), but the cell can decrease if someone is absent that day.

As you plan out a day, week, and month it's a never ending game of matching the order pieces to the sections and hoping you can complete the entire board by the end of a week or month.  Luckily, you can see how you did in hindsight by KPI's such as on-time delivery and plant efficiency (how many resources were used per piece versus the plan).

Like a jigsaw puzzle, the more you play the game, the better you get at it, but it is a fun challenge every day.