Production Manager - live preview

Good morning, Daniel

24 works orders open, 6 short on material and the paint line is the constraint again.

Works orders open249 due this week

Short on material6blocking 3 orders

Output yesterday1,842units, 96% of plan

Scrap rate1.8%target below 2%

Blocking production

3 open

WO-4412 - short 40 of FRM-2201-BLKPurchase order due 12 Sep, order is due 04 SepMaterial short

Paint line at 104% loaded this weekTwo orders will slip unless one movesCapacity

WO-4396 - operation 30 not bookedReported complete but no time booked against itBooking gap

Works orders

What is being made, from which bill of material, and where it has got to.

Open works orders

Order	Product	Qty	Due	Stage	Material	Status
WO-4412	Frame assembly, black	120	04 Sep	Not started	Short	Blocked
WO-4409	Frame assembly, grey	200	05 Sep	Machining	Complete	In progress
WO-4402	Bracket, type 4	800	06 Sep	Paint	Complete	In progress
WO-4396	Clamp, 18mm	2,000	03 Sep	Assembly	Complete	Booking gap
WO-4388	Frame assembly, wide	60	10 Sep	Not started	Complete	Scheduled
WO-4371	Clamp, 9mm	1,500	29 Aug	Complete	Complete	Closed

An order cannot be released to the floor while any component is short.

Materials

What each order needs, what is free, and what is on order.

Material availability

Order	Component	Required	Free	On order	Expected	Status
WO-4412	FRM-2201-BLK	120	80	60	12 Sep	Short 40
WO-4412	CLP-118	240	372	0	-	Available
WO-4409	FRM-2201-GRY	200	204	0	-	Available
WO-4402	BRK-RAW-04	800	1,240	0	-	Available
WO-4388	FRM-2340-RAW	60	0	120	09 Sep	Awaiting

Free stock excludes units already allocated to other works orders.

Time booking

Booked on the floor, against the operation, at the time it happened.

Today's bookings

Time	Order	Operation	Work centre	Operator	Qty	Minutes
07:15	WO-4409	20 Machining	CNC 2	Daniel Novak	80	142
09:40	WO-4402	30 Paint	Paint line	Gang 2	400	96
10:20	WO-4396	40 Assembly	Bench 1	Gang 1	1,200	188
11:05	WO-4409	20 Machining	CNC 2	Daniel Novak	60	104
13:30	WO-4402	30 Paint	Paint line	Gang 2	400	92

Booked time drives both job costing and the capacity picture, so it is entered once.

Bills of material

What goes into what, at which revision, with where-used both ways.

Bills of material

Product	Revision	Components	Operations	Effective	Status
Frame assembly, black	rev C	6	4	01 Aug 2026	Current
Frame assembly, grey	rev C	6	4	01 Aug 2026	Current
Frame assembly, black	rev B	6	4	12 Mar 2026	Superseded
Bracket, type 4	rev A	3	3	18 Jan 2026	Current
Clamp, 18mm	rev D	2	2	22 Jul 2026	Current
Frame assembly, wide	rev A	7	5	-	Draft

A works order records the revision it was raised against, so old jobs stay explicable.

Schedule

What runs where and when, with the orders that will slip shown as slipping.

This week

Work centre	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Load
CNC 1	WO-4409	WO-4409	WO-4388	WO-4388	Free	78%
CNC 2	WO-4409	WO-4412	WO-4412	WO-4412	Free	84%
Paint line	WO-4402	WO-4402	WO-4412	WO-4412	WO-4388	104%
Bench 1	WO-4396	WO-4396	WO-4402	WO-4402	Free	71%
Bench 2	Free	WO-4388	WO-4388	Free	Free	42%

The paint line is over-loaded, so something moves now or slips later. The app will not pretend otherwise.

Capacity

Available hours against loaded hours, by work centre. The constraint is always visible.

Paint line104%

Over-loaded - the constraint this week

CNC 284%

Approaching capacity

Bench 242%

Spare capacity available

Loading, next 4 weeks

Work centre	Available hrs	Loaded hrs	Load	Orders	Constraint
Paint line	152	158	104%	9	Yes
CNC 2	152	128	84%	7	Near
CNC 1	152	119	78%	6	No
Bench 1	228	162	71%	8	No
Bench 2	228	96	42%	4	No

Loading uses routed standard times, corrected by booked actuals over the last 90 days.

Routings and work centres

The operations a product goes through, and the standard time for each.

Routing: Frame assembly, black rev C

Op	Description	Work centre	Setup min	Run min per unit	Status
10	Cut to length	Saw	20	0.8	Active
20	Machining	CNC 2	45	1.4	Active
30	Paint	Paint line	60	0.6	Active
40	Assembly and pack	Bench 1	10	1.1	Active

Why standard times get corrected

Standard times drift out of date within months, and a schedule built on stale standards lies confidently. Booked actuals feed back automatically so the plan degrades honestly rather than silently.

Booked time is compared with routed standard on every operation
Loading uses standards corrected by 90 days of actuals
Persistent variance is flagged for the planner to review
Changing a standard creates a new routing version
Works orders keep the routing version they were raised against
Every change is written to the audit log

Audit log

Every release, booking correction and routing change. Retained for seven years.

Events

When	Actor	Action	Target	Source
01 Sep 08:20	System	Blocked release, component short	WO-4412	scheduler
01 Sep 07:15	Daniel Novak	Booked 142 minutes to operation 20	WO-4409	terminal
31 Aug 16:40	Marta Kowalski	Rescheduled to relieve paint line	WO-4388	web
30 Aug 11:20	Lena Brandt	Published routing rev C, superseded rev B	Frame assembly, black	web
29 Aug 09:05	Marta Kowalski	Corrected booking, wrong operation	WO-4396	web

WO-30412

One works order, its materials and its options.

In progressShort by 400 unitsWO-30412 · 4,200 units · line 2 · due 12 September

Product 8814, batch of 4,200

Scheduled for 4,200 and will make 3,800, because a component is short. The shortage was visible when the order was released and the release check only looks at the first level of the bill.

Ordered4,200units

Achievable3,800short 400

Line time booked18 hrsof 20 available

Due in5 daysno float

Bill of materials

1 shortage

Level	Component	Needed	On hand	On order	Short
1	Housing assembly	4,200	4,200	-	No
1	Control module	4,200	4,200	-	No
2	Seal ring, in the housing	4,200	3,800	2,000 · 6 days	400 short
2	Fastener set	8,400	12,000	-	No
3	Seal material	-	Supplier	-	-

The release check reads level one, where everything is available. The shortage is at level two, inside a subassembly that shows as complete.

Options

Make 3,800 now, 400 in six daysTwo setups, one late deliveryRealistic

Wait six days and make 4,200One setup, all of it lateWorse

Expedite the seal ring$1,840 premium · 2 daysCosted

Substitute an approved sealRequires quality sign-offPossible

The customer takes partial deliveries on this product and has done twice this year. That fact is on the customer record and not on the shortage alert.

What it costs to be wrong

Second setup2.5 hours of line time · $1,100

Expedite premium$1,840

Late delivery penalty$4,200 · contractual

Cheapest pathSplit and expedite · $2,940Best

Every option is priced, which turns a scheduling argument into an arithmetic one. The most expensive choice here is making the decision late.

Release a works order

What to make, how many, and whether it can be made.

The order

ProductLinePriority

QuantityDue date

Availability check

Level 1 componentsAll availablePass

Level 2 and below1 shortage · 400 unitsFail

Line capacity18 of 20 hoursPass

ToolingAvailable · last used TuesdayPass

The check runs the whole bill rather than the top level. A subassembly that shows as in stock can still be short of what it is made from, and that is the failure this screen exists to stop.

If it cannot all be made

DefaultRelease what is possible and flag the restHold the whole orderRelease anyway

Releasing anyway is available and is sometimes right, because a line running at 90% beats a line stopped. It is a choice with a name on it rather than what happens when nobody checks.

A shortage below level one is shown before release, with its lead time.

Shortages

What is missing, what it stops, and when it arrives.

Open shortages22across 14 orders

Orders affected14$412,000 of output

Found after release18of 22

Average lead time9 daysagainst a 5-day schedule

Shortages

14 orders stopped

Component	Level	Short by	Stops	Arrives	Found
Seal ring	2	400	WO-30412 · 4,200 units	6 days	After release
Control module	1	1,200	WO-30388 · 2,400 units	11 days	Before release
Bearing, 22mm	3	800	WO-30366 · 1,800 units	4 days	After release
Label stock	1	6,000	WO-30341 · 6,000 units	2 days	After release
Motor assembly	2	200	WO-30302 · 900 units	18 days	After release

Eighteen of twenty-two were found after the order was on the line. Every one below level one was, because the release check never looked there.

A shortage found before release is a scheduling decision. The same shortage found after release is a stopped line, a part-built batch and a phone call to a customer, and it is the same information three days later.

Line performance

Availability, speed and quality, and which one is the problem.

Overall effectiveness68%world class is 85%

Availability82%stoppages and changeovers

Performance91%speed against rated

Quality91%first-pass yield

By line

68% overall

Line	Availability	Performance	Quality	Overall	Biggest loss
Line 1	88%	94%	96%	79%	Changeovers
Line 2	74%	91%	88%	59%	Material shortages
Line 3	86%	89%	93%	71%	Speed losses
Line 4	81%	92%	89%	66%	Quality rework

Line 2 is the worst on availability and the worst overall. Its losses are material shortages rather than machine faults, which is not something maintenance can fix.

Where the availability goes

Line 2, this month

Material shortages41 hrs

Changeovers28 hrs

Breakdowns18 hrs

No operator11 hrs

Planned maintenance8 hrs

Forty-one hours lost to material, more than breakdowns and maintenance together. The usual assumption about a poorly performing line is the third bar.

What would move the number

Run the release check on the whole bill41 hrs a monthFree

Reduce changeovers by batching12 hrs a monthPlanning

Fix the recurring breakdown9 hrs a monthMaintenance

Cover the operator gap11 hrs a monthRostering

The largest single gain costs nothing and is a check that already exists at level one being run one level deeper.

Capacity

What is promised against what the lines can do.

Committed next 4 weeks18,400 hrsagainst 16,800 available

Overcommitted1,600 hrs9.5%

Line 2 committed112%the worst-performing line

Line 1 committed78%the best-performing line

Next 4 weeks

112% on line 2

Line	Available	Committed	Utilisation	Overall effectiveness	Verdict
Line 1	4,200 hrs	3,276 hrs	78%	79%	Room
Line 2	4,200 hrs	4,704 hrs	112%	59%	Overcommitted
Line 3	4,200 hrs	3,864 hrs	92%	71%	Tight
Line 4	4,200 hrs	4,116 hrs	98%	66%	Tight

The most loaded line is the least effective one. Work has been going to line 2 because it is scheduled on rated speed rather than on what it actually achieves.

Planning on rated capacity rather than demonstrated capacity is why the schedule is 9.5% overcommitted while one line sits at 78%. The correction is arithmetic and the conversation is not.

Reports: activity

Volume and throughput, by owner and by product family.

Volume over time

12 weeks

Thousands of units per week. Every trough is a material shortage rather than a machine problem, which is not what a production chart is usually read as saying.

Units produced this month184,000against 212,000 scheduled

Opened this month188against 162 closed

Median age6.4 daystarget is 5 days

Owned by nobody14oldest is 3 days

By product family

This quarter

Family A84k

Family B48k

Family C31k

Family D14k

Trials7k

By line

This quarter

Line	Open	Closed	Median days	Overdue
Line 1	48	46,200	79	2
Line 3	44	41,800	71	4
Line 4	46	43,100	66	5
Line 2	50	38,900	59	11
Unassigned	14	0	-	14

The fourth column is overall effectiveness. Line 2 has the most orders and the lowest effectiveness, and the scheduling runs on rated speed rather than that number.

Reports: performance

Against target, with the gap named.

Against target68%overall equipment effectiveness

Best lineLine 179%, least loaded

WorstLine 259%, most loaded

Trend-3 ptson last quarter

Against target by product family

100 is the target

Line 179

Line 371

Line 466

Line 259

Effectiveness runs inversely to how loaded a line is. Overloading the weakest line is the direct result of planning on capacity rather than on demonstrated output.

What moved

Rule-derived

Effectiveness down 3 points41 hours a month lost to material shortagesDown

18 of 22 shortages found after releaseEvery one of them below level oneWatch

First-pass yield up 2 pointsSince the seal specification was tightenedUp

Threshold rules over the figures above, not a model. Each line names the number it came from so you can disagree with it.

Reports: exceptions

What breached, what is late and what nobody owns.

Breached22open material shortages

At risk412inside 48 hours

Unassigned14no owner at all

Reopened18closed then raised again

Exceptions

22 open

Order	Product	Problem	Output at risk	Found
WO-30412	Product 8814	Level 2 shortage, 400 units	$41,000	After release
WO-30302	Product 9014	Level 2 shortage, 18-day lead	$96,000	After release
Line 2	112% committed, 59% effective	Overloaded 4 weeks	$184,000	Planning
WO-30341	Product 8820	Label stock, level 1	$62,000	After release
WO-30366	Product 8902	Level 3 shortage, bearings	$29,000	After release

Four shortages and one planning fault, and all five were knowable before anything reached a line. Nothing here is a manufacturing problem.

The release check reads the first level of the bill. Reading all of it costs nothing and would have caught eighteen of twenty-two shortages while they were still scheduling decisions rather than stopped lines.

People

Who has an account, and what they own.

People

96 accounts

Name	Role	Plant	Last active	Status
Halvard Ness	Administrator	Plant systems	7 minutes ago	Active
Jutta Reinhardt	Production manager	Plant	22 minutes ago	Active
Aksel Berg	Line leader	Line 2	1 hour ago	Active
Rui Almeida	Operator	Line 2	40 minutes ago	Active
Katarzyna Nowak	Planner	Planning	2 hours ago	Active
Elsa Ryberg	Quality	Quality	3 hours ago	Active

Deactivating somebody prompts you to reassign what they own rather than doing it silently, because an unowned record is how a register rots.

Roles

What each role is scoped to and what it may approve.

Roles

5 roles

Role	Type	People	Scope	Can approve to	Status
Administrator	Built in	1	Everything	No limit	Active
Production manager	Built in	2	All lines	Releases anything	Active
Planner	Built in	4	Schedule and orders	Releases with cover	Active
Line leader	Built in	8	Own line	Re-sequences own line	Active
Operator	Built in	72	Own line, bookings	Books production	Active

A role carries a scope and an approval ceiling. Both are enforced on the server; hiding a button is not access control.

Recent changes

Release blocked on a level 2 shortage without an overrideHalvard Ness · 6 SeptemberLogged

Line leaders given re-sequencing rightsHalvard Ness · 12 MayLogged

Role changes sit in the same audit log as record changes, because both change what somebody can do.

Why custom roles exist

An operator books what was made and cannot change what was ordered
A line leader can re-sequence their own line within the day
A planner can release an order with a known shortage, by name and with a reason
Nobody can change a bill of materials from inside a works order

Permissions

Every capability against every role, as enforced.

What each role can do

10 capabilities

Capability	Administrator	Production manager	Planner	Line leader	Operator
View the schedule	Yes	Yes	Yes	Own line	Own line
Release a works order	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
Release with a known shortage	Yes	Yes	With a reason	No	No
Re-sequence a line	Yes	Yes	Yes	Own line	No
Book production	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
Book scrap	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
Split an order	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
Expedite a component	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
Change a bill of materials	Yes	No	No	No	No
Read the audit log	Yes	Yes	Yes	Own line	No

Enforced per query rather than by hiding controls. A scoped "yes" means the row exists but is limited, which is why some actions need a second person.

A bill of materials cannot be edited from inside a works order by anybody. A shortage is solved by changing the plan or the stock, never by changing what the product is made of on one order.

Notifications

What the system sends, to whom, and when.

What is sent

Shortage found at any level before releaseTo the planner, with lead timeOn

Shortage found after releaseTo the planner and the line leaderOn

Line committed above 100%To the production manager, weeklyOn

Order will miss its due dateTo planning and customer serviceOn

Scrap above 5% on a batchTo quality and the line leaderOn

Every message names the record it is about, so a reply lands somewhere.

Quiet hours

No routine notifications20:00 to 07:00, local to the personOn

Urgent overridesA line stopped for material with an order due this weekOn

Weekly digestMonday 08:00On

A notification that waits until morning is one that did not work, so the override is explicit rather than a setting nobody finds.

Notification rules are yours to set. What is here is a starting point drawn from how the queue actually behaves.

Integrations

Connected systems and their sync history.

Connected

4 connected

Stock systemOn hand and on order at every levelConnected

PurchasingLead times and expedite costsConnected

Line data captureOutput, stoppages and reasonsConnected

QualityFirst-pass yield and holdsConnected

Sales ordersWhat the customer actually needs and whenNot connected

What breaks without them

Without sales orders the fact that a customer accepts partial delivery lives on a customer record nobody in production sees
Without stock at every level the release check can only read level one, which is the cause of eighteen of twenty-two shortages
Without line data capture the loss reasons are written on a whiteboard
Production still runs; every problem is discovered on the line

Sync history

Last 24 hours

When	Source	Records	Result
Continuous	Stock system	4,120 items	22 shortages
06:00 today	Purchasing	188 orders	Current
Continuous	Line data capture	4 lines	Live
Continuous	Quality	188 batches	2 on hold

A sync that half-succeeded is listed as such rather than as a failure, because the records that did land still changed something.

Import and export

Bulk load and extract, with per-row validation.

Import

WhatIf a row already exists

Validated before anything is written. A file with one bad row imports the rest and tells you which line failed and why.

Export

WhatFormat

RangeEverythingThis yearFiltered view

Recent imports and exports

Last 30 days

When	What	Rows	Result	By
2 Sep 06:00	Import	4,120	Complete	Halvard Ness
1 Sep 18:00	Export	188	Complete	Jutta Reinhardt
26 Aug 07:40	Import	412	406 loaded, 6 rejected	Katarzyna Nowak

Every import is kept with its source file, so a bad load can be traced rather than argued about.