I've worked in IT and software development for automotive manufacturing for over 15 years.
> Ways of extracting this knowledge?
Ask questions. Ask obvious questions. Walk the plant floor.
Be prepared for things to not make sense. The only real explanation is a long history of "They made it work"
Your machines are named Machine B, Machine A, and Machine C because A and B went in first, C was added later and there was only room on that side.
The problem is not there was no plan - the problem is there was a plan in 196x, and another plan in 197x, and .... (See "Standards" https://xkcd.com/927/ )
Learn about Lean Manufacturing and Toyota production system obviously.
Traceability - do you know what your bill of trace is? Do you really know? Can you prove that it will never be wrong? Do you audit your trace process? Do you audit your trace captures? All of them? (I worked on traceability for a few years. I will never work on a compliance app again)
Innovation in the areas you mentioned will always be about balancing constraints. The answer to "Why don't they just do X" is: try it and see. It will always work in your mind. You don't know what constraint is the hardest until you actually build it, whatever it is. The hard constraint will move around depending on exactly what you are doing - it's not consistent between companies or between lines of business or even between stages in the process.
Physical automation in manufacturing is more difficult than it seems at first, second, and third thought. Automation does not solve problems. You must solve every problem the automation will encounter.
Authors: Sidney Dekker, Clayton Christensen, W E Deming - not all about manufacturing specifically, but a very good basis for thinking about people and business.
> Ways of extracting this knowledge?
Ask questions. Ask obvious questions. Walk the plant floor.
Be prepared for things to not make sense. The only real explanation is a long history of "They made it work"
Your machines are named Machine B, Machine A, and Machine C because A and B went in first, C was added later and there was only room on that side.
The problem is not there was no plan - the problem is there was a plan in 196x, and another plan in 197x, and .... (See "Standards" https://xkcd.com/927/ )
Learn about Lean Manufacturing and Toyota production system obviously.
Traceability - do you know what your bill of trace is? Do you really know? Can you prove that it will never be wrong? Do you audit your trace process? Do you audit your trace captures? All of them? (I worked on traceability for a few years. I will never work on a compliance app again)
Innovation in the areas you mentioned will always be about balancing constraints. The answer to "Why don't they just do X" is: try it and see. It will always work in your mind. You don't know what constraint is the hardest until you actually build it, whatever it is. The hard constraint will move around depending on exactly what you are doing - it's not consistent between companies or between lines of business or even between stages in the process.
Physical automation in manufacturing is more difficult than it seems at first, second, and third thought. Automation does not solve problems. You must solve every problem the automation will encounter.
Authors: Sidney Dekker, Clayton Christensen, W E Deming - not all about manufacturing specifically, but a very good basis for thinking about people and business.