Sustainability
Sustainability
Environment, health and safety
Sustainability, health and safety are central to the production processes in all our facilities around the world. They're the natural concerns of a responsible company- good for the environment and good for our employees. But they're also crucial to our core values of quality and efficiency.
Sustainable manufacturing is an important concern of any Perkins facility, wherever it is in the world. So too is the health and safety of our employees. We won't compromise on any of these- they're all part of running a company that is responsible and efficient, and firmly committed to the quality of its products.
Sustainable policies are efficient policies- driving down waste is good for the environment and a manufacturing process that operates safely is also operating efficiently.
Empowering employees
Our employees are our greatest assets and we take advantage of their skills, their experience and their ideas. Every production line employee, for instance, is empowered to stop the whole line at the press of a switch if he or she sees a problem that needs to be dealt with.
This is important for efficiency, since it means that any faults in production are rectified immediately, rather than being replicated in each engine on the line. It’s important for our commitment to quality, because it means that faults are prevented from creeping into the production process. And it’s also important because it empowers our teams and engages them with the products they’re making.
The importance of ideas
We encourage members of our teams to submit ideas about any aspect of work in the facility –concerns about health and safety issues, or proposals to improve productivity, efficiency or quality. We get around 15,000 of these ideas each year, and each one is studied, responded to, and acted on if there is value in doing so. And if it’s not acted on, the employee is told why.
Production employees and senior managers co-operate in regular improvement workshops in which changes to production processes are designed, assessed, analysed and implemented. These are real improvements to our efficiency, and they have a direct impact on the uncompromising standards of high quality on which we pride ourselves.
Every Perkins employee can take personal pride in the quality and reliability of every engine that comes off the production line.
Risk assessment and management
Our employees’ suggestions are a central part of our risk assessment strategy – the people working in the facility are best placed to spot potential incidents before they happen.
In addition, though, we have stringent risk management strategies in operation. Any near-miss incident results in an immediate and thorough investigation, with a detailed assessment of the reasons for it and the implementation of measures to prevent it happening again.
Again, effective risk assessment and risk management improve our employees’ working lives and keep them safe while helping to maintain the smooth running and efficiency of the production processes.
Operating stations designed for safety and efficiency
Careful design can prevent accidents before they happen. We have built safety and efficiency into the ergonomic design of our operating stations and production lines, with awkward lifting and adjustment of heavy engines carried out automatically.
Throughout our facilities, lifting gear has replaced manual lifting, and wherever possible, engines are moved around on conveyor belts rather than by moving trucks.
We’ve achieved a lot. But the search for improved sustainability and for better health and safety at work doesn’t stop here. It’s part of the continuing drive for efficiency, and it’s going on.
What we do well, we want to do better.
