Journal of Industrial Information Integration 12 (2018) 13–22

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Journal of Industrial Information Integration

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jii

Developing dashboards for SMEs to improve performance of productive T

equipment and processes
⁎
Sandrina Vilarinho , Isabel Lopes, Sérgio Sousa
ALGORITMI Research Centre, Department of Production and Systems, University of Minho, Guimarães, Portugal

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Developing and implementing dashboards is common in large companies. However, these practices should be
Continuous improvement adapted to small and medium enterprises (SMEs), since they differ in several characteristics, including at in-
Dashboard formation system level. This paper proposes a procedure to develop dashboards for SMEs aimed at improving the
Information system performance of productive equipment and processes, at shop floor level. The developed dashboard intends to
Kaizen
improve performance by efficiently providing information to the productive areas and turn this information into
Total productive maintenance
Visual management
knowledge, plans, and actions which promote an effective shop floor activity. The main phases of the proposed
procedure are defined based on the traditional process of product development. One of the main phases, the
development of the dashboard layout, was performed considering visual management and continuous im-
provement approaches, such as kaizen and Total Productive Maintenance. The development of an adequate data
source that feeds the data into the dashboard is also considered in the procedure. In order to achieve an effective
dashboard, its development should consider the level of quality maturity of the company, as well as, the maturity
of the information and communication system. The proposed procedure assists SMEs in achieving a dashboard to
improve the performance of productive areas, improving productive information and communication and pro-
moting a culture of continuous improvement at shop floor level.

1. Introduction This pillar aims to achieve overall equipment effectiveness, which can
be measured by the Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) indicator. In
In the last decades, the industry has experienced a high degree of addition to the OEE, several tools are also used to analyze losses and to
changes of different nature due to the increase of economic, political, track the improvement process, such as the seven quality tools.
social and environmental pressures. The customer and other stake- The main challenge for successful continuous improvement in-
holders’ requirements force industries to keep up with these changes itiatives is to develop a sustainable infrastructure that implements,
and maintaining high levels of quality. A key element that supports promotes and coordinates them. Visual Management can provide a
organizations to embrace these challenges is the adoption of continuous solid base in supporting these initiatives, through visualizing informa-
improvement through a systematic, incremental and iterative way, tion, displaying requirements, setting directions and guiding actions.
throughout the company, in their daily routines and involving all em- Dashboards are an example of the application of visual management
ployees. that proactively supports and improves decisions, keeps employees fo-
Kaizen is defined as a Japanese business philosophy of continuous cused on main issues in their work and helps them improve perfor-
improvement, being globally used by organizations that have as ob- mance and achieve expected results [2]. It is supposed that the key
jective a dynamic change for better [1]. It incorporates several tech- information displayed on dashboards be influential in the decision-
niques, tools and methodologies that have been developed over time, making activities of companies so, an appropriate design of the dash-
for the implementation of continuous improvement, including TPM. board is crucial. The term dashboard comes from the dashboard of a
TPM is a maintenance management methodology and its main activities vehicle as it presents the metrics that the driver needs to know, simi-
are organized in pillars. One of them is designated by ``specific and larly dashboards also present information from which managers and
focused improvements'' or “kobetsu kaizen” and includes activities that employees can visually identify trends, patterns and anomalies about
maximize the effectiveness of equipment, processes and organization the company [3]. Research has been carried out, focusing their evolu-
through the elimination of waste, enabling performance improvement. tion, purposes, categories, formats, as well highlighting the importance

⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: [email protected] (S. Vilarinho), [email protected] (I. Lopes), [email protected] (S. Sousa).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jii.2018.02.003
Received 30 September 2017; Received in revised form 5 January 2018; Accepted 19 February 2018
Available online 27 February 2018
2452-414X/ © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
S. Vilarinho et al. Journal of Industrial Information Integration 12 (2018) 13–22

of dashboard design and development [2–5]. However, the develop- definition adds that continuous improvements “can also be realized by
ment process should be explored, considering potential issues like data collecting data, analyzing information, setting objectives, and im-
availability and reliability, that would lead to some process change or plementing corrective and preventive actions”. The importance and
improvement and should be considered as part of the dashboard de- evolution of continuous improvement are reflected in the existence of
velopment initiative [5]. several paradigms, methodologies, techniques and tools that have
The convergence of industrial production, information and com- emerged and have been improved so that organizations can better re-
munication technologies, associated with the Industry 4.0, intends to spond to the competitiveness that is being lived [12]. Some of the most
increase operational effectiveness as well as the development of new notable methodologies to support continuous improvement are Total
business models, services, and products [6]. For the deployment of Quality Management (TQM), Total Productive Maintenance (TPM), Six
Industry 4.0, some principles and key technologies are identified Sigma and Lean Manufacturing. These have much in common at the
guiding the evolution of intelligent production systems [7]. Dashboards level of principles, techniques and tools, differing essentially in the area
development and implementation can also contribute to integrate these that improvement should be made [12].
principles and technologies into company´s environment. Dashboards Continuous improvement is an expression also known by the
are capable of showing the current state of the business across different Japanese term kaizen, that is used globally by organizations that focus
media, offering management a view of the business that exceeds tra- on ``involving everyone, everywhere, to make changes for the better,
ditional reports [8]. every day'' [1]. Imai [1] emphasizes the relevance of the Gemba, a Ja-
The current literature focused on the development of dashboards is panese term that means the place where the products are manu-
too complex for smaller companies [2,3,5]. In most cases, SMEs do not factured. The improvement movements should come from both, man-
have, an organized quality management system, manifesting a low level agement to Gemba and from Gemba to management since there are
of quality maturity [9]. This is reflected in several aspects, including the numerous opportunities to make the company successful [1]. The
level of maturity of information systems, compromising visual man- adoption of kaizen by organizations may have different starting points
agement. Other relevant SMEs characteristics were identified in a lit- and rhythms of progress, however the initiatives tend to achieve a si-
erature review by Zach et al. [10] and those that may have more impact milar position [13]. Miller et al. [13] identify three main types of
in visual management are: SMEs are constrained in terms of their fi- kaizen: kaizen project; kaizen support and daily kaizen. The kaizen
nancial and human resources, the decision process is more intuitive and project embraces the activities of temporary teams working on kaizen
based on experience, most of the activities are governed by informal events, the introduction of new products, among other projects. The
rules and procedures with a low degree of standardization and for- main goal of the kaizen project is to achieve rapid performance im-
malization. More specifically, at the information system characteristics provement and financial results. The kaizen support includes strategy
level, the authors point out: SMEs often lack the managerial expertise to development, planning, training, recognition and management activ-
plan, organize and direct the use of information resources, many SMEs ities that are necessary to guide the success of kaizen. The support
possess insufficient in-house expertise for successful information system kaizen purpose is to support strategic and guiding activities, with a
adoption and, the information system function is traditionally per- secondary focus on ensuring that collaborators are achieving better
ceived to be in its earlier stage of evolution. Dashboards can be printed results through daily kaizen. The daily kaizen includes small cycles of
or simply displayed on a variety of screens. However, to move towards activities improvement, including suggestions programs, teams based
Industry 4.0, companies should feed dashboards with real-time data on frontline problem solving and maintenance of standards. Although
and integrate them with companies´ databases. the financial benefits of daily kaizen are relatively small when com-
In this sense, the process of dashboard development in the context pared to other types of kaizen, it is considered fundamental for long-
of SMEs should attend their particularities and main issues, considering term sustainability [13].
that in most cases they have low levels of quality maturity, and pos- TPM is a maintenance management methodology, considered by
sibly, low maturity on the information system. Once procedures to Imai [1] a relevant system for obtaining a successful kaizen strategy.
develop dashboards oriented to SMEs focusing in their particularities Nakajima [14] defines TPM as ``an innovative approach to main-
are lacking in the literature, the processes of developing a dashboard tenance that optimizes equipment effectiveness, eliminates malfunc-
considering the level of maturity of the information system should be tions, and promotes autonomous maintenance by operators through
explored. day-to-day activities involving the total workforce''. The main activities
Therefore, this paper presents a procedure to develop dashboards of TPM are organized in eight pillars [14]. The kobetsu kaizen pillar is
for SMEs aimed at improving the performance of productive equipment one of them and aims to eliminate all types of losses. The identification,
and processes, to be implemented at the shop floor level. The procedure analysis and elimination of losses incurred in equipment operation
is an adaptation of the traditional product development process and is allow improving equipment effectiveness, aiming to achieve zero losses.
based on several methodologies and tools for continuous improvement, [15]. Ahuja et al. [16] identify several activities associated with this
such as kaizen and TPM. This paper is an extended version of the re- pillar, such as identification and elimination of losses related to
search presented by Vilarinho et al. [11]. equipment, labor and raw material, calculate, set targets for the OEE
The paper is structured as follows: in Section 2 a brief review of the and promote its improvement and mitigation of losses. Nakajima [14]
literature is presented, Section 3 presents the dashboard development refers to OEE as ``a bottom-up approach where an integrated workforce
procedure; Section 4 presents the implementation of the proposed strives to achieve overall equipment effectiveness by eliminating'' six
procedure in a SME. Finally, in Section 5 the conclusions and sugges- large losses. For the OEE calculation, three factors are considered:
tions for future work are presented. availability, performance and quality.
Aiming at problems identification in the industrial context,
2. Literature review Marksberry et al. [17] emphasize that a structured problem-solving
approach has a direct correlation with the organization's performance
2.1. Continuous improvement [17]. There are several approaches to problem-solving. Some of the
most common approaches are PDCA (Plan, Do, Check, Act), 8D (eight
Among several definitions of continuous improvement presented in disciplines) and DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve). Several
literature, the definition of the ISO 9000:2015 Quality management tools can support problem-solving, which range from common sense
systems - Fundamentals mentions “a set of recurring activities that are and creativity to the seven basic tools [18]. Beyond the use of con-
carried out in order to enhance performance” and “can be achieved by tinuous improvement methodologies and tools, the existence of small
carrying out audits, self-assessments, and management reviews”. The groups of improvement activities at the shop floor level stands out. In

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S. Vilarinho et al. Journal of Industrial Information Integration 12 (2018) 13–22

general, these groups are in charge of working together to improve the developed, the drivers and the obstacles to their adoption, recognizing
company performance by solving problems and managing specific the applicability of dashboards in all areas of companies to support
manufacturing areas, equipment or processes. Shirose et al. [19] decision making. Their work emphasizes the importance of dashboards,
highlight the existence and importance of teams at different levels. The given the rapid growth of dashboard implementation in large compa-
various teams should be organized in order to guarantee the link be- nies. Eckerson [2] and Rasmussen et al. [26] issued practitioner-or-
tween them and close communication throughout the organization. The iented publications. Eckerson [2] explains how to best apply perfor-
same author identifies three fundamental ``weapons'' to effectively mance dashboards to optimize results, taking into account that
support teams: one-point lessons meetings and activity boards or pa- organizations have been interested in dashboards, using business in-
nels. telligence and data integration tools and technologies. Rasmussen et al.
[26] focus essentiality on the development of dashboard technology for
2.2. Visual management based on dashboard midsize and large companies, with valuable metrics and graphical
components to support employees in improving performance. Allio [27]
Visual management is a management system that strives to improve identifies common difficulties in strategic dashboard design and ap-
organizational performance by aligning the company vision, funda- plication, and recommend guidelines to improve dashboard design,
mental values, objectives and organizational culture with other man- scope, use and impact. The author focuses on dashboards that support
agement systems, work processes and elements, and finally stake- managers capture meaningful data to improve the implementation of
holders, through stimuli. Corbin et al. [20] present a number of business strategy. Concerning common data problems, the author
practices that can be part of the visual workplaces, among which there stresses that an initial investment in enabling infrastructure helps to
are some that have a strong performance management subject into it, keep accurate data and reinforces its value.
such as manual or digital panels. Visual panels are a type of visual Yigitbasioglu et al. [3] provide a literature review concerning the
elements that appear in the literature named with different terms: role of dashboards as decision support tools in performance manage-
boards [21], activity boards [22], panels (manual or digital) [20] and ment and identify possible design issues that should be addressed by
dashboards [3,5]. In this paper, the term dashboard is adopted to name organizations wanting to develop and implement dashboards. The au-
this type of visual element. thors argue that the identification of dashboards’ purposes allows a
In general, dashboards can be defined as a graphical user interface functional adjustment of their features (visual and functional). Func-
that comprehends measures of business performance to enable decision tional features allow a cognitive adjustment with different types of
making. Yigitbasioglu [3] present a more complete definition: “a visual users, and visual characteristics allow to improve the process of vi-
and interactive performance management tool that displays on a single sualization and interpretation of information. Finally, the features of
screen the most important information to achieve one or several in- the dashboard enable visual interpretation and information decoding
dividuals and/or organizational objectives, allowing the user to iden- which promotes decision support in performance management. Yi-
tify, explore, and communicate problem areas that need corrective ac- gitbasioglu et al. [3] stress that the dashboard should be interactive and
tions”. With this tool, it is possible to promote the participation of all in flexible, taking into account the various purposes for which it is in-
the improvement process [3]. From Eckerson's perspective [2], dash- tended. They also alert that it is necessary to be aware of the effect of
boards have three fundamental purposes: to monitor critical activities information overload once dashboard users utilize presented informa-
and processes using metrics that trigger for alerts when performance tion to support their decisions. Therefore, dashboard contents which
falls short of established goals, to analyze the root causes of problems distract the users’ focus on the key dashboard information should be
by exploiting relevant and timely provided information through several avoided.
perspectives and levels of detail, to manage people and processes to In literature, although there is information about the development
improve decisions and lead the organization in the right direction. and implementation of dashboards, it is commonly focused on large
Eckerson [2] highlights that not all dashboards are necessarily built on companies with advanced information systems. Also, dashboards are
Business Intelligent infrastructures, existing different types of infra- frequently considered part of a business intelligence system which in-
structure and data source management systems that can provide data cludes a wide set of complex tools and technologies. Compared to large
into the dashboards. Data sources can range from a relational data enterprises, SMEs differ in communication and information procedures
source to a simple text file [5]. It must be highlighted that solving and other characteristics which have an influence on the dashboards
problems when developing and applying information infrastructure for development process. Therefore, remaining approaches are too so-
manufacturing, contributes to facilitating the industrial information phisticated for the SMEs reality, once they require data and technolo-
integration process [23]. gies not often available. In addition, these approaches are essentially
In literature, several categorizations for dashboards are identified. directed to executives and managers. Developing dashboards involves
For example, Suzaki [24] presents the following categories: company dealing with issues strongly related to organizational capabilities or
evolution, performance and improvement actions, project status, gen- system maturity. Maturity models characterize organizations maturity
eral information and photographs of the shop floor, etc. Dashboards assigning levels in different maturity classes. One of the earliest ma-
adopted by organizations can be categorized in one of those categories turity models is Crosby's Quality Management Maturity Grid, which
or may be the result of a mixture of elements from each of them. Bititci suggests that companies were likely to evolve through five phases in
et al. [25] present a classification for dashboards, depending on the their ascent to quality management excellence [28]. Subsequently,
level (strategic or operational) and the theme (planning or progress) for other models were introduced, describing different stages, similar to
which it is intended. In their study, a transversal approach is developed evolutionary stages, which enable improvements in process quality. For
that integrates visual management at the strategic level and at the instance, maturity models are increasingly being applied within the
operational level. According to the authors, the approaches of visual information system field, in order to easily and objectively measure the
management at the strategic level are usually static, mainly in com- current maturity of information system that supports the business and
munication from top to bottom. to plan for improving its practices [29]. The identification of the level of
Visual methods always imply some risks, such as the possible mis- maturity of a company with respect to quality and information system
understanding of visual information. Therefore, the design stage is allows understanding strengths and weaknesses of company´s key
considered a critical phase to tackle possible visualization risks and to capabilities. In turn, this knowledge can help to identify improvement
make them effective [25]. Several researchs have been conducted on and innovation actions, influencing dashboards development.
the importance of panel design, development and implementation. Therefore, dashboards oriented to SMEs focusing on their particu-
Pauwels et al. [4] clarify what dashboards are, how should they be larities, including their maturity, are lacking in the literature.

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Dashboards development is also uncommon when aimed to involve stages of the diagnosis are similar to the typical stages in the audit
workers from shop floor level in activities that improve the perfor- process: preparation, execution, results analysis and synthesis.
mance of productive areas. This way, the presented procedure and its The preparation stage includes the collection of information about
application in a company is a contribution in this scope. the company, in order to understand the organizational environment,
the priority needs, the particular objectives, the products that the
company provides, company´s processes, the size and the organiza-
3. Dashboard development procedure
tional structure. This first stage also includes the definition of the
borders, to define relevant company´s departments to be considered,
The proposed dashboard development procedure is based on the
and the stakeholders’ selection to be integrated into the project team.
classical product development process, in particular, on the systematic
Stakeholders selection should consider those who share relevant ideas,
approach to product development process, proposed by Pahl and Beitz
experiences and knowledge in the dashboard development, and can
[30], which has become one of the most internationally accepted. These
participate in the future dashboard implementation. Finally, the pre-
authors outline the main phases of product development, from task
paration stage includes interviews preparation to perform on the en-
clarification phase, through conceptual design up to the final embodi-
vironment's company in order to obtain in-depth information referring
ment and detail design phases. Task clarification phase involves col-
to participants’ points of view and experiences.
lecting information about the requirements that have to be fulfilled by
The execution stage includes semi-structured interviews, participa-
the product and also identifying existing constraints and their sig-
tive observation, meetings with employees from several hierarchy le-
nificance. The conceptual design phase and subsequent phases should
vels and finally, company´s information gathering and analysis.
be based on the identified requirements which must be updated con-
Relevant information is mostly associated with the quality management
tinuously. The conceptual design determines the concept of which the
system of the company, such as documents on quality policy and ob-
construction structure (overall layout) of a technical system is achieved,
jectives, quality manual if it exists, documented procedures and re-
on the embodiment design phase. The detail design phase completes the
cords, among others. Company´s system information should also be
embodiment of the product with complete production and operating
analyzed, in order to know and understand technologies and, commu-
procedures [30].
nication and information procedures used by the company, particularly
The defined phases of the proposed procedure to develop dash-
at shop floor level. After obtaining and analyzing results, a synthesis
boards for SMEs to be implemented at shop floor level and focused on
should be performed, focusing company´s fragilities, improvement op-
productive areas are (Fig. 1):
portunities and suggestions to the dashboard.
- Diagnosis of the productive areas – to understand the SME´s current
status, to identify priority improvement actions and to collect em-
3.2. Dashboard requirements assessment
ployee´s suggestions to the dashboard;
- Dashboard requirements assessment – to clarify in an objective way
The identification of dashboard requirements has the purpose of
the requirements that have to be fulfilled by the dashboard, given
understanding the stakeholders’ needs to ensure that those are met with
the diagnosis results, the literature, and the project team know-how;
the final result. The dashboard should be developed proactively,
- Dashboard layout development – to convert the identified require-
avoiding gaps between the stakeholders’ expectations and the final
ments into technical solutions, performing and refining layouts until
version. To define its characteristics, the results obtained in the diag-
achieving the most satisfactory solutions;
nostic phase, as well as, the experience of the project team and the
- Dashboard implementation and improvement – to test the design
information collected in the literature should be considered. Firstly, the
dashboard and the developed resources for its implementation,
obvious requirements are defined and recorded and then, they are re-
evaluating their performance and performing improvements.
fined and extended. Refining requirements imply clarifying the objec-
tives that the solution must satisfy and also the properties that dash-
Each phase should be planned, executed and evaluated. The results
board must and must not have. A dashboard requirements list should be
obtained in one phase are the starting point to the next phase. This way,
arranged in a clear way and have into account objections and amend-
the objectives and main actions that should be considered in each phase
ments [30]. It is suggested that requirements be organized on the fol-
are described below.
lowing items: purpose, user characteristics, visual characteristics,
functional characteristics, contents and decision-making [3]. These
3.1. Diagnosis of the productive areas items should not be very strictly formalized, being only the means to
prevent relevant issues to be forgotten and to provide a supporting
A diagnosis should be performed to assess and understand the cur- structure. In order to achieve an effective performance, relevant com-
rent state of the company productive areas and to identify improvement ponents of the company´s strategy such as goals and objectives, metrics
opportunities. It also intends to gather suggestions for the dashboard and targets, plans and initiatives should be analyzed, considering some
and to define priorities that should be taken into account. The main of them as part of the dashboard contents [2].

Dashboard Dashboard
Diagnosis of Dashboard layout
requirements implementation
productive areas development
assessment and improvement

Fig. 1. Defined phases for the dashboard development procedure.

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3.3. Dashboard layout development compiled into the company´s information system. A data source that
feeds data into the dashboard, integrated into the company´s informa-
The main purpose of this phase is the conversion of the require- tion system should be considered. This allows an adequate analysis and
ments in technical solutions, presented through a dashboard layout and treatment of the information and facilitates the organization and
associated support tools, particularly, the data source that feed the data management of the information planned to be presented on the dash-
into the dashboard. In this phase, the concept and the layout are spe- board.
cified. Key factors for the dashboard management can be synthesized in a
The concept is achieved and then, several preliminary layouts are document which clarifies the main dashboard management activities:
produced in order to obtain more information about different variants. responsible, update periods, activities to be performed, required inputs
Refining and improving layouts and evaluating technical and economic and desired outputs. In addition, at this phase, improvement initiatives
criteria, the best layout design can be achieved [30]. Benchmarking, that are intended to be supported by the dashboard should be analyzed,
basic research and creativity are examples of approaches that can in order to explore and ensure necessary resources and mechanisms to
support the development of the dashboard layout. enable them to be effectively implemented.
It is crucial that the dashboard features (visual and functional) and Finally, in this phase, the function for the generation of information
the contents fit with the dashboard purpose, as well as, consider user´s to be presented on the dashboard should be tested. The information
characteristics. Dashboard features have to be defined in order to suc- relevance should be evaluated, as well as, the activities for dashboard
cessfully support visual interpretation and information decoding. management and the activities to be carried out with the support of the
Adding to that, dashboard contents have to be defined in order to dashboard. The identification and implementation of improvement
promote the decision support in performance management and support actions also make part of this phase.
activities under the continuous improvement process, in an effective
way. 4. Procedure implementation in a SME
Dashboards have implicit performance measurement once it intends
to communicate strategic objectives and enable company´s employees The pilot project was carried out in a foundry, ISO/TS 16949:2009
to measure, monitor, and manage key activities and processes. certified, that produces aluminum alloys parts, through die-casting
Therefore, it is also crucial to select and use effective metrics that processes, for the automotive industry, telecommunications, railway
trigger alerts when performance falls below predefined targets (the transport, among others. As support activities, the company also carries
desired state at a particular point in time) and populate them with clean out finishing, assembly and painting (subcontracted processes). The
and valid data. Dashboards commonly show performance indicators, company is a SME and has between 100 and 120 employees who work
which are metrics that measure how well an activity is executed by in three shifts per day and produces mainly for international markets. In
comparing results to a strategic goal. Indicators are classified into two Portugal, the country where the selected company operates, SMEs are
major types: leading and lagging indicators. Leading indicators measure recognized as a pillar of the national economy. In this country, the
activities that have a significant effect on future performance. Lagging SMEs are prominent in the industrial sector, representing over 99% of
indicators, such as most financial metrics, measure the output of past all firms [32].
activity [2]. Different types of indicators should be included in a The main company departments are Administration and Financial,
dashboard, to ensure a mix of past and current, as well as, future per- Commercial, Human Resources, Product Engineering, Maintenance,
formance measures (monitoring the planning and preparation of ac- Quality, and Production. Production activities are carried out in specific
tions that would occur in the future) [31]. As a starting point in the areas named Foundry, Mechanization, Finishes and Final Control.
selection of the indicators that will be presented in the dashboard, Concerning the company´s processes required for the quality manage-
metrics associated to overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) are sug- ment system, they are carefully defined in order to ensure its operation
gested, given their potentialities on improving the performance of and control. For the main processes, a set of key performance indicators
productive equipment and processes. are defined and applied, having a relevant role in management deci-
It is also intended that dashboards be a sustainable infrastructure sion. Company managers value the process of continuous improvement,
that implements, promotes and coordinates using methodologies and revealing an interest in adopting new approaches that enhance the
tools for continuous improvement, particularity kaizen and TPM. In this improvement of productive processes and equipment. Currently, some
sense, in addition to the selection of the indicators to be presented in quality improvement methodologies and tools, such as PDCA cycle, 5S
the dashboard, it is necessary to identify which and how to display and the seven basic quality tools are used in the company.
more related information and others contents. Also, relevant activities The implementation of the proposed procedure on the SME is de-
should be defined, based on continuous improvement approaches that tailed in the following subsections, which correspond to the defined
can be supported by the information presented on the dashboard (e.g., procedure phases.
five-minute meetings, one point lessons, employee suggestion program,
structured problem-solving activities, among others). 4.1. Diagnosis of the productive areas

3.4. Dashboard implementation and improvement A diagnostic synthesis was performed, organizing information on
the following topics: productive equipment and processes, resources
After achieving the dashboard layout follows the development and and information, communication and suggestions for the dashboard.
implementation of the necessary resources for dashboard construction The company is divided into several departments and this project
and implementation. This phase also involves tests to ensure that the was essentially focused on the Production, Quality and Maintenance
obtained dashboard, its support tools, underlying activities and its departments. Production areas are divided in: Foundry; Mechanization,
management activities are as expected and successful. This, in turn, will Finishes and Final Control. Productive equipment is localized on the
unleash improvement opportunities in order to achieve more robust Foundry and Mechanization areas. The processes more relevant to the
versions. project were those associated with the production management and
There should be an initial concern to ensure that complete and continuous improvement. Those processes were analyzed, in particular,
properly organized productive records are maintained so that it is their objectives, performance indicators, inputs, outputs, resources,
possible to feed reliable data into the dashboard. This includes a com- information, activities and methods that were used to perform process
prehensive analysis of the existing records in order to identify gaps and measurements, monitoring and analysis. It was found that information
achieve solutions to face them. The records should be properly should be improved in production areas, to ensure a better and more

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effective planning, operation and control of their processes and responding to the new ideas and proposed adjustments. Those ideas and
equipment. Concerning the existing performance indicators, they adjustments resulted, essentially, from work meetings with the stake-
should be revised and complemented to be more consistent with the holders, in particular with the heads of production, quality and main-
defined processes’ objectives. tenance department's heads, quality technicians and other workers
In terms of resources and information, it was verified that in- delegated to manage and monitor the dashboard in the future. The
formation is not uniform among various production areas. The Foundry performed adjustments also took into consideration the resources and
is the area that has more information available. In other production information in the company, at the moment of the dashboard devel-
areas, it was identified the need to develop a systematic way to make opment process. Some resources and information still could not be in-
records that guarantee the control of the effectiveness of the productive tegrated into the dashboard layouts, because they were being devel-
processes and equipment. These records are manually inserted in data oped or improved. Some examples were: records of productive areas
form, mostly developed in the company (e.g. Excel ® files). However, that were being developed in order to achieve complete and accurate
these data files are not developed in a systematic and standardized way productive records and data, new indicators that were intended to
and consequently, decision making can be based on incomplete and implement but were dependent of the referred improvements on the
unreliable information. Therefore, the company should improve its records, parts of the information system related to productive areas that
information system to allow gathering reliable data from productive intended to be more complete and robust, among others. Although this,
areas and convert such data into useful information for better decision the drafted layouts were enough flexible that these resources and in-
making. formation can be integrated on the dashboard, in the future.
The communication among department heads, section heads and The obtained dashboard layout is oriented to the shop floor level of
workers is done in an informal way. Meetings related to the production the company and for the SMEs in general. This is reflected in its features
process are performed between department heads on a weekly and and contents, which are also based on continuous improvement ap-
monthly basis. Also regarding the communication, there are placards proaches, in particular, kaizen and TPM. As result, the dashboard
located on the shop floor with information to employees. However, the layout contains four main zones, defined taking into account the in-
need for a more meaningful way of sharing information as well as the formation update frequency and the nature of the contents. In turn,
involvement of employees in activities that promote continuous im- each of the zones can be divided into several areas that are defined
provement was recognized. Therefore, the dashboard development considering the purpose of the contents. The four main zones are
must have in consideration the actual maturity level of the company named: Monthly/Weekly Kaizen, Daily Kaizen, Others and Head. The
information system, avoiding the development of a complex dashboard Monthly/Weekly Kaizen zone has the objective to present information
not aligned with the resources and information that the company may to be updated monthly or weekly. This zone is divided into three areas:
allocate. Trends; Current Status and Improvement Actions. The purpose of the
In addition to these findings, suggestions were also identified for the Trends area is to present the evolution, over the months or weeks, of
dashboard. The revision and creation of new records sheets were pro- indicators that were selected taking into account their relevance in the
posed, allowing workers to register relevant information for the control performance of productive processes and equipment. The Current
of the effectiveness of the processes and equipment. In order to mini- Status area has the purpose of supporting the analysis of certain si-
mize the number of nonconforming products, a more detailed analysis tuations in a more detailed way, through the use of basic quality tools.
was suggested, such as the identification of the most critical references The Improvement Actions area is meant to record actions, identified
and the identification of the most common defect types for each of these through the analysis of information provided from the other areas and
references. The suggestion to start monitoring the OEE indicator in zones of the dashboard. Fig. 2 shows the layout of the Monthly and
some Foundry equipment was made and, when the process is stabilized, Weekly Kaizen zone.
extends the procedure to the remaining productive equipment. The Daily Kaizen zone has the objective of sharing information to be
Although there are placards on the shop floor, they need to be updated daily, as well as, support daily preventive and corrective ac-
complemented, developing and implementing a dashboard at shop floor tivities based on the presented information. The contents of this zone
level. The dashboard should be projected to carry out several activities are related to daily goals, per productive area and per shift. In this zone
such as five-minute meetings at the beginning of the shift, to promote the number of parts to be produced (per productive area, per shift), the
sharing and discussion among employees, mechanisms that expose number of parts actually produced and the number of conforming and
problems to promote an active and autonomous participation of op- nonconforming parts can be recorded. Possible deviations verified in
erators in problem-solving activities and one-point lessons. relation to the targets serve as a basis for alerts and analysis of the
A synthesis of the performed diagnosis was communicated to re- problematic situations. Consequently, the structured problem-solving
levant people in the organization and linked to the project, in order to process can be trigger promoting improvement actions. Fig. 3 shows the
be used to understand the current state of the productive areas and layout of the Daily Kaizen zone.
define its future direction. The Others zone provides different information, resulting from the
combination of various elements, such as awards, project status point,
4.2. Dashboard requirements assessment photos, training plan, reports related with meetings, dashboard in-
structions for its management, among others. This zone can also sup-
The identified requirements were based on results obtained in the port shop floor team activities carried out by teams at the top, middle
diagnostic phase, on the experience of the project team (quality, and shop floor levels and create a more satisfying workplace. Several
maintenance and production department heads), as well as, on the in- teams were being defined in the context of the company, in which the
formation collected in literature. Table 1 synthesizes the main identi- leader of a team is a member of a team at the next level, linking dif-
fied requirements according to the items: purpose, user characteristics, ferent teams and assuring close communication through all the com-
functional and visual features, contents and support in decision-making. pany. These team activities can include short and frequent meetings
with defined agenda items (e.g. progress toward objectives; problematic
4.3. Dashboard layout definition situations; improvement action plans; expected results, etc.). These
team activities can also embrace one-point lessons which are short and
In this phase, the identified requirements were converted into focused lessons.
technical solutions, presented through dashboard layouts and drafts of Finally, Header zone allows the identification of the dashboard re-
the support tools that generate the information to be presented on the sponsible or members of teams that participle in continuous improve-
dashboard. The layouts initially developed were refined and improved, ment supported by the dashboard. The dashboard also has white spaces

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 S. Vilarinho et al.

Table 1
Synthesis of identified requirements for the dashboard.

Purpose Users characteristics Functional and visual features Contents Support in decision-making

Monitoring, measurement, analysis, and Information displayed in the dashboard, as well Dashboard presentation format should consider Information about the technical and managerial Effective decision making based on
improvement of productive processes as associated activities should be able to be the level of maturity of the information system, performance of the productive processes and the analysis of accurate and reliable
and equipment to achieve planned easily understood for all. and consequently can be a board to post equipment (e.g. leading and lagging indicators) information.
results. information manually, being the information
mainly generated by the digital support.
Control of nonconforming products in each The expected users are operators associated with Information presented in a simple and appealing OEE indicator and the three factors that integrate Timely access to information to
production area, promoting activities to productive areas, quality technicians, persons way in order to ensure understanding and it should be considered. those who need it, in order to react
deal with problems of nonconforming responsible for production areas and persons involvement of the users. quickly to critical situations and
products. responsible for quality, maintenance and opportunities.
production departments.
Analyze relevant information to demonstrate Information presented through trend charts and Information and activities that enables interaction Taking action based on a balance

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the consistency and effectiveness of the others graphics; quality tools; tables; images; of employees, both horizontally (on the shop floor among factual information,
productive equipment and processes. white space; among others. level) and vertically (between different hierarchy experience and common sense.
levels) (e.g. meeting schedule; report of relevant
meetings, etc.).
Identification of problems and support Presented information must respect principles of Daily information about production goals,
problems solving approaches. visualizing data, allowing that information can nonconforming products and alerts, in the
be quickly and easily understand by anybody different productive areas (e.g. produced and
(e.g. proper colors, data-to-ink ration, text types, nonconforming products, per area and per work
2D and 3D graphics, etc.). shift).
Promote continuous improvement activities, Information and activities that enable users to
considering the quality policy, quality understand their impact on productive processes,
objectives, audit results, analysis of data, engaging them in the continuous improvement
among others. process (quality tools, problem-solving tools, plan
for improvement actions; employee suggestion
program, etc.).
Manage employees associated with
productive areas, engage them in
improving decision-making and improve
the overall performance.
Journal of Industrial Information Integration 12 (2018) 13–22
S. Vilarinho et al. Journal of Industrial Information Integration 12 (2018) 13–22

Fig. 2. Part of the layout dashboard related to monthly and weekly kaizen.

to support the analysis and treatment of existing information, among support the user in understanding and managing the file. The “Data”
other activities. Fig. 4 presents a global dashboard layout, showing the tab aggregates the data needed to generate information on the re-
distribution of the main zones and areas. maining tabs. These remaining tabs are specific tabs grouped into four
groups, just as the dashboard is organized into four zones. Each of those
tabs is associated with the zones and the areas of the dashboard. The
4.4. Dashboard implementation and improvement information on each of these tabs is ready to be printed on sheets A3 or
A4 to place on the dashboard in the space defined for this purpose. The
The dashboard presentation format is based on a board to post in- Excel ® file was developed to be easy to understand and use by any
formation manually, being the information essentially generated in collaborator with basic computer skills. It also intends to be functional
digital support, i.e. in an Excel ® file specifically developed to ag- and take a short time in updating the data, as well as, convert these data
gregates the data needed to generate updated information for printing into relevant information. Finally, it should be noted that the content of
and posting on the dashboard. The file is organized in several tabs to the tabs, in particular of the specific tabs, can easily be adapted to the
manage and update the dashboard information in an easy way (Fig. 5). company´s needs and stakeholders´ new ideas.
General tabs, named “General view” and “Usage guide”, intend to

Fig. 3. Part of the layout dashboard related to daily Kaizen.

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S. Vilarinho et al. Journal of Industrial Information Integration 12 (2018) 13–22

Fig. 4. Global dashboard layout adapted to the company.

In order to allow that the Excel ® file is properly complete and was selected and instructions for the dashboard management were
functional, the records that were filled on the shop floor by the workers defined. The SME intended to continue the implementation during a
in the four Production sections and have to be collected on the com- significant period of time to evaluate and improve its performance. The
pany's information system were identified and analyzed. Subsequently, activities and improvements performed allowed improving the pro-
a relationship was established between the current records and the duction information system and performance management of produc-
necessary ones. Based on this process, it was possible to identify records tive areas.
that should be made in each section of the production. These records
were being posteriorly implemented, improving productive data and
information, as well as making the company's information system more 5. Conclusions
complete and robust. The restructuration of the information system was
carefully made to facilitate its connection with the Excel ® file devel- The existing procedures to develop dashboards are commonly fo-
oped to support the dashboard. cused on large companies with advanced information systems and are
In addition, it was important to identify and define key factors for too complex for SMEs reality. Compared to large enterprises, SMEs
the dashboard management to ensure the necessary and appropriate manifest a lower level of maturity on quality and information systems.
resources for its operation. Thus, in a final phase, for each zone of the This and other SMEs characteristics should be considered during
dashboard, the following information was identified: the person in dashboards development to achieve proper and successful dashboards.
charge, update periods, activities to perform, required inputs and de- In this paper, a procedure to develop dashboards in the context of SMEs
sired outputs. was presented. The procedure assists these companies to achieve sui-
This activity served as a guide for the management of the dashboard table dashboards for improving the production areas information and
and allowed detecting fragilities and opportunities for improvement in communication, and also improve their performance.
the whole process associated with the use of the dashboard. The proposed procedure consists of several phases: diagnosis of the
In the time allocated to the project, the Excel ® file and printing production area; dashboard requirements assessment; dashboard layout
information to post on the dashboard were tested. To deploy the development; dashboard implementation and improvement. The pro-
dashboard on the shop floor, a strategical point of the productive areas cedure application in a SME contributed to identifying gaps in the
company´s information system, driving the development and

Fig. 5. Excel ® file to generate data needed to generate an update dashboard information.

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S. Vilarinho et al. Journal of Industrial Information Integration 12 (2018) 13–22

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