Practical guidance for better manufacturing decisions
These on-site summaries turn Todd Drummond’s published ideas into practical starting points for component manufacturers. Read the core guidance here, follow the related service pathways, or open the original LinkedIn publication for the complete source article.
Featured Onsite Insights
Current guidance on labor standards, constraints, and decision-making—organized to help you connect an operating problem with a useful next step.
Board Foot and Work Minutes Can Coexist
Board foot is useful for familiar sales and company reporting, but it does not describe how much constrained labor a particular job should consume. Used alongside board foot, validated work-minute standards create a stronger basis for estimating, scheduling, staffing, capacity, and margin review.
Executive question: Are you using one familiar unit to judge jobs whose actual production difficulty is very different?
Stop Chasing Efficiency—Remove the Bottleneck
Busy people and busy machines do not automatically increase shipped output. Identify the point currently setting the pace, protect its available time, control the work released toward it, and direct improvement or capital toward the limitation that governs the whole system.
Executive question: Will the next investment increase total shipped output—or only make a non-constraint look more efficient?
Use the OODA Loop to Make Better Operating Decisions
Observe, Orient, Decide, Act creates a disciplined response when markets, labor, product mix, or customer expectations change quickly. The value is not speed alone—it is separating the visible symptom from the underlying cause, choosing one practical priority, and measuring what changes.
Executive question: Before changing equipment, layout, or workflow, have you separated the symptom from the cause?
Onsite Knowledge Library
Browse practical guidance by operating challenge. Every article below is available here on the TDC website.
Labor and Work Minutes
- Truss Manufacturing Time StandardsSee how engineered labor standards can support estimating, scheduling, capacity planning, performance measurement, and pricing.
- Employees—Wages, Retention, and ProductivityExamine the relationship among compensation, retention, turnover, productivity, and total workforce cost.
Profit, Pricing, and Capacity
- Margins in Component ManufacturingConsider how better labor visibility and production information can support more informed margin and pricing decisions.
Workforce and Incentives
- Leading Change in Component ManufacturingReview a practical framework for addressing resistance and moving from a recognized problem toward useful action.
Component-Manufacturing Growth
- Component Manufacturing for a Lumberyard—Pros and ConsExamine the opportunities, operating complexity, management demands, and planning questions involved.
- Home Builders Using Wall PanelsExplore how wall-panel construction can affect scheduling, labor coordination, site activity, and capacity.
Need help applying an idea to your operation? Review TDC consulting services or describe the challenge to Todd.
Earlier Published Articles
These original publications remain useful background reading on communication, mistake-proofing, labor, and automation.
Historical context: Product references and data in these articles reflect their original publication dates. Use the current service pages below for today’s Todd Drummond Consulting offerings.
Maintaining Successful Project Management Communications
A look at why schedules, assignments, documents, messages, and accountability work better when project information is organized around a shared operating record.
Mistake-Proof Your Process with Must-Have Communication Features
An application of Poka-Yoke thinking to project communication, emphasizing clear records, visible responsibilities, timely alerts, and less duplicate entry.
Labor Shortages and Why Automation Is Not a Cure-All
A reminder that automation cannot by itself resolve staffing, productivity, quality, or process problems. Demographic figures in the source reflect its 2021 data period.
More Published Work
Browse additional articles and industry contributions through these original publication sources.
Client Experience
Ideas That Lead to Action
I’ve been reading Todd’s articles for the last few years and have been intrigued by his view of productivity measures, so I decided to hire him to learn more about his philosophy.
Turn an article idea into an operating decision
Have a question about labor standards, a bottleneck, workflow, equipment, or the first practical improvement step? Describe the issue you are trying to solve, and Todd can help identify the most useful place to begin.