The initiative has been in action since 2016 and receives hundreds of projects annually, all designed by employees, who end up more engaged and participatory
Millionaire savings and greater employee engagement are some of the results of the Santa Helena Productive program, based on the Lean methodology, which establishes criteria to eliminate waste, reduce expenses and optimize the production process. Active since 2016 in the food industry responsible for brands such as Paçoquita and Mendorato, the initiative already has more than a thousand projects and, even during the pandemic, ideas continued to emerge, or rather, were even more creative and voluminous.
In 2020, as reported by Devanir Medina, corporate manager of Engineering, Safety and Quality at Santa Helena, “despite the critical scenario and the difficulties imposed by the distance, the number of projects continued to grow and leveraged even more in this second semester”. In fact, the planned goals are very close to being achieved. It was through the program that the idea of making the home office a hybrid activity in the administrative sector emerged, for example.
The Lean methodology developed at Santa Helena, in which there are already more than 500 trained professionals, has the encouragement of managers called Champions. They are responsible for leading the procedure known as Ideation, in which, from meetings involving the entire team, they raise problems, discuss solutions and define what are the key projects for the period, focusing on achieving the financial results of each department. These professionals, as well as the project creators, still receive points in career development proposals.
Although challenging, this year was the most productive of all for the Santa Helena Produtiva program. More than 1,500 ideas were presented. Of this total, 189 were prioritized and transformed into projects. Medina points out that, for companies that are inspired by the model worked by the industry located in Ribeirão Preto (SP), it is necessary to understand the action as a program that has no date to end. “As a process of continuous improvement, it does not have an established life cycle.”
Planning is also important, so the goals for 2021 began to be set at the beginning of this second half. “During this period, we carried out several training and other types of training to prospect and identify new opportunities for the coming year. As a result, more than 100 initiatives were mapped and offer a high potential for financial gain and competitiveness for the company”, explains the manager. With projects aimed at departments such as Production/Engineering, Supply/Quality and Commercial, to name a few, the company hopes to renew the good results collected since the beginning of the operation. “The Santa Helena Productive program has already accumulated, in the last five years, a cost reduction of more than R$110 million and we hope that in 2021, in view of the scenario of economic recovery, it can bring us even more competitiveness.”