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66 The PCB Magazine • October 2015 those that were in vogue in the business admin- istration and capable of delivering fast results, but without any consistency. There is a principle in statistical process con- trol (SPC) that fits perfectly with the concept of continuous improvement which says: Making improvements on an unstable process will pro- duce random results, while making improve- ments in a stable process, no matter how bad it is, will produce stable results that are able to be managed and improved. In other words, PCB shops must create and follow rigid procedures before thinking of con- tinuous improvement, and this is totally differ- ent from saying companies must be static. Conclusion In order to reduce cycle time, companies must focus their efforts on identifying their bot- tlenecks, eliminating wastes and working hard to make the best use of their processes. Unfortunately, especially in the PCB indus- try, the bottlenecks change rapidly from one PCB to another, according to its layout. So, it is not uncommon to have different bottlenecks in the same factory and managers saying that TPS (Toyota Production System) principles cannot be applied to the PCB industry due to its com- plexity and fast environment changes. I would rather suggest another response to that. When working in such a complex industry, leaders must have fanatic discipline to apply everything presented in this article and go be- yond it to find solutions to attend to customers' needs, one step at a time. Instead of copying ev- ery single tool Toyota has created, organizations need to understand the philosophy behind it and search for their own way of doing business. Improvement is similar to a marathon: the running is long, not easy, and full of obstacles; you may go slow, but never stop. I hope I have encouraged you to start a new journey in your business. What are you waiting for? Take the next step! PCB References 1. Liker, Jeffrey K., 2004. Figure 3: The PcB process. Renato Peres is an industrial engineer and production coordinator at circuibras circuitos impressos Profissionais. THE PCB MARATHON FeATure