GREAT QUALITY

	Global Manufacturing System
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	J.D. Power and Associates Initial Quality Study
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A System To Build Great Cars and Trucks

The GM Global Manufacturing System-or GMS-is an important building block of an integrated strategy to develop products that excite our customers in markets around the world.

GM is bringing together the best, most competitive manufacturing practices from around the world and leveraging what it has learned as it moves to a common global manufacturing system for all of its new plants and existing facilities.

The system is dynamic. With each new plant or renovation of a current plant, it is further refined and implemented with regional variation, based on the individual plant environment, supplier capability, vehicle architecture and cultural factors.

At the heart of the system is the operator in the plant - the person who builds GM's great products. Plants and processes are designed around providing support for the operators and teams on the plant floor, so they can efficiently build great vehicles that provide our customers with higher quality, value and responsiveness.

Dave Barber, Oshawa Car Assembly Plant

Several factors played a role in the evolution of GM's GMS. The experience gained through NUMMI, a joint venture with Toyota provided the introduction of the Toyota Production System techniques into GM.

Continuous focus is placed on research of best practices of GM's competitors and joint venture partners, along with forging closer ties with suppliers to include a much greater willingness to accept alternate or new ideas.

Manufacturing performance is improved through the consistent adoption of five principals-people involvement, standardization, built in quality, short lead time and continuous improvement. The principals are interrelated and implemented as a complete system.

When implemented, the GMS principals maximize performance in the areas of people systems, safety, quality, customer responsiveness and cost.

Computer technology is playing a role in enabling GM to take waste out of the system. Virtual reality and math-based applications are used to reduce development costs and improve overall efficiency in the development life cycle. To help ensure that equipment and processes support operators GM uses 3-D math modeling to create a "virtual factory" that helps planners integrate equipment, tools, fixtures and machinery that will be used in the plant.