Capabilities Involved: Consulting & Coaching | IATF 16949 | ISO 14001

Tube Fab is a custom tubing fabricator located in northern Michigan supplying to numerous OEMs and Tier 1 customers. As part of a 2017 initiative to support the continued growth of the automotive business, Tube Fab sought to overhaul their Quality Management System (QMS) and transition from ISO/TS 16949:2009 to IATF 16949:2016 certification. Tube Fab used this as an opportunity to redesign their management system to reduce redundancies, simplify process definition, and strengthen the sequence and interaction between their core processes.  Plexus worked with Tube Fab in various capacities—side-by-side with their implementation team, and senior staff to optimize processes and prepare for the transition audit to IATF 16949:2016. While Plexus oversaw activities providing support and consultation, Tube Fab took a hands-on and active role in implementing the work and driving decisions, resulting in a self-sustaining IATF 16949 Management System solution for the organization. 

Plexus provided the following services for this customer deployment:

• Review of the transition from ISO/TS 16949:2009 requirements to IATF 16949:2016 requirements in preparation from their own internal audit team review to assure no gaps existed
• Remapping and streamlining of their processes, reducing them in number and complexity by over 60%
• Development and alignment of KPI metrics with emphasis on financial Cost of Poor Quality (CoPQ) data conversion to measure QMS effectiveness and efficiency
• Facilitation and guidance during small team development of processes to assist the team in making the most of the meetings
• Gateway review and consultation of various milestones to ensure the communication channels were clear, and the set expectations were achieved
• Process streamlining for easier integration of IATF 16949:2016 with ISO 14001:2015 

Following the deployment of this initiative, Tubefab achieved IATF 16949 recognition, and the facility reports continued participation in the updated and streamlined processes with alignment with ISO 14001:2015 progressing.