Late one night, on a Saturday no less, the owner of a custom hydraulics and manifold manufacturing firm received a phone call that an expensive machine had jammed, and was rendered inoperable. Maintenance was unavailable, and no one in the shop knew how to fix it. As many of you would gather, leaving a million dollar piece of machinery down until Monday was not an option. The only solution was for the owner to head into the shop himself and fix it. Hours later, once the machine was up and running, the owner contacted Invaware with the problem: “How do I get what’s in my head, out to the guys in the shop?” From this problem came a great solution, and Mr. Narrative was born.
After trying multiple solutions, including video instructions, Invaware discovered that creating instructions using images and text was the best way to move forward. Using images provides users with a visual of each step, and including some text produces metadata that becomes fully searchable, creating your own search engine database filled with all the information about your company. With time, Mr. Narrative has evolved past just documenting electronic work instructions. Our customers have come up with great uses for the platform, and we want to share those with you!
Document all your SDS in one place where they are easily searchable. Stop flipping through binders full of papers when you need the handling instructions for chemicals. Snap a picture of the sheet, add it to your Mr. Narrative account with the name of the chemical or product, making it quickly and easily searchable as soon as you need it.
Document trials and testing for new product development. Success or failure? Snap a picture and record the results of each trial. Everything will be date stamped and you can flip through to see your progress!
Document service inspections. Take pictures of products that come in for service or repair and store the records in Mr. Narrative. This helps to keep record of when the product was there, what the problem was and what was done. This information can be provided to the customer, which provides added value.
Conduct health and safety audits. Allow your Health & Safety Committee members to circulate with an iPad and take detailed pictures of their findings during their inspections. Collect them all in one place where those responsible for correcting issues can find them and take action.
Record your SR&ED documentation. SR&ED or SRED refers to the Canadian Government's "Scientific Research and Experimental Development" program. Many manufacturers participate in this program for their innovations and some of our customers utilize the Mr. Narrative platform to document their processes, failures and wins. When it’s time to submit for their credit, they can easily export the appropriate books to a PDF, or even generate a URL to the documentation and submit it electronically.
Use Mr. Narrative as a training tool. A question we get a lot from our potential customers is “Where/how do I start?” Taking on the process of documenting your company's procedures is no easy task, and yes, it will take time. One way to get started is to have your new hires complete the work instructions following their training. By doing this, you’re not only having the process documented, but you are also verifying that the trainee understands the process. Having them complete these work instructions in draft mode allows for their superior to review the steps prior to having them published to the rest of the company.
Documenting parameters for production. If you’re in the business of producing custom parts or products for customers, and you’re like some of our users, and only run these jobs once or twice a year, Mr. Narrative is the perfect place to record all the parameters for those jobs. You can quickly document visuals of each parameter, and easily reference them next time the order comes in.
As you can see, Mr. Narrative is about more than just producing electronic work instructions. Mr. Narrative is a centralized knowledge bank for everything you do. Are you ready to start building your company’s very own “Google?” Contact us for your free trial at info@invaware.com.