The Hexis AI Tool | UnTapped Ops Tool

The White Paper

UnTapped Sustainable Operations is developing a platform called Hexis that enhances business performance by providing real-time insights for leaders while enabling proactive decision-making and risk management. It addresses operational instability and inefficiencies, which can lead to significant financial losses. By utilizing AI to identify weak signals and improve transparency, Hexis allows leaders to respond effectively to potential issues, fostering a culture of accountability. This technology replaces outdated compliance methods, so businesses adapt to changing environments, maintain operational integrity, and transform management practices for better outcomes.

Introduction

Today’s influential leaders set up safeguards to ensure that business performance operates in accordance with established baseline parameters. These safeguards represent critical resources, policies, procedures, and work processes that prevent businesses from facing high-risk events such as environmental, reliability, product quality, personal safety, and productivity loss. Dashboards, operating trends, and input from functional experts have been effective, but there are drawbacks related to human bias, irrelevant historical patterns, and critical information being filtered. As a result, it is hard to have confidence that weak signals truly represent performance gaps that lead to negative consequences. The Hexis is being developed to build transparency and accountability which will improve operation stability. We recognize controlling operational instability is critical to drive out risks that lead to incidents ranging from small to catastrophic.

Imagine a world where doctors did not have X-ray technology (ie. MRI and CT Scans) to diagnose patients. Before this technology, hospitals, and doctors, as stated in the article from “A Brief History of X-Rays in Hospitals” dated November 14, 2015, were flying blind. Doctors spent more time guessing what was going on inside the body rather than diagnosing the problems. X-rays gave them a clear view and allowed a more precise and often proactive approach to patient care. It made doctors more effective and improved overall medical care.

Hexis can support business leaders just as X-ray technology supports the medical profession. It will provide leaders with better insights to help them maintain the health of their businesses. It will help leaders maintain essential controls ensuring operating integrity which leads to a stable business.

What Hexis Will Do

There are several enhanced AI technological solutions today that utilize sensors and cameras. Some technology providers are trying to combine data from different computer systems to detect anomalies. These can prove to be expensive and overly complicated. Translating this data into useful information can prove to be overwhelming for employees. There are some technology providers who successfully monitor and report risks by gathering data from incidents, root cause investigations, and audit results. Analyzing such data makes it difficult to identify weak signals because it is outdated and does not reflect the interdependency gaps of the work processes.

Hexis will use AI technology to identify weak signals by comparing real-time business performance to performance standards, best practices, and regulations. These weak signals will be compared to historical trends that lead to adverse outcomes. Hexis will help build transparency across the organization, thus providing the leader with a more comprehensive management overview. Leaders will be notified when weak signals require immediate action or a more strategic intervention. This will also help build a culture of accountability because senior leadership will be able to access a more fact-based and realistic view of the business’ health so they can provide support when needed.

The Business Case
for Hexis

The Business Case

Leaders must ensure that policies and procedures are followed to ensure good business performance while reducing overall risk. Failure to maintain operational control exposes the business to significant risks in areas of safety, environmental, productivity, and product quality. Managing risk is even more challenging with unpredictable external factors like climate change, political instability, supply chain variability, and globalization. Businesses could be ineffective at coping with these changes because many leaders may not have complete knowledge of their baseline performance, leading to reactionary responses.

Current compliance relies on high-level leadership oversight and assurance practices that are inadequate. These practices cannot ensure uniformity in reliability, productivity, and product quality because audits only provide a snapshot in time. In addition, leaders routinely do not receive an accurate picture of their current or future performance using KPIs because work process interdependence is not adequately represented in their reports.

Manufacturing success depends on efficiency and system security. As Allie Pizzemento states in The Hidden Cost of Instability and Ineffective Processes (April 11, 2023), “If manufacturers do not take precautions or continue to use outdated methods, they will incur unnecessary costs and increased expenses due to poor risk management strategies. Similarly, an undertrained or disorganized workforce can lead to issues like slow production scheduling and long waiting times for customers.”

The International Data Corporation (IDC) research shows the prohibitive cost of inefficiencies:

Companies lose 20-30% of revenue due to operating inefficiencies.
Companies experience 800 hours of equipment downtime annually (approximately 15 hours per week)
Companies lose $22,000 per minute when production stops, totaling $50 billion annually due to unplanned downtime.
Companies lose 1-10% of the available production time due to unplanned shutdowns.
Companies with poorly managed supply chains overspend on outsourced parts and materials, increasing production costs and decreasing profit margin.

Why the Hexis Upgrade is Important

Leaders must have confidence in their decision making to prevent themselves from being vulnerable to risks that erode their confidence. They need to be able to identify anomalies and deviations resulting from day-to-day business challenges to:

Respond to demands resulting from attrition and changing workforce.
Ensure required training meets the needs of the business,
Maintain regularly scheduled equipment inspections and maintenance,
Assure product quality meets customer needs,
Manage customer requirements.

It is crucial to build upon historical work practices and leverage technology to ensure workplace stability, ensure brand integrity and meet shareholder confidence. Hexis represents the next step in business management to achieve this end.