Factory of the Year

Process and deadlines

Complete and submit questionnaire: by 30 June 2021

Selection of finalists: July 2021

Visits to finalists’ locations: July – August 2021

Selection of winners: September 2021

Individual evaluation reports for all participants: November 2021

Presentation of the Factory of the Year awards: probably March 2022

The competition is open to manufacturing companies in any industry sector. They can submit applications for factories and business units. Taking part is free of charge. The number of employees should be at least 100.

You must complete the questionnaire to take part in the competition. Typically, the questionnaire takes 5-10 days to complete. The better your company data is already organized, the easier it is to transfer it to the questionnaire.

Once the completed questionnaires have been thoroughly evaluated, the competition finalists are selected and will receive an on-site visit by Factory of the Year representatives for an assessment.

The Factory of the Year competition’s jury panel will then select the winners. To win, contenders have to demonstrate outstanding performance or exceptional creativity in specific competition categories.

The winners will be announced at the end of September and published in the industry journal Produktion. Winners will be visited by a Produktion editor and profiled in detail in a special year-end edition of the magazine.

The prizes will be awarded in March next year at the annual Factory of the Year conference.

You can download the questionnaire here.

The winners will be selected in two stages. Participating companies must complete a detailed questionnaire, which can be requested online. Taking part in the competition is free of charge.

The questionnaire asks for quantitative and qualitative information on typical factory performance data across the value chain. Leading award contenders are chosen based on this information and will receive a visit from an experienced Kearney audit team. The competition jury panel, comprising prominent experts from industry and research, then selects the winners on the basis of the questionnaire and the audit team’s on-site findings.

Parallel to this, all participants receive a detailed evaluation in the form of a confidential feedback report, which details their position in the competition and highlights possible improvement potential. We look forward to receiving your application!

Benefits

Industrial companies can only benefit from taking part in the Factory of the Year competition. Clearly, winning a prestigious award like Factory of the Year is hugely motivating for employees. But any business, irrespective of whether it actually picks up an award, can gain from taking part. In addition, it’s free.

As participants have noted, time and again, the process of completing the questionnaire alone can draw attention to weaknesses in a company’s performance. All businesses taking part receive a detailed, confidential evaluation, that tells them how they ranked in comparison with companies with which they share a similar starting position. Shortlisted candidates receive a visit from an experienced Kearney audit team and are given initial expert feedback. And the Factory of the Year event offers an ideal opportunity to share ideas and learn the secrets behind the successes scored by the best in the competition.