Method

Short Interval Management

In French: AIC (animation à intervalle court)

Short interval management is a system of short, frequent team huddles, organised in cascade, where each level handles what it can and escalates the rest within the day.

What it is

Short interval management — AIC in French — comes down to one sentence: rather than a long monthly meeting where things are noted, short and closely spaced huddles are held where things are decided.

Each huddle is held standing, in front of a board, at a fixed time and for a fixed duration. Only three things are looked at: what has happened since the last huddle, what is abnormal, and who does what between now and the next one. What cannot be settled at the level where it is raised goes up to the next level — that is the escalation mechanism, and it is what gives the system its value.

Short interval management goes hand in hand with active supervision: the manager physically goes to the shop floor to observe the process instead of following it through reports. The board does not replace the walk, it gives it an agenda.

The cascade

The system is organised in nested levels, from the workstation to senior management. A common split: a very short huddle at the start of the shift with the operators, a slightly longer team huddle with the team leader, a workshop huddle, then a site huddle. Durations grow with the level, frequency decreases.

The exact thresholds — five, fifteen or thirty minutes — are in no way prescriptive: they are tuned to the actual rhythm of the activity. What is not negotiable is that each level has a fixed time, a defined scope, and an escalation path to the next.

A good short-interval indicator is simple, visual, frequent and actionable: someone who is not an expert must see in a second whether it is normal or not, and know what to do if it is not. An indicator that has to be explained has no place on the board.

The common mistake

Turning the huddle into an indicator review. The figures are commented on, everyone justifies their own, the meeting lasts three times the planned time and ends without a single decision. A short-interval huddle is not there to explain the past but to deal with the day’s deviation: if no name and no deadline come out of it, the board has become decoration. Second symptom of the same ill: when nothing goes up to the level above any more, it is never because all is well — it is because escalating is perceived as an admission.

On the shop floor — Logistics

On an order-picking platform, moving to a fifteen-minute huddle at the start of each shift brought out that the same three causes of delay came back every week. They were known to everyone and to no one: no format had ever put them side by side.

The other tools illustrated by this trade: logistics and distribution.

Frequently asked questions

What does AIC mean in production?

AIC is the French abbreviation for short interval management. The term refers to a system of brief team huddles, held at a fixed time and at close intervals, where the deviations of the moment are dealt with rather than the results of the month being commented on.

What goes on a short interval management board?

The strict minimum needed to decide: the current state of the activity, what is out of the ordinary, and the actions in progress with a name and a deadline against each. Anything that requires an explanation to be understood has no place there — the board must be readable standing up, in a few seconds, by someone who is not an expert.

How long should a short interval huddle last?

It depends on the level: a few minutes at the workstation, more as one goes up the cascade, with the frequency decreasing inversely. The values encountered — five, fifteen, thirty minutes — are practices, not rules. What counts is that the duration is fixed and kept to, failing which the huddle becomes a meeting again.