Are your manufacturing logistics costs being hidden in a fog of overlapped services?

1st January 2011

If you outsource a specific element, all of your on site logistics or something in between, you need to be clinical with your reporting KPI's. If not you could be letting profits slip between the gaps. Transparent and distinct cost centres have always been at the heart of Rudolph and Hellmann's success and it is why they have a team of specialists dedicated to this task.

The ‘Central Operational Support Team (COST) are centrally based and combine a mixture of highly focused skills and expertise, enabling them to accurately identify, measure and evaluate real-time KPI’s. This means they can constantly make micro adjustments to improve performance and reduce cost (or, if you look at it the other way, prevent waste). The team is made up of a number of individuals with expertise in IT, process and operations, transport, HR, finance, law, and are supported by a dedicated administration team.

These highly experienced professionals, with specialist automotive logistics knowledge, understand every aspect of the manufacturing process. Their mission is simple and it doesn't matter whether a contract is new, old or a shared responsibility. Rudolph and Hellmann's COST are constantly seeking out and removing waste whilst continually improving effectiveness.

The 'Central Operational Support Team' have developed a 5 step approach:

1)   COST exploration and audit

Think mystery shopper and you are somewhere close, on smaller projects they continually observe, advise and implement small improvements. On larger and more complex projects they start with experts in process and operations discretely auditing your operations. Conducted under a non disclosure agreement, they then review your plant, process and supplier obligations, whilst HR and Finance analyse your employee 'profiles', liabilities and supplier contract, IT assess your communications platform and KPI reporting capabilities.

2)   Reporting on improvements against expectations

This forensic analysis of your operations and obligations will reveal any grey areas of overlap where profits can slip away. The COST team then provide a confidential report of process and operations improvement, including KPI’s and SLA recommendations. This includes a roll out plan from consultation period to change over, details of KPI capture and reporting, together with predicted cost savings from day 1 of implementation. It will also include targets for year on year reductions and the change management programme required to get there.

3)   Change management programme

Implementation of the change management programme is always the most challenging element of any process improvement. Now the COST team switch from investigators to support the process implementation, the change management team are allocated, briefed and inducted. Once a consultation period and change over date are announced the COST team are in place to advise and help execute the roll out of the new plans. If required, they will also design and facilitate an employee TUPE and training programme.

They also facilitate weekly ‘client team’ and Rudolph and Hellmann change management team briefings.

Throughout this process daily Rudolph and Hellmann director briefings are given to guarantee the proposals in the changeover do not impact on the day to day logistics deliverables.

4)   ‘Launch to stabilisation’ period

The 'launch to stabilisation’ period is the most critical within any significant change of process. This is why the COST team are a key part of the change management team. They provide detailed monitoring of all KPI’s, staff moral and inter-supplier relationships.
Their key role is to design themselves out of the process as soon as possible. The daily Rudolph and Hellmann director briefings are reduced to weekly when appropriate and weekly ‘client team’ and Rudolph and Hellmann change management team briefings conclude as soon as the implementation has been successful.

5) Quarterly trend analysis and review of KPI’s against SLA

The final phase is ongoing and enables the COST team to continually seek out and remove waste whilst improving effectiveness.

This ongoing commitment will identify and highlight any issues from external influences or internal influences and provide the quarter’s process improvement targets to drive focus.

The process is ongoing and enables the Rudolph and Hellmann Automotive COST team to continually seek out and remove waste whilst improving effectiveness.

Here’s how the 360 onsite logistics audit and assessment works!

Put us to the test, what have you got to lose?

Contact us for a FREE ‘on site' logistics audit – carried out under a non disclosure agreement - our findings will be reported in full confidence and will provide a detailed analysis of where savings and improvements can be made.

_{There’s only one condition - you must be UK based and be operating in the automotive sector, with a head count of around 25 - 30 or more operating in logistics roles.}