Recently I was asked by an MD if I could support in a situation that was causing them a lot of stress and pain with a customer, customers who’d have them…;0) but in this case get the issue sorted = increased sales volume.
The Customer was increasingly getting frustrated, but not with the actual product (the product, new material and manufacturing process were performing superbly).
THE PROBLEM LAY WITHIN THE PAPERWORK.
For some customers (most to be fair) traceability is a key item which needs to be controlled, like anything both parties had their view, which generally fall into these two options
a) What you THINK it is…
b) And what it SHOULD be…
It’s not very often we look at “what it ACTUALLY is”, one of my sayings is “we don’t see things as they are, we see things as we are and perception is invariably different from reality, few processes work the way we think they do”
So manage by fact, collect the data, highlight the outcomes and opportunities and put it right.
Hasten to add that’s exactly what we did, a SIPOC (Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, Customer) was completed along with documenting the current situation, analysing the data, removing the waste and optimising the process. Standard Work was created for the new operation with all parties trained to the new standard.
Now we have a happy relaxed(ish) stress-free GM and more importantly a Happy Customer willing to increase the volumes to the business, WIN WIN!
Business Focus:-
- Customer Satisfaction
- Do so profitably (but Customer Satisfaction is always at the fore)
