2 min read

The End is Here

Kristin McLane : December 27, 2022 at 10:00 AM

What is Paperless Manufacturing? How can software improve production? How is MES different than ERP and other software?

I hear everyone say that the years pass so quickly and this one, for certain, has done so. We are so grateful for you; the people we serve. Thank you for a year of amazing work. This year, we doubled-down on the small to mid-size North American manufacturing market. We’ve been servicing a segment of this market for a long time and see a huge need there.

There are a few things that come to my mind as lessons learned this year. We will be focused at the turn of the year on a series on Production Scheduling and Inventory Management, as these are areas that we have seen consistent interest in these last 2 years. We’ll explore why and what makes them important.

Today, we’re talking about a few high-level trends from this year. Things we’ve heard and things we’ve learned both from you and about you.

A Tool that Works for You

If you are a manufacturer with less than 50 employees, there’s little in the way of tools for your business that are not a job shop ERP with template reporting. While it’s great to know that a tool will capture your data, we learned that you have little time to find that information and make it into your own reports. You need the system to do it for you.

You know what you need, or at least the manufacturers we talk to do, but you may not use fancy words to say it. You tell us that you need to know how you’re doing. Lean consultants would tell you this is Scheduled Attainment. For you, it becomes a way to predict what will come next.

A reliable workforce and a tool that flexes

You also need a production schedule that works, that lets you shift work around as you need, because your employee base is no longer the reliable Monday to Friday group you once had. You have people out with COVID, you have employees shifting jobs in and out and you have people that just don’t show. While this was always the case in manufacturing, it seems the global pandemic brought it to a head and it’s just more accepted now that you will know how many people will be on the floor today once you get into the day itself. That’s not a reliable way to do production and so your job has become one of constantly shifting work.

THE THINGS YOU NEED TO DO YOUR WORK

Finally, you need the materials that are required to do your work. For some of you, that might be the written work instructions for the task. Others are focused on the supply chain itself and the raw materials and parts you need to make your products. Still, others are talking about machine and work center capacity – where you have it and where you need it. It seems that everyone we talk to is worried about how they’re doing, right now.

We’ve talked indicators – both leading and lagging. This is more direct than even those. While we will dive into the Manufacturing Index and what it means to you in 2023, this is about the hard numbers of how you’re doing at this very moment. Live data.

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Whatever your current challenges are and wherever the new year takes you, here’s what we wish for you. We hope you have customers that make you profitable, a workforce to get the job done, and the tools to do it right. You are building the community around you, whether you build things or not. Manufacturers provide reliable and important jobs for their communities, critical tax dollars for their local schools, and a permanent place for people to find new skills. Here’s to an incredible 2023 ahead. Let’s go get it!