January 15, 2014 at 17:17To implement an ERP system in production
I went to a factory a couple of weeks ago. They want to implement ERP. Held a presentation, everyone watched. Management asked to prepare a consolidated document stating what is needed to implement the system.
I made a document. It turned out to be very entertaining, it is a pity to throw it away, so I decided to share it with everyone.
First, a little about the foundation.
So, what does it take for an ERP system to be implemented in a company? Well, firstly, the toilets should be clean. The condition of the toilets is the state of the company as a whole. You will laugh, but it is. If the toilets are dirty, then first you need to solve the system problems in the company, and then you can take on ERP.
Before implementing the system (as well as before solving any problem), you need to determine the course of the solution. That is, withhow will you do it. We were always taught in school by our good old math teacher. The approach should be systemic, not chaotic.
What techniques will you use for production management? Do not know? Well then, you will introduce the system and get the same thing now, only in the program. It makes no difference, but you will incur expenses.
The technique in production is still primary. It is better to have a methodology, but not have software, than to have software, but not have a management technique.
If you know what management techniques will solve your problems in production, then you can already look for software for them.
You can not choose software that contains obviously unacceptable methods. If the production is custom-made, and you are offered the old and unkind “space-calendar planning”, then take a couple of years and spit. And in the end, Excel will help you. A million times already proven, a million. Do not suffer. I personally observed situations when all products and their structure are stored in an ERP system, and planning takes place .... in Excel.
One of the key and most common mistakes. For some reason, it is believed that the introduction of an ERP system is a project of the IT department. In reality, this has nothing to do with IT. And if it does, then the most insignificant. The IT department may be responsible for setting up the system, for distributing access. Essentially everything. No IT data should be entered into the system. And even more so to be responsible for the implementation. If the project is the responsibility of the IT director or even the pathos vice president of IT, the entire project is failed. There will be nothing.
This is a draft management of the company and it must have an appropriate status. And the project should be managed either by the general director or deputy.
The complexity of this project is comparable to the construction of a new workshop and attention to it from the management should be appropriate.
Managing a project does not mean poking around in settings every day. This means controlling the course of events and preventing the project from slipping. Provide him with the necessary administrative support.
It is necessary to create a project working group. At a minimum, it should include:
- the project manager
- the production
director - the logistics
director - the head of the design department
- a representative from a consulting company, of course.
But you don’t need to inflate the group much, otherwise you will get Krylov’s fable about a swan, cancer and a pike. Man 5 is full.
At the stage of preparation for operation, the group should gather (you can also remotely gather, via skype) once a week (two) for 30 minutes-an hour and summarize the work done and outline a plan for the coming week. After the start of industrial operation, the collection frequency of the group should increase to once a day, and then the frequency should gradually decrease as the temperature decreases.
If modern project management techniques are also used to manage the ERP project, then it will certainly be good.
The main burden on implementation falls on production, designers and logistics. In reality, it is the production manager who should be the initiator of the introduction of such a system, since it is he who is the resulting link in the entire process at the plant and, as a result, he has the most problems.
And here is the most delicate moment. If the production manager is not interested in implementation, then nothing will come of it. As if the leadership did not want this.
If the production manager has no motivation to radically change something, then he will not. If the fact that production works poorly or well does not change anything personally, then there is almost no chance. His salary does not change, he is not fired, etc. Question: Why do something?
Everything is simple. If production works (hmm, does it work) in a mess and he personally does not suffer at all and does not feel danger to himself, then this situation is even better for him. Because it is irreplaceable!
This is the main problem that must first be solved, and then start the project. Either he needs to be changed, or take him deputy with his powers. If we take the deputy, then the current leader will further poison the situation and sabotage the project in every way, because he will consider that he is being served. One way or another, this mood will creep among the staff in smoking rooms, in private conversations. Well, not for me to tell you how to do this. So decide ...
At the stage of preparing the system for operation, they will have a very high load and they must have resources. At least one person must spend the WHOLE working day on the project. Because he has a huge amount of work to create product trees. Something, of course, can be transferred from old systems, but as practice shows, the quality of this data is rarely decent. And so many things will need to be done with your hands. And the designer should do this.
They must work in conjunction with production. At the stage of preparation for operation, logistics should not have a high load. The procurement schedule, of course, must be fully synchronized with the production schedule and this process must be checked and debugged before launch.
Management should ensure their timely entry into the system. The situations of indispensability of employees should be completely excluded. It should not be such that a person goes on vacation, and there is no one to replace him and therefore no one enters data into the system. This will instantly destroy the whole system. I saw such situations, that's why I am writing. You need to pay attention to this and rid the company of such situations.
The production manager (the one who will manage the project) and his deputy must undergo training in those production management techniques that you intend to implement. There is no point in introducing management techniques without understanding how they work and what result they will lead to.
It may turn out to be a wall, about which everything will break. I talked to a former gene. Director of Izhmash, he took a sip of this at one time.
And before embarking on a project to improve production (well, to be honest, ERP systems are being introduced precisely for this. Another conversation is how it all comes out ...), this issue must also be resolved.
If workers receive bonuses from the development of their site , then this is how gangrene will destroy the enterprise. I am not exaggerating.
Such motivation leads to:
Let's talk with a simple example. Let's say your production consists of three sections. Let's not complicate, this is not the point. The first section cuts the pipe into pieces. Let the minute go to "cut off". The second section drills holes in the cut blank. The number of holes varies from order to order. There is also a minute for each hole. Holes from 4 to 8, for example. So the productivity of the second section is 6 times lower than the first (well, approximately). In the third section, this farm is supposedly polished. And it takes 12 minutes. This means that the productivity of the third section is two times lower than the second section.
This is a completely normal situation for most industries, when productivity decreases as the process moves to the final stage.
So here. If people at the sites are motivated specifically to develop their sites, this means that they will try to work out to the maximum. It is understandable.
That is, the first section will try to work to the maximum. Where it leads? Well, of course, to the growth of the heap of blanks in front of the second section, since its productivity is much lower.
But this is not the worst disaster, because before the second section all the blanks are the same and you don’t have to think which one to process in the first place, which one in the second, etc. The second section will also work to the maximum and this, in turn, will lead to heap growth already before the third section. But then all the blanks are already different (due to the number of holes)!
And now the attention is the question: how to understand the unfortunate guy in the third sectionWhat kind of blank should be processed? Which one came first? Of course not. He simply will not be able to make the right choice and therefore will process the first one he has. And the right one lies somewhere in the middle. Order will be guaranteed expired. Then the client will call when the delivery has already expired, they will collect a commission led by the head of the workshop and they will go look for the necessary procurement. I don’t fantasize, I saw it with my own eyes, and more than once. I think so everywhere .
And what to do? - you ask.
Well, firstly change the motivation system. It should not be from the development of the site, but from the development of the plant . Feel the difference? It’s one thing when your people are motivated by the growth of incomplete, and it’s quite another thing when they are motivated byproduction output .
Well, of course, the load on all sections should correspond to the performance of the bottleneck.
In short, something like this.
Look like that's it. Have I forgotten anything?
I made a document. It turned out to be very entertaining, it is a pity to throw it away, so I decided to share it with everyone.
First, a little about the foundation.
So, what does it take for an ERP system to be implemented in a company? Well, firstly, the toilets should be clean. The condition of the toilets is the state of the company as a whole. You will laugh, but it is. If the toilets are dirty, then first you need to solve the system problems in the company, and then you can take on ERP.
Before implementing the system (as well as before solving any problem), you need to determine the course of the solution. That is, withhow will you do it. We were always taught in school by our good old math teacher. The approach should be systemic, not chaotic.
What techniques will you use for production management? Do not know? Well then, you will introduce the system and get the same thing now, only in the program. It makes no difference, but you will incur expenses.
The technique in production is still primary. It is better to have a methodology, but not have software, than to have software, but not have a management technique.
If you know what management techniques will solve your problems in production, then you can already look for software for them.
You can not choose software that contains obviously unacceptable methods. If the production is custom-made, and you are offered the old and unkind “space-calendar planning”, then take a couple of years and spit. And in the end, Excel will help you. A million times already proven, a million. Do not suffer. I personally observed situations when all products and their structure are stored in an ERP system, and planning takes place .... in Excel.
Project status
One of the key and most common mistakes. For some reason, it is believed that the introduction of an ERP system is a project of the IT department. In reality, this has nothing to do with IT. And if it does, then the most insignificant. The IT department may be responsible for setting up the system, for distributing access. Essentially everything. No IT data should be entered into the system. And even more so to be responsible for the implementation. If the project is the responsibility of the IT director or even the pathos vice president of IT, the entire project is failed. There will be nothing.
This is a draft management of the company and it must have an appropriate status. And the project should be managed either by the general director or deputy.
The complexity of this project is comparable to the construction of a new workshop and attention to it from the management should be appropriate.
Managing a project does not mean poking around in settings every day. This means controlling the course of events and preventing the project from slipping. Provide him with the necessary administrative support.
It is necessary to create a project working group. At a minimum, it should include:
- the project manager
- the production
director - the logistics
director - the head of the design department
- a representative from a consulting company, of course.
But you don’t need to inflate the group much, otherwise you will get Krylov’s fable about a swan, cancer and a pike. Man 5 is full.
At the stage of preparation for operation, the group should gather (you can also remotely gather, via skype) once a week (two) for 30 minutes-an hour and summarize the work done and outline a plan for the coming week. After the start of industrial operation, the collection frequency of the group should increase to once a day, and then the frequency should gradually decrease as the temperature decreases.
If modern project management techniques are also used to manage the ERP project, then it will certainly be good.
Production
The main burden on implementation falls on production, designers and logistics. In reality, it is the production manager who should be the initiator of the introduction of such a system, since it is he who is the resulting link in the entire process at the plant and, as a result, he has the most problems.
And here is the most delicate moment. If the production manager is not interested in implementation, then nothing will come of it. As if the leadership did not want this.
If the production manager has no motivation to radically change something, then he will not. If the fact that production works poorly or well does not change anything personally, then there is almost no chance. His salary does not change, he is not fired, etc. Question: Why do something?
Everything is simple. If production works (hmm, does it work) in a mess and he personally does not suffer at all and does not feel danger to himself, then this situation is even better for him. Because it is irreplaceable!
This is the main problem that must first be solved, and then start the project. Either he needs to be changed, or take him deputy with his powers. If we take the deputy, then the current leader will further poison the situation and sabotage the project in every way, because he will consider that he is being served. One way or another, this mood will creep among the staff in smoking rooms, in private conversations. Well, not for me to tell you how to do this. So decide ...
Constructor
At the stage of preparing the system for operation, they will have a very high load and they must have resources. At least one person must spend the WHOLE working day on the project. Because he has a huge amount of work to create product trees. Something, of course, can be transferred from old systems, but as practice shows, the quality of this data is rarely decent. And so many things will need to be done with your hands. And the designer should do this.
Procurement
They must work in conjunction with production. At the stage of preparation for operation, logistics should not have a high load. The procurement schedule, of course, must be fully synchronized with the production schedule and this process must be checked and debugged before launch.
Primary data
Management should ensure their timely entry into the system. The situations of indispensability of employees should be completely excluded. It should not be such that a person goes on vacation, and there is no one to replace him and therefore no one enters data into the system. This will instantly destroy the whole system. I saw such situations, that's why I am writing. You need to pay attention to this and rid the company of such situations.
Training
The production manager (the one who will manage the project) and his deputy must undergo training in those production management techniques that you intend to implement. There is no point in introducing management techniques without understanding how they work and what result they will lead to.
Workers motivation in workshops
It may turn out to be a wall, about which everything will break. I talked to a former gene. Director of Izhmash, he took a sip of this at one time.
And before embarking on a project to improve production (well, to be honest, ERP systems are being introduced precisely for this. Another conversation is how it all comes out ...), this issue must also be resolved.
If workers receive bonuses from the development of their site , then this is how gangrene will destroy the enterprise. I am not exaggerating.
Such motivation leads to:
- work in progress
- increase production time
- extremely high percentage of late orders (up to 50%)
Let's talk with a simple example. Let's say your production consists of three sections. Let's not complicate, this is not the point. The first section cuts the pipe into pieces. Let the minute go to "cut off". The second section drills holes in the cut blank. The number of holes varies from order to order. There is also a minute for each hole. Holes from 4 to 8, for example. So the productivity of the second section is 6 times lower than the first (well, approximately). In the third section, this farm is supposedly polished. And it takes 12 minutes. This means that the productivity of the third section is two times lower than the second section.
This is a completely normal situation for most industries, when productivity decreases as the process moves to the final stage.
So here. If people at the sites are motivated specifically to develop their sites, this means that they will try to work out to the maximum. It is understandable.
That is, the first section will try to work to the maximum. Where it leads? Well, of course, to the growth of the heap of blanks in front of the second section, since its productivity is much lower.
But this is not the worst disaster, because before the second section all the blanks are the same and you don’t have to think which one to process in the first place, which one in the second, etc. The second section will also work to the maximum and this, in turn, will lead to heap growth already before the third section. But then all the blanks are already different (due to the number of holes)!
And now the attention is the question: how to understand the unfortunate guy in the third sectionWhat kind of blank should be processed? Which one came first? Of course not. He simply will not be able to make the right choice and therefore will process the first one he has. And the right one lies somewhere in the middle. Order will be guaranteed expired. Then the client will call when the delivery has already expired, they will collect a commission led by the head of the workshop and they will go look for the necessary procurement. I don’t fantasize, I saw it with my own eyes, and more than once. I think so everywhere .
And what to do? - you ask.
Well, firstly change the motivation system. It should not be from the development of the site, but from the development of the plant . Feel the difference? It’s one thing when your people are motivated by the growth of incomplete, and it’s quite another thing when they are motivated byproduction output .
Well, of course, the load on all sections should correspond to the performance of the bottleneck.
In short, something like this.
Look like that's it. Have I forgotten anything?