Our client, a global leader in safe, environmentally sound building systems faced a challenging post-merger integration environment with both operational and financial performance below expectations. Our assessment provided insight into “Quick Win” opportunities, thus supporting a quick turnaround.
Story
A post-merger integration led to the new organization experiencing a significant increase in lead times, excess and obsolete inventory, late orders and dissatisfied customers. We were asked to assess the new integrated operation, end-to-end, and develop an improvement roadmap.
Surprisingly for our client, though actually quite common, 75% of the end-to-end lead time, and much of the waste, complexity and frustration was consumed by non-manufacturing activities: order processing, engineering, and planning. To help the new management team achieve swift improvements, we targeted order processing as the key to quickly delivering significant improvement with measurable business impact.
Our journey took us through a 6-week Phase 1, where we collaborated closely with the client’s dedicated task force, developed and validated a roadmap, and consolidated opportunities and recommendations into a set of prioritized workstreams with clear timeframes, benefits, deliverables and accountability.
Conclusion
In the quest for improvement, we identified significant bottlenecks spanning the entire value chain, particularly in customer order processing, engineering, procurement, and the shop floor. With the roadmap approved, we launched our first initiative: quick wins to shorten lead times and clear order backlogs. The outcome was impactful — order backlog was reduced from 14 to 4 days, and the overall lead time was reduced by 25% within just 3 months. Customer satisfaction increased, leading to reduced cancellations. This case study shows how targeted interventions can lead to significant improvements, increase customer satisfaction, and pave the way for future growth.
“The Pacellico Team did an excellent job of quickly providing deep insight and analysis, and then consolidating into a road map that all stakeholders could buy into and execute quickly, providing measurable value”
Divisional Operations Leader