Another year is sliding by with incredible speed and you’re waiting to catch the Cloud Bus – Which route is for you?
Our manufacturing clients are extremely busy, which is great but when they were originally trying to find the ideal time to review their IT requirements, the date they come up with most often was ‘never’. They felt as I am sure you do, that upgrading or replacing systems would be so disruptive that business would grind to a halt and let’s face it, who can afford that to happen?
The good news is that it doesn’t have to be a switch on – switch off exercise and the even better news is that you don’t always have to replace everything.
If the prospect of change feels overwhelming to you, then consider taking one step at a time. Finding out what causes the most pain inside your business is a great first step. Thinking about what you would like systems to provide you, is another. If you could design your own system, what would it look like?
“Nothing is particularly hard if you break it down into small jobs.” – Henry Ford
Planning is King! If time is in short supply in your business, give yourself a minimum target of time to spend regularly thinking “what if” – What if you could calculate your materials and production costs accurately? What if you could increase productivity or improve the management of your product life cycle from design concept to production planning to installation?
There are specialised solutions with increased automation, tracking and reporting capabilities out in the market. If you don’t spend time thinking about what functionality improvements you are after, you may fall prey to Vendor sales techniques that have you trying to modify your business to fit the software. In reality, you should be able to find software that fits around your business and your critical business processes.
Top reasons for software purchases in the Manufacturing industry:
As reported by Software Advice 11 November 2014
- Better planning / management functionality – 31%
- Better user experience – 27%
- Improve efficiency / organization – 26%
- Manual methods ineffective – 9%
- Improve accuracy and reporting – 3%
- Better accounting functionality – 3%
Other results worth noting:
- 45% of Manufacturing businesses were managing their operations using manual methods
- 23% were using a mix of manual & non-manufacturing software
- 98% wanted an integrated suite
- 1% wanted ‘best of breed’
So what does this tell us? You are not alone. You may have an unique business operation but problems you are facing in regards to software are shared with many other manufacturers. We can feel disoriented when faced with an overwhelming event, project or problem.
What can you do right now to improve this feeling? Take a deep breath. Before taking any action, break the technology problems down into groups that specific roles are experiencing. Think about how your staff would feel if you were able to take their technology pain points away… It is worth thinking about is it not? Just think about one role at a time. That is the best way to start your technology improvement.
If you would like to talk to FeatureIT to get some ideas for improvement, contact FeatureIT – We don’t sell software but we do know how to help Manufacturing companies and the technology traps to avoid.
