Consider a typical product
information scenario within a manufacturing organization:
Inefficiency
in a manufacturing organization
This scenario characterized
by disparate product information repositories,
manual point-to-point processes and isolated systems,
results in huge inefficiencies and data inaccuracy.
This is illustrated in the example of a simple
product specification change - a modification
or improvement to an existing product.
The change is initiated
by the Product Manager. Engineering Design are
informed of the change and create the new technical
design drawings in their CAD system. After the
approval process, Production receives the new
drawings and begins manufacturing with their PDM
system.
Due to the lack of
systems and loose processes, marketing are notified
late in the process and miss the deadline to include
the change in the print catalog. So, the print
catalog is printed with old outdated information.
IT or an external company is responsible for managing
changes to the static web-site. So there is a
further delay in communicating this change to
them, and for web pages to be updated with the
new specification. Customers, who are making purchasing
decisions based on the web-site or print catalog
are doing so with outdated product information.
In addition, since there is no enterprise systems
integration policy, the ERP is also not updated
with the new specification change.
So, a customer using
the latest print or web catalog, attempts to place
an order for the product with the old specification.
Sales who are servicing the customer with data
from the ERP, print or web catalog successfully
place the order. Only when the order is communicated
to Production, is an alarm raised that the old
specification product has been discontinued. The
irate customer is informed of the error and cancels
the order. In addition, a reseller finds out about
the new product informally, and phones Customer
Service to inquire. Customer Service cannot find
reference to the new specification, resulting
in the channel partner being very dissatisfied
and frustrated.
The above example highlights
the inefficiencies from one perspective. The problem
could be many times more costly if the product
change was to a regulatory issue, like an MSDS,
and was not communicated to the sales channels
in a timely manner.
The key problems resulting
from managing product information with disparate
data storage, manual processes and isolated systems
are:
