Most manufacturers today use some type of MRP or ERP planning system and most constantly struggle to identify which activities - releases messages, expedites, reschedule recommendations - are really important to delivering those next customer shipments on time. When asked to confirm a promised delivery date, most plant managers can't say with any level of confidence - or can only guess based on hours of level-by-level pegging and matching of dates and quantities.

On-Time Orders (OTTO), using the Reality-based Priority Management (RPM) methodology, gathers information from the existing MRP/ERP system's files into a data warehouse and it "chases down" all the relationships between purchase receipts, production orders, planned orders and customer demands. With those links pre-determined, reports and inquiries can quickly trace from any item or activity to the finished product and customer order they support. It's also a quick and easy way to check the status of all the activities feeding a given customer order/item.

Armed with this information, production management can prioritize and direct resources toward those activities that directly impact customer order completion. Purchasing management can identify which receipts are essential for near-term customer order completion and keep a close eye on the most critical items. Plant resources can remained focused on the most important items and orders, and follow-up on those that make a difference.

How it works

OTTO is a monitoring system that helps pull material through the plant ensuring on-time shipments. It provides a "true" link between customer demand (internal & external) and both manufacturing and purchasing activities. It seamlessly integrates into existing ERP software and recognizes and notifies plant personnel in advance of potential delays - helping prevent materials shortages, production delays or both!

OTTO does all this by creating indented soft linkages between demands and supplies and identifying the actions required to meet customer demands (whether internal or external).

It self-installs, normally in less than an hour, and doesn't change the existing MRP/ERP system in any way. When it runs, OTTO retrieves customer order information, production orders, purchase orders, planned orders and, along with demand link data, stores it all into its own database. Next, it follows all the links through all levels and stores the relationships along with the raw data. This allows it to establish and track direct links between purchase and production orders and the customer order/lines they support.

The objective of OTTO is to maximize the amount of time spent analyzing the information and minimize the amount of time spent compiling the data. Remember, power saws don't turn bad carpenters into good carpenters - they make fast, bad carpenters. However, they "can" make good carpenters more productive by allowing them to spend more time on knowledge-based activities like measuring.

OTTO provides line management with the visibility needed to ensure resources are deployed correctly to meet immediate needs. The master scheduler in one plant stated, "In the past I never knew there was a problem with an order until shipping told me. Now with OTTO, I tell them ahead of time we're going to have a problem. And it tells me what we need to do to avoid the problem!"

OTTO isn't magic, but it will improve delivery performance by dramatically reducing the amount of time people spend chasing data, allowing them to coordinate short-term priorities and ensuring the output from operations will be customer shipments.

          
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