As a business and production consultant, I don’t want to totally redirect all of you from getting some outside help and perspective. There’s much to be gained by having a new set of eyes on your business operations. But all those other consultants out there will agree with me on this one. You observe an operation, analyze what you see, and report back to owners and managers with your recommendations.
A common response from management is, “We already knew about those issues.”
My response, as I imagine other consultants would respond, “Yes, I understand you knew about these problems, but you haven’t done anything about them!”
I think we all in our businesses are guilty of this. We either plan to address an obvious problem later, or just don’t want to deal with the consequences of taking action today. We know the issues exist. Unfortunately, later rarely comes, and putting off the hard decisions won’t make them go away.
So, here’s my challenge: Take a day, or even part of a day, to walk around your shop and take notes on those obvious things that need to change… things that you would like to see changed… things you know you’ve been in avoidance-mode on changing. Go back to your office and make a list. Then put this list into priority order. Before the month is out, take action on the number one thing on your list. Next month take action on the next, and so on.
Do you need to let go of a “bad apple” employee? Do you need to document procedures in screen prep? Do you need to reorganize and deal with inefficiencies in your garment inventory area?
You probably need to take action on everything on your list right now if you had to confess. But as we speak, you’re doing nothing. Crossing these items off, one at a time, one month at a time, will get you moving in the right direction. A direction toward maximum production.
Too big a challenge? There are plenty of us who would be happy to spend a day or two on your floor compiling that list! But you still have to do the hard work of taking the necessary actions to make these corrections happen.
We’ll be discussing this subject in depth in upcoming issues of Screen Print Weekly.
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