INDUSTRY Challenges

Do your passenger numbers, cargo volumes or goods volumes continue to fall?

Are yield and profit falling too? 

Do your costs and capacity remain the same as before the downturn?

Challenge:

T&L feels a responsibility to continue to guide our clients on how they can shape their operations to get through the current downturn. In fact, we feel strongly that there are opportunities to significantly improve the way our clients plan, resource and carry out work, and to set an operation up to better react to future economic ups and downs.

Our Spring 2009 issue of Delivering Results focuses on how the aviation and distribution industries can cut back in a planned, controlled manner in order to control cost and service, not just in periods of economic downturn but also in the quieter periods of each week, month or year.

Paul Bloch and David Calder, Joint Managing Directors of T&L, introduce T&L’s approach.

T&L's Approach:

“In essence, cutting back refers to reducing operational activity appropriately in line with the decrease in volumes,” says Paul Bloch. “But let’s not assume this is as simple as it sounds. Cutting back in the right areas without compromising service requires an in-depth understanding of operational performance and the drivers of demand, as well as a planned approach.”

As David Calder points out, “We all see productivity increase during busy times as dead-time is filled in with additional work. The trick is to maintain those peak levels of productivity when business is quiet by not allowing the idle-time to reappear. Otherwise an organisation is not achieving its cost reduction and profitability potential.”

Of course, cut backs are tough to achieve in typical industrial or operational environments. Paul recalls from his experience, “Often work schedules are the result of working practices or workload misconceptions that have built up over time rather than being a function of the histograms of workload against the measured productivity drivers for the work area.”

“Timing of breaks, how long a job takes, the amount of overtime staff are accustomed to earning and even the social aspects of a roster will frustrate efforts to make cut backs. Even more fundamental is the issue of just having enough of the right data to know what work needs to be done when and how much effort that work will represent.”

Using topical examples from our client industries, the feature article of our newsletter addresses key opportunities to reduce waste in an operation and looks at the importance of creating a controlled operation with strict, common key performance indicators in place. We invite you to read the download of the Spring 2009 issue of Delivering Results (above).