When discussing manufacturing, the conversation during pre-sales and scoping usually includes a customer wanting to use work orders. Although this seems innocent enough, as a value-added partner we will press the customer on this request.

Why do you want to use work orders?

The answers we’re looking for include “We’d like to track labor and/or machine times and costs.” Or “We want to track downtime and reason codes.”

Those responses are a good start, but the pressing continues.

Do you understand that to report this information into the ERP, the manufacturing team will need to capture it and enter it into the ERP? For this question, we want the customer to say they’re already tracking this information or that they’re willing to adjust staffing as required to capture this information.

Finally, we want to know if the customer has a process or plans to implement a process to review and act upon the captured information. We need the customer to know that capturing data just for the sake of capturing it doesn’t add value – they have to use it.

Depending on the customer’s state of mind after contemplating these questions, we explain that the ERP allows the customer to use several production processes and that all products don’t have to be built the same. The logic here is that it might make more sense to only measure the highest running products or the highest cost products instead of all products. The other option we discuss is tracking some products in detail until they’re performing better and then moving on to the next one.

When discussing work orders with customers, it’s important to understand why they want to use work orders, whether or not they have the processes and resources to capture and enter the information, and if they have a process to act on the captured information. The good news is that the ERP can offer the customer many options for handling the requirement.

Most importantly, as a value-added provider, we work with the client to make sure the ERP can handle the business needs as well as to make sure the customer has the proper processes to use the information captured.

Have questions about work orders, ERP systems, or software support? Contact Southeast Computer Solutions – we can help.