Achieving On-Time Delivery for a Leading Manufacturer of Control Valves in India

Background

This case study highlights the success of an engineering and manufacturing company in streamlining execution and ensuring on-time delivery. The purpose of sharing this is to inspire you to tackle similar issues in your business. Remember, implementation and results take time, a clear plan, proven strategies, continuous handholding, support, and monitoring by coaches. Company and owner names are not disclosed for privacy reasons, but the insights are what’s important.

This family-owned business, dealing in customized industrial equipment for power plants and boilers, has been around for over 22 years. The owners are highly educated technocrats who work with various specialists for different areas of their business. When we started, the first goal was to eliminate all delays in deliveries. Unfortunately, 100% of their deliveries were delayed, with 80% due to internal issues and 20% due to client delays. In EPC (Engineering, Procurement, and Construction) businesses, delays can occur from the client’s side due to pending approvals, inspections, or their readiness to pick up material.

We focused on the 80% of delays that were within our control. Typical reasons included unclear orders, incomplete designs, delayed purchase orders due to missing drawings and BOMs, unreliable vendors, and late incoming materials. Salespeople were hesitant to commit to delivery dates, leading to lost orders.

Transformation Journey

1. Coaching Methodology: Milind’s approach included weekly 1-2-1 Zoom video coaching sessions. As a confidante, Milind helped the business owner overcome limiting beliefs and take impactful actions. The process involved brainstorming and concluding agreements, empowering the owner to make decisions by analyzing their situation holistically.
2. Creating Project Plans: The first step was to create a project plan for every order. With a clear, documented high-level plan, everyone had greater visibility of schedules and priorities. We set a cutoff date: any order received after this date had to have a documented project plan. The same person who created the plan also coordinated with all departments.
3. Cross-Functional Meetings: We held cross-functional meetings once a week to review progress and bottlenecks. Initially, these meetings ran for hours but improved over time with weekly frequency.
4. Daily Huddles: We conducted daily huddles on the shop floor every morning to align priorities, announce what individuals were working on, and ask for support from each other.
5. Reviving Old Practices: During brainstorming sessions, the owner mentioned that they used to have similar meetings, but they fizzled out over time. This realization made it easier to reimplement these strategies, as there was no resistance from the team.

Outcome

Within 5 to 6 months, the scenario changed dramatically:

• On-Time Delivery: 80% of orders were delivered on time, with the remaining 20% delayed due to client issues.
• Increased Invoicing: They achieved a significant milestone in invoicing that month, surpassing their previous records.
• Boosted Confidence: The execution team gained confidence, telling the sales team to bring in more orders because they could deliver.

This transformation demonstrates that achieving on-time delivery requires a clear plan, commitment, and continuous improvement. It wasn’t an overnight success but the result of a well-thought-out strategy, continuous support, and monitoring by Coach Milind Bibikar. It shows that with the right approach, businesses can overcome delays and achieve significant improvements in performance.

If you face issues with delayed deliveries or rework and want to improve your performance, I can offer you a complementary brainstorming session. Just say “OTIF” (On Time In Full), and we will take it further from there.