Two years ago, I visited two factories in the same industry.
Both offered customised products.
Both had similar complexity.
Both were in the ₹60–80 crore range.
But they operated very differently.
In the first, the production manager tracked jobs on a whiteboard.
Updates happened over WhatsApp.
Every custom order needed multiple discussions between sales, planning, and production before it could even be scheduled.
In the second, I watched a custom order get processed live.
It was checked against a product matrix.
Material availability was verified.
A production slot was assigned.
Customer confirmation went out within two hours.
No MD involvement.
No chaos.
Same complexity.
Different systems.
Hi, I’m Shrikant Prabhudesai.
I work with manufacturing CEOs to improve delivery, cost, and time performance so growth doesn’t create operational breakdowns.
Today I want to talk about the systems that allow customisation at scale—without chaos.
First system. A product configuration framework.
Most factories struggle because they don’t define boundaries.
What can be customised?
What cannot?
What are the limits?
Without this, every enquiry becomes a fresh decision.
Sales, engineering, and production each make their own judgment.
That creates hidden chaos—
longer quoting cycles,
uncertain planning,
and constant variation on the floor.
I worked with a ₹70 crore conveyor manufacturer that built a simple configuration matrix.
It defined:
the standard platform,
what could vary,
and the allowed range of variation.
The impact was immediate.
Quoting became faster.
Planning became predictable.
A configuration framework doesn’t limit flexibility.
It makes flexibility manageable.
Second system. Structured order entry and review.
In most factories, order entry is informal.
An enquiry comes in.
Sales interprets it.
A drawing is made.
The job goes to production.
Gaps show up only when production starts.
By then, the job is already delayed.
I worked with a ₹50 crore fabrication company where 60 percent of delays came from incomplete order information.
Missing specs.
Unclear dimensions.
Assumptions not validated.
All discovered on the shop floor.
The fix was simple.
A structured order review checklist before releasing any job:
drawing confirmation,
material specs,
critical dimensions,
finishing details.
Within two quarters, on-time delivery improved from 58 percent to over 80 percent.
Not because production got faster—
but because uncertainty was removed upfront.
Order entry is not admin work.
It is the most critical quality gate in customisation.
Third system. Separate planning for standard and custom work.
This is where most factories hesitate.
They try to run both types of work in one schedule.
But the two are fundamentally different.
Standard work is predictable.
Custom work is not.
When both run together,
the variability of custom jobs disrupts everything.
I worked with a ₹110 crore pump manufacturer where planning was constantly being redone.
Custom job delays were pushing standard jobs back.
The shift was to separate capacity.
Dedicated machines and time slots for custom work.
Standard work ran independently.
The result:
better efficiency for standard jobs,
fewer surprises in custom jobs,
more stable planning overall.
Separating planning doesn’t add complexity.
It removes it from the system where it causes the most damage.
Factories that handle customisation well
don’t rely on better people or more effort.
They build structure around variability.
A configuration framework defines what you offer.
Order entry systems remove uncertainty early.
Planning separation protects execution.
Together, these systems create something powerful—
A factory that can say yes with confidence.
Not because it will figure things out later,
but because it is designed to deliver.
Customisation without structure
is just complexity with a justification.
Customisation with structure
is a real competitive advantage.
A simple reflection:
Are you managing variation…
or designing for it?
Because that difference determines
whether customisation drives your margins—
or your chaos.
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