Curt was numb. “Whew, where is Marty when I need him?” He knew Marty, VP Sales, was traveling, but he dialed his cell phone and left a desperate message anyway about the Shantilly order. Curt dialed the company receptionist “Hello, Mary? Can you connect me with someone over there in manufacturing or shipping? I’m not sure who to even ask for, but this is a four alarm emergency and I need to speak to someone.” He had to have this order to have any chance to make his sales quota this year. If he was going to lose it at least he wanted to make sure Marty knew it wasn’t his fault.
“Who is this?” Cindy demanded.
“Hi, this is Curtis from Corporate Sales.” Before Cindy could respond Curt blurted out, “I have a customer emergency and I need to speak to someone ASAP. Can I come over and talk to you about it right away?”
“In an hour I can give you 10 minutes, come to my office in Building 3, first floor,” she said.
Cindy held up her hand to stop Curt when he appeared at her door. She left the meeting going on in her office, and met him in the hall.
Curt told Cindy about the conversation he had with Roy and the consequences. “I’m in charge of scheduling,” Cindy said. Curt felt energized; he hit the jackpot. “We’ve been working on some things to speed up delivery time, but I don’t think they’re done yet,” she continued. “I have to speak to some folks before I can give you a firm commitment to tell Roy,” Cindy said. Just then, Danny and Will were walking down the shop floor center aisle. They were the Stamping and Chip Board Assembly Supervisors and it looked they were getting back from a very late lunch.
“Hmm, are any orders going out today?” Curt wondered.
“Hey guys, you got a minute?” Cindy asked. She explained Curt’s situation. “I know you guys were tied up in a kaizen event all week. How is it going?"
“We’re just getting back from our kaizen celebration lunch,” Will said.
“What a week! We reduced our changeover time from 8 hours to 1 hour in stamping and we still have further improvements to make,” Danny said.
“Chip Board Assembly is a now part of work cells and now the products fly through, " Will added.
“There’s your answer Curt. These two departments were the last to go through kaizen and the toughest to speed up, and you heard the results. Call Roy back this afternoon and tell him we’re still his supplier,” Cindy said proudly.
“Your order will be there by 8AM Thursday Roy, no problem,” Curtis stated.
“Thanks for the call Curt, and please don’t take what I said personally the other day. You guys didn’t leave me any choice; I’d have to go with another vendor if I can’t rely on you. Thanks again for the follow up, and keep in touch,” Roy said.
The following Monday, in the sales meeting, Marty asked, “So Curt, what are you going to do this week that will increase your chances of making your quota?” He asked this same question at the end of every sales meeting. This time Curt had a good answer.
“Well, from now on I’m going to stay in close contact with our manufacturing Supervisors. If not for them I would have lost the Shantilly order and any chance to make quota this year. I don’t know how they did it, but there were able to ship an order that used to take 21 days and shipped it in 12 days. I always knew we were the quality leader, but when we combine that with the shortest delivery time we are unbeatable. We’re now the leader and I am going to use it at every opportunity to win more business.” Curt said.
“That’s a great idea. Each week I’ll ask one of the Supervisors to join us for our Monday meeting to update us on improvements they are making, and discuss how we might use them to win more business for the entire team.” Marty said.
“Besides, I want to find out more about this “kaizen” stuff, I think it will be a big seller.” Curt said.
Moral: Share your lean initiatives and successes with your sales and marketing teams. They do want to know what you are doing that increases their ability to win more business. Otherwise your lean successes are like a great novel that never gets published.
The Everest Consulting Group has two books and many articles that may help with your efforts to implement lean at your company. Click on www.everestcg.com to learn more about The Kaizen Revolution and The Journey To Teams.
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