Warehouse Philosophy

I think it's safe to say that all professional warehouse managers have the same department goals. 100% accuracy in the areas of shipping, receiving, and inventory control with maximum efficiency on all current processes at the lowest possible cost while maintaining 100% internal and external customer satisfaction. But how do we achieve such a lofty goal?

I believe it starts with a well defined warehouse philosophy. Your warehouse philosophy is more then a management style, in fact it dictates your management style. A warehouse philosophy helps to shape and mold your department's culture. As a professional warehouse manager it is our responsibility to create a warehouse philosophy that will support the mission statement of our organization and simultaneously assist in achieving department goals.

If you have read any of my previous post then you may be able to take a guess at my warehouse philosophy. Simply stated my warehouse philosophy is "Continued improvements through education, sharing of knowledge, and transparency".

Adopting this philosophy has motivated me to continuously seek out new information and techniques relevant to warehousing and warehouse management. The obvious result is I am becoming a more knowledgeable and confident leader.

 It is widely believed that knowledge is power, but in actuality it is the application of knowledge that will help gain your desired results. What good would it do if I were to read one hundred books about warehousing and I decided to never to act on, or shared any of this information with my team or those affected by my department? So of course I take advantage of any opportunity I can to share information with, not only my team , but other department members as well.

With my adopted philosophy my team is also gaining knowledge resulting in a stronger more invested department. When your team is invested in achieving the department goals you no longer have people working for you, you have people working with you.

Let me give you two different scenarios.

Warehouse A has a manager that delegates the daily duties to his/her clerks. The clerks do their daily assignments to the best of their ability's and go home at the end of each day. The warehouse manger reviews the department data and tries to figure out how to improve the department, then goes home when his/her day is over.

Warehouse B has a manger that has a ten minute meeting each morning. In this meeting he/she shares department information such as, how many packages were received the previous day, how many packages were shipped, how many orders were picked and processed. Then he/she spends a few more minutes reviewing a specific daily process. The process action blocks are mapped out on a whiteboard and he/she asks his/her team to fill in each action block of the process together. Then, as a team, they review the process and look for any possible improvements. Someone mentions the printer paper capacity could be larger to reduce the amount of times the paper has to be refilled. The warehouse manager agrees to look into that simple improvement and off the team goes to preform the daily tasks. A process improvement has been identified, and the team is empowered.

Would you agree that the clerks in warehouse B are going to spend a few extra minutes thinking about what they are doing and how they are doing it each day? The warehouse manager in warehouse B has ignited a spark of thought that could turn into a flame of new processes that revolutionizes this warehouse. This is the definition of an invested team. This team has bought into the warehouse managers philosophy of continued improvements through education, sharing of knowledge, and transparency, possibly without even knowing it.

I'm sure you have figured out that the second scenario happened in one of my warehouses, but actually both scenarios were from my own experience. The first happened before I made a conscious decision to create and adhere to my own warehouse philosophy.

So what is your warehouse or department philosophy? Don't have one? Start with mine and adjust accordingly. I have had tremendous success with it and I would be willing to bet you would too.

Like what you read? Find my past blog post here:
http://thepallet-jack.blogspot.com/
Feedback is always welcomed!

My name is Matt Austin. I am a Professional Warehouse Manager. I greatly enjoy all areas of warehouse process improvement, and sharing ideas. Please feel free to contact me with any warehouse situations you may be experiencing for some outside perspective. Thank you for reading!