The Robots Are Coming!

The other night I found myself walking through my warehouse. Something was different. My warehouse seemed cleaner than normal, more organized than I remembered it being and instead of clerks I had androids picking orders. You know, the kind you see in the movies that look exactly like humans but are clearly not. I felt nervous, but found relief when I looked at the communication board. The colorful charts and graphs told me that all my department goals were at 100%. Feeling a sense of ease knowing my department was running so efficiently, I headed to  my office. I walked into my office only to find one of those androids sitting in my chair! He promptly gave me my pink slip and smiled as he said I was no longer needed. I woke up in a cold sweat from this terrible nightmare.

The truth is, automation is nothing new in the warehouse. It is all around us, hidden in plain sight. Items such as that set of rollers that were installed at the end of the packing station to that old tape gun you can never find. So why is it so frightening?

Automation by definition is "the technique of making an apparatus, a process, or a system operate automatically". So why do so many shudder when the conversation topic turns to automation in the warehouse? It has to do with perception. Interestingly enough when I looked up the definition of automation for this post on Google, I was showed this example:
"unemployment due to the spread of automation."

How has Automation become such a taboo word in our industry that somehow it is linked to the downsizing of a hard working work force? More importantly, what can we do to help change this perception?

Well, the how is easy to explain and understand. We automate processes to make them run without our human intervention, thus resulting in the use of less man hours for that particular process. The requirement of less man hours can sometimes reduce the need for man power, and that is what scares people. We can look back at the introduction of robots to the auto industry and understand why people may fear automation. Here we find a case where one robot could replace as many as ten humans. Before one gets to freaked out, we have to remember that warehousing is not the automotive industry and our version of automation will be much different.

Although automation in a warehouse will not be the same as in other industries, the end goal is the same, improved efficiency, higher quality product and a savings in labor and costs. So as creative professional warehouse managers the responsibility lies on us to reallocate those formally used man hours and manpower in such a manner that will benefit our department and our organization.

As professional warehouse managers it is imperative that we continue to educate ourselves on the newest and latest forms of automation and share that information with our team, we certainly do not want anyone being left behind. We must then evaluate this new information and make an educated decision whether or not to implement new automation in our warehouses. Doing some in depth cost analyses is one of the best ways to decide whether or not to move forward with some new forms of automation.


The bottom line is, is that technology is everywhere and it is moving, growing, becoming more affordable, and more accessible at a rate that mankind has never seen before. It is ingrained into our daily life. Here is the US everyone I know has a computer in their pockets capable of giving them the answer to just about every question known to man.

A clever warehouse manager will embrace this wave that is coming, not fear it. It may be quite sometime before every organization has the budget to purchase robots that can perform such tasks as delivering products from  the warehouse floor to the packing stations, but that doesn't mean we should pretend these types of things don't exist. Remembering what I stated in a previous post, we can dissolve fear of the unknown with a little bit of information. 

As professionals in our industry it is our duty to stay informed about new automation technology. To chose not to and to deny ourselves the information that is available we are not only doing a disservice to our organization but we are also failing to be positive mentors to our team members.  We must adapt and evolve with our industry. We all know what happens to a company and it's employees when it chooses not to evolve. Those are the folks who get pink slips handed to them by the androids.

Some related reading:
http://money.cnn.com/2014/05/22/technology/amazon-robots/


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!

Q x A=Excellence

Let me paint a picture for you. You are a warehouse manager with plenty of experience who started at a new company about a month ago. You have noticed that several of your warehouse's current processes could use  an update. You spend hours tirelessly creating this new process, writing it, mapping it, tweaking it, until you are satisfied these changes will most definitely improve your department.

You gather your team and unveil the new process. You explain in detail that you have noticed some areas that need improvement and that this new process will improve efficacy, eliminate movement waste, and launch the department past it's quarterly goals. Excitedly you proclaim that "starting today, this is how we do things".  What kind of reaction do you think you would receive from your team?

Well, I don't want to burst your bubble, but I'll tell you what kind of reaction you will probably get. You will have a few team members who will just nod and agree but won't really follow the new process, although they may make a half hearted effort to do so. You will have a few team members that will mutter under their breath and go grumbling back to work, and you will have the one or two who will absolutely not change what they are doing. These folks will poke every hole in this new process that they can think of and fight you on every step you have created.

But why? Why would someone not want to change things for the better? You explained how things need to improve, you have even shown how they will improve, so why the resistance and what do you do?

It's the same scenario you might face trying to get your child to eat broccoli. You can explain all the health benefits of broccoli, you can make bold statements such as "you'll grow up big and strong" but the reality is they won't willingly eat it simply because it's new, it's weird, and they have never seen it before.

Humans are inherently afraid of what they don't know, and that includes change. This trait is ingrained into the primal part of our brains. A little appropriately allocated fear can be a good thing and has most likely kept our species alive over the years. If we didn't know the plant, we didn't eat it, thus never getting poisoned. If we didn't know what was in the cave, we didn't go into the cave thus never getting eaten.

So now lets review the formula for success in the above situation. Quality x Acceptance = Excellence. What this means is we need to have process "buy in" by the majority of the team before we roll out a new process. Having "buy in" will help ensure the desired process's success. Oh, and by "majority" I mean the alpha male or female on your team. This person may not always be a leader by title, but can be the person with most tribal knowledge or the unappointed leader.

I'm sure you have met this individual at one stage of your career. I'm referring to that person who can rattle off part numbers like they were his/her favorite song lyrics, or tells stories about "how we used to do it" in the break room. Whatever the case, this person is most likely well respected by your team and having them on your side is just as critical to your new process's success as the process itself. The best process in the world will not succeed if  your team does not believe in it.

How does a professional warehouse manager create process buy in? It starts with some astute observations of the members of your team. Allow me to give you the scenario above again but this time our warehouse manager applies the Q x A=E formula.

You are a warehouse manager with plenty of experience who started at a new company about a month ago. You have noticed that several of your company's current processes could use an update. Bob has worked as a clerk in the warehouse for 15 years and is skeptical about you and your fancy ideas. You ask Bob, on the floor (his territory),  what he thinks about the current process. You ask him if he sees any areas that he would like to see improved. You take physical notes on his ideas. You thank him for his input and move on to Sally who has worked in the warehouse for 8 years. You ask her the same questions and get some different insight. You may do the same with a few other members of your team. You begin work on the new process and at certain points you invite Bob, Sally, and other members of the team into your office to review what you written or mapped thus far and ask them for their perspective. You ask them back for a final review of the new process once you have completed it. Then you gather your team and unveil the new process mentioning and thanking your team members for their individual contributions to the creation of this new process.

Now what kind of response do you think you would receive? Do you believe that your team may be more inclined to get behind this new process if they helped create it? I believe they will because you have eliminated fear by allowing your team to help create the new process. It's no longer this new, weird thing they have never seen before.

Of course you are the process manager. It is your responsibility to ensure the processes is maintained and to have the wherewithal to recognize when the process needs to be re-evaluated. This does not mean you have to be the only one who creates the process. When the time comes for re-evaluation remember once again that QxA=E and you will achieve the desired outcome.

As for getting my children to eat broccoli, I'm still working on that.   

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!

The Power of "Why"

If you have had any sort of long term interaction with a small child then you have probably played the "why" game at some point. If you haven't had the pleasure of playing this game it goes something like this:

Small child: Daddy, why do birds fly?

Daddy: Because they have wings.

Small child: Why?

Daddy: Because somewhere along the evolutionary path of that particular bird, wings were more advantageous then arms to the survival of the species.

Small child: Why?

Daddy: It could be for a number of reasons, perhaps that bird lived mostly on a step cliff and flying was more efficient then climbing or perhaps it was that flying was faster than running to avoid being eaten by predators.

Small child: Why?

Daddy: Well because I don't think anything would like to be eaten by a predator.

Small child: Why?

Daddy: Would you like some ice cream?

The "why" game can be fun, it can be annoying, but it is always important. Unlike adults, children have no inhibitions when it comes to asking the question "why.” This is a simple innocent admission of a lack of knowledge, and an expression of curiosity  about the world they observe. These are the first steps in being creative and honestly, wouldn't we want our professional warehouse managers to be creative as well? It is in fact creative minds that solve problems and improve processes.

I think it is easy to see how the "why" game can translate to our warehouses. If we ask the question "why" enough times we will eventually find an area in our process that needs improvement.  Let’s put the why game to the test in some common warehouse situations.

The first example:  an order was shipped to the wrong address. Why? After some research we find the wrong address was printed on the shipping label. Why? The current process involves the clerk manually typing the addresses into the shipping portal. Why? That is the limitation of our current shipping software. Why? Perhaps we need to have a conversation about updating our shipping software to avoid repeating this mistake.

Sticking with the above shipping theme, how about we look at a common problem of the wrong material being shipped to the customer. Why? After some digging we find that the wrong material was picked for the order. Why? We check the bin location and find the wrong material is physically in that bin location even though the WMS states differently. Why? By asking the question why, what started as an apparent shipping error turned picking error has now morphed into a possible receiving error.

I want to be clear that asking "why" will give you a different perspective then asking "how". The two different questions should be asked whenever a process has had a break down, but the "why" question will eventually get you to the root causation of the process break down.  That is very different information then how the process broke down.

If we go over our first scenario again asking only "how" we would get a much different outcome. It would look like this:

An order was shipped to the wrong address. How? After some research we find the wrong address was printed on the shipping label. How? The current process involves the clerk manually typing the addresses into the shipper portal. How? The shipping clerk uses the key board at the shipping computer to input the address in the shipping software.

The main difference in these two questions is that "how" can be answered where as "why" can always continue. Don't believe me? Spend some time with a small, curious, creative child.

So the next time you find yourself faced with processes review, remember the most powerful weapon you have is just too simply ask “why". Then you can focus your creative minds on answering that question. You can keep asking "why" until the process is ready for another test run. Once you and your team are satisfied with an answer you can stop asking "why" and you can all go get some ice cream.

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!

Welcome 2016 with a Kaizen event

The end of one year, the beginning of the next. This is my favorite time to be a professional warehouse manager. It is finally here, that magical time of year after the dust has settled from the physical inventory, year end, Q4, and the holiday madness. This is the little bit of quiet time we get to
sit back, take a breath, put on some classical music, and review some good old fashion data.

Personally, I find it rewarding to compare this year's accomplishments to the previous years. As the department manager I have the opportunity to hold in my hands physical proof of my leadership successes and some areas that need may need some improvement. This is my very own performance review.

The successes are fantastic, but it is the areas in which our department performance has dropped that I am most interested in. There could be several different contributing factors that could decrease the performance of a department in a specific area. For example, turnover decreases productivity and efficiency for obvious reasons. Your department may have to operate short handed. New talent has to be hired. New personel  have to be trained, a workflow rhythm has to be established,  team cohesion has to be established, so on and so forth.

New process implementation could be another contributing factor for a decrease in efficiency and productivity. In some cases a new process may slow things down a bit while it is being implemented. A perfect example of this would be switching from one WMS to another. The outcome may be better performance overall but, there is no doubt that a learning curve will take place along the way. Anyone who has lived through a massive system overhaul or change can certainly attest to this being true.

So what do you do if there is no glaringly obvious reason for a drop in performance in a given area? I would suggest you gather your team for a Kaizen event.

Kaizen is the Japanese word for improvement, so one could call a Kaizen event an "improvement" event. A traditional Kaizen event involves everyone from the CEO to the mail clerks. In short, during this event a companies'  processes are mapped and discussed from all possible angles to improve those processes. (more details about Kaizen events in the links provided below)
Sometimes a Kaizen event in the traditional sense is not possible but a savvy warehouse manager can perform such an event in his department  on a smaller scale. What better time to do such a thing then right now at the start of a new year.

In my opinion Kaizen events do not all have to be large, grandiose, complicated, functions that aim to fix the entire department at one time. I have been witness to such events and saw little to no results. I would advise a smaller, more controlled,  more focused Kaizen event. Identify one issue and focus your team on that one issue. Once successfully completed you will have built momentum to move to the next slightly larger issue. If this is a new tactic to your department then I would advise setting your sights on a process that is very meaningful to your team. This will prove to them that Kaizen events are indeed valuable. You would be amazed at what your team can do if they all buy into this "crazy Kaizen thing" you're doing.

I once wanted my new team to understand the positive effects this type of leadership style could bring to our department. I was a new manager at a old company with a set culture of "never question anything."  Well if we never question anything then how do we learn?

I wanted to start with something I knew could be improved upon so I focused on the shipping/packing  stations in my warehouse. I asked my shipping clerks if they liked how their individual packing stations were configured. I got a lot of blank stares at first, but with a little prodding I started to get some suggestions. It started small, new tape guns, a few more small supplies, but with encouragement the ideas really started flowing. Rollers for packed shipments, a carousel for pallet wrapping, a relocation of the shipping stations closer to the dock door. This was Kaizen in all it's glory. My team and I working together to improve an area of the department and it's processes.

We had a greater brain storming session, then narrowed things down to fit our budget. At the end of the event we had, in fact, moved some shipping stations, bought a few new materials and greatly improved not only the efficiency of the shipping department but also the morale of the entire warehouse department. You can imagine how this first event lead to many more process improvements through out the warehouse.

So while you are taking a breath and setting your department goals for the upcoming year, why not take a look and see how a Kaizen event can benefit your warehouse. There has never been anything wrong with shaking things up a bit. Don't buy into the old saying " if it aint broke, then don't fix it," instead how about "it may be walking, but how can we make it run?"

Here is some reading about a Kaizen event to get you started: http://www.isixsigma.com/dictionary/kaizen-event/
http://leanmanufacturingtools.org/625/planning-and-running-kaizen-events/

Like what your read? Take a look at some of my other post here:
http://thepallet-jack.blogspot.com/2015/12/creating-value-from-non-moving-inventory.html

Feed back 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!