Today morning, about 7-8 members from our company,Manhattan Associates visited Kenco warehouse and had a plant tour for 4 hours or so.
Steven Brunnet (team mate) , Abhi(SCI team) and myself went together in Abhi's car - a one hour drive.It was a huge warehouse with 165 dock doors and 1.5 million squarefeet in area.
There was too much stress on labor management that I found a bit disconcerting. For an 8 hour shift , the operators are allowed just two fifteen minute breaks including lunch breaks. Even rest room breaks have to be accounted for in the labor management system being used. I disliked the machinization of the people and found it a little difficult to relate our friendly harmless looking afro-american host and his passion for labor efficiency.
I was looking forward to process related insights where as the tour was guided towards just walking around and explaining the sections etc. I tried asking questions and got some answers that helped relate some of the understanding that I already have.
Stack Height : For each kind of product there is a spec on how many can be stacked on top - You will see it on the cartons.
LPN :
ASN : They don't use the ASNs coming in from the manufactures. They create shipments in the system.
Unloading : The forklift picks goods from the truck and places it inside the warehouse. After the physical placement of the goods is done.
Scanning after unloading : After unloading, scan the boxes again so that the data gets into the system.
Dock Door -> Goods mapping :
They arrange the goods so that from each dock door, you have access to various kinds of goods without having to go far.
Label printing : After unloading everything, scanning is done and then labels are printed.
RDC(Regional Distribution Center)/LDC(Local Distribution Center)
The same facility houses RDC/LDC/LAR(Latin American Region) etc and these are configured as different facilities.
Kenco is a 3PL company managing the inventory for Whirlpool. Whirlpool maintains data in SAP. Kenco uses WMOS. WMOS data is integrated into SAP.
Fork lift drivers : Could see these in action. Electric fork lift cars(Toyota) with hands that press from the sides and lifts up the washers/driers etc.
Loading : Loading is a tricky problem. How do you stack stuff so that you can put maximum stuff in.
Not very happy with WMOS as it does not direct you to the closest location of the good.
Labor Management is deeply engrained in the system : Each operator works against the tasks being assigned to him on the screen of the fork lift car that he is driving.
I could see that it takes some expertise to stack them perfect swinging around nicely - driving mostly in reverse.
Value Added service : Could see the value added service section. This section has step by step instructions on each of the permitted customizations. Customizations like adding an ice box to a refrigerator.
After VAS, the same LPN needs to be printed back on the carton.
Racks used for smaller goods where as larger things like washers are stacked on top freely.
Wifi : There is strong wifi all through the warehouse so that the system gets updated by actions from the forklift driver.
Automatic task allocation : As and when a task is completed, system allocates a new task to the worker.
Cycle count : When a worker comes for picking stuff in a location and he does not find it, he initiates a cycle count.
FourWall : Four wall a location and count the number of items in that location.
Randoms : Whirlpool generates randoms and asks Kenco to manually count number of items in a particular location.
: Full inventory count.
It is not usually hard to find the missing carton.
Charging zones for the fork lift cars ; the RFID scanners etc.
Stress on time spent/productivity : 50 cents per hour more in incentive etc.
Product Recalls : Sometimes, there are product recalls from the company(Whirlpool).
I had a good time listening to Steve as he spoke about various interesting things on the drive both ways. We ended the day with the best entree in Atlanta award winner(Pulled pork sandwich) -
2243 Akers Mill Rd
Ste 110
Atlanta, GA 30339 (770) 612-2502
Steven Brunnet (team mate) , Abhi(SCI team) and myself went together in Abhi's car - a one hour drive.It was a huge warehouse with 165 dock doors and 1.5 million squarefeet in area.
There was too much stress on labor management that I found a bit disconcerting. For an 8 hour shift , the operators are allowed just two fifteen minute breaks including lunch breaks. Even rest room breaks have to be accounted for in the labor management system being used. I disliked the machinization of the people and found it a little difficult to relate our friendly harmless looking afro-american host and his passion for labor efficiency.
I was looking forward to process related insights where as the tour was guided towards just walking around and explaining the sections etc. I tried asking questions and got some answers that helped relate some of the understanding that I already have.
Stack Height : For each kind of product there is a spec on how many can be stacked on top - You will see it on the cartons.
LPN :
ASN : They don't use the ASNs coming in from the manufactures. They create shipments in the system.
Unloading : The forklift picks goods from the truck and places it inside the warehouse. After the physical placement of the goods is done.
Scanning after unloading : After unloading, scan the boxes again so that the data gets into the system.
Dock Door -> Goods mapping :
They arrange the goods so that from each dock door, you have access to various kinds of goods without having to go far.
Label printing : After unloading everything, scanning is done and then labels are printed.
RDC(Regional Distribution Center)/LDC(Local Distribution Center)
The same facility houses RDC/LDC/LAR(Latin American Region) etc and these are configured as different facilities.
Kenco is a 3PL company managing the inventory for Whirlpool. Whirlpool maintains data in SAP. Kenco uses WMOS. WMOS data is integrated into SAP.
Fork lift drivers : Could see these in action. Electric fork lift cars(Toyota) with hands that press from the sides and lifts up the washers/driers etc.
Loading : Loading is a tricky problem. How do you stack stuff so that you can put maximum stuff in.
Not very happy with WMOS as it does not direct you to the closest location of the good.
Labor Management is deeply engrained in the system : Each operator works against the tasks being assigned to him on the screen of the fork lift car that he is driving.
I could see that it takes some expertise to stack them perfect swinging around nicely - driving mostly in reverse.
Value Added service : Could see the value added service section. This section has step by step instructions on each of the permitted customizations. Customizations like adding an ice box to a refrigerator.
After VAS, the same LPN needs to be printed back on the carton.
Racks used for smaller goods where as larger things like washers are stacked on top freely.
Wifi : There is strong wifi all through the warehouse so that the system gets updated by actions from the forklift driver.
Automatic task allocation : As and when a task is completed, system allocates a new task to the worker.
Cycle count : When a worker comes for picking stuff in a location and he does not find it, he initiates a cycle count.
FourWall : Four wall a location and count the number of items in that location.
Randoms : Whirlpool generates randoms and asks Kenco to manually count number of items in a particular location.
: Full inventory count.
It is not usually hard to find the missing carton.
Charging zones for the fork lift cars ; the RFID scanners etc.
Stress on time spent/productivity : 50 cents per hour more in incentive etc.
Product Recalls : Sometimes, there are product recalls from the company(Whirlpool).
I had a good time listening to Steve as he spoke about various interesting things on the drive both ways. We ended the day with the best entree in Atlanta award winner(Pulled pork sandwich) -
2243 Akers Mill Rd
Ste 110
Atlanta, GA 30339 (770) 612-2502
Cinish, Very good info... thank you for this... between these days there are not many posts from you...
ReplyDeleteThanks, Swapna
Thanks Swapna - I am flattered to have someone who looks for my posts :)
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