Financial and Operational Discipline Is a Team Sport

Most printing company MIS systems are chock-full of data and production information. A few challenges though, are how to extract them in a meaningful way, and then who’s going to own those numbers and defend them – good or bad? If nobody owns the numbers, then nobody defends them. Having robust business and operational insight isn’t just knowing the numbers; it’s knowing who is responsible for each one and having a list of levers to push or pull should the results fall short of expectations. Here are some applications.

The Financial Review

The monthly financial review should be looked at as an opportunity to confirm what you probably already know. While your CFO or head of your accounting department should lead this review, the owner, or CEO ultimately owns the outcome. Throughout the review, everyone on the senior team should be allowed to ask questions and make comments. Here’s where it goes a different direction though, the department head who’s responsible for the line item in question defends it. This is not the responsibility of the CFO, as they are the scorekeeper. If sales are soft, then sales should defend the results. If waste is up, then production defends it.

Driving Throughput and Fixing Constraints

When you look at operational throughput, you’ve got to lean on production leadership to own it. But the constraints that are identified are often cross functional – sales, scheduling, and production all touch those constraints. The plant manager or production manager usually is the one identifying these constraints, as they are the closest to the bottleneck. They use real data and not only gut feel. When the impediments have been clearly identified, there needs to be a single owner per constraint with a deadline for the fix. While that owner may lean on many to solve the problem, they still own the issue. Constraints that are assigned to everyone, belong to no one.

The Weekly Scorecard

This is a scorecard that has 5 to 10 different metrics covering sales, throughput, on-time delivery, spoilage or rework, AR and cash – as examples. Typically, it’s the owner or president that reviews this weekly with the various department heads. These same department heads may also review a departmental version with their team. Some companies will use the red, yellow and green indicators for the scorecard to give it some teeth. Yellow means it needs to be watched and red means there needs to be an action plan due by the next time we meet. Whoever owns the metric that’s in red is responsible for developing the action plan, due by the following week.

These are just examples of how you can be using the information in your MIS system to help drive performance and improvement in your business. Business and operational insight isn’t just about knowing your numbers, it’s knowing who’s responsible for each one and giving them the latitude to take corrective action, reduce constraints, and improve overall operational performance. This is not a Barney Fife assignment.

These are my thoughts, but what’s working for you? How are you working to keep the momentum of your business going, while leveraging the opinions and experience of your team? Please add your thoughts and comments below.

Mike Philie helps owners and CEOs in the Graphic communications industry validate what’s working, identify what needs to change, and create a practical path forward.

PhilieGroup | mphilie@philiegroup.com | Linkedin

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