Logistics and distribution
Get the right goods out, on time, without the firefighting.
A small logistics or distribution business runs on procedures, one or two key people and a system that may or may not be doing its job. When any of those slips, the customer finds out first.
What it means for you
Fewer errors reach customers
Less rework, fewer credit notes and fewer awkward calls.
Less firefighting
Procedures and systems that hold up on a bad day.
A business that outlasts key staff
What people know is written down and built into the work.
What owners usually ask for
- “Our warehouse system never really worked.” Find out why, then recover it or replace it, whichever costs you less. Most failures are about procedures and people as much as software.
- “The wrong goods keep going out.” Trace where the errors really start, and make the smallest change that stops them.
- “We need to connect to a big customer or marketplace.” EDI and marketplace links set up so orders move by themselves rather than by copy and paste.
- “It all lives in one supervisor’s head.” Procedures written down in plain language, and built into how the work actually runs.
- “I can’t see which customers make us money.” Margin by customer and by job, from the figures you already have.
Where I have done this
The experience behind it
A warehouse operation, recovered and relaunched
An operation taken over with a new investor, with a late warehouse system and EDI link, weak procedures, and gaps in training and leadership. As interim manager I rewrote the procedures, led the rebuild of the warehouse system with a specialist developer, and coordinated the owner and the accounts lead. The warehouse system and EDI went live, e-commerce pick-and-pack expanded and the business relaunched, including returns and fulfilment for online retail and wine merchants.
A contractor’s supply side
Twenty years with one Hong Kong contractor taught me the other side too: purchase orders, invoices, payment certificates and job costs, in a system of more than 500,000 records that has to work every day.
Being straight about it. I can’t quote you a percentage improvement from that recovery, because nobody measured one properly. On your job we agree the measure and take a baseline before anything starts.
Good places to start
Jobs slip, or the wrong goods go out
Find where delivery breaks, and put ownership and a working system around it.
ProjectSmartNumbers you can trust
Reporting pulled together from the systems you already run.
WorkSmartNot sure what is wrong
One session to find the real cause and the next move.
ThinkSmart · HK$888Running a warehouse on workarounds?
Tell me what went wrong last month. If it is not something I should be doing, I will say so.