In the distribution center, active floor management can assist the managers to enhance performance in 3 main ways. Be sure to walk the floor on a regular basis to stay abreast of problems.
By having management show presence on the floor regularly, it helps to recognize which workers may require more training and which may be the next to be promoted to a managerial position; it shows you consider the floor and everything that occurs there and the employees to be essential to the overall operation and extremely essential; finally, you could address problems as they occur.
Determine the Use of Space: Begin by examining cube utilization within your facility. Check if there is much empty space near the ceiling. Implementing narrower aisles and higher racks and particular forklifts which work in those types of environments can greatly increase how you store and transport supplies. What may not look like much wasted area could translate into thousands of square feet and extra dollars with some adjustments.
Check for Obsolete Inventory: If you see a SKU or stock-keeping unit has not moved in over a year, it is certainly consuming valuable space. Additionally, if you have numerous half-full pallets stored or staged in aisles, you are also not utilizing available space to its full potential. By doing an inventory overhaul and re-organizing existing stock, a lot of space could be made to accommodate faster moving objects.
How is the Flow of Product? Make the time to trace how precisely product flows in your facility regularly. Check to see if the flow is sequential and logical. Around 60% of direct labor within the warehouse is allotted to traveling from one place to another. You could potentially have less personnel completing the same amount of work by being aware of product flow. Being able to move staff to finish other tasks rather than having personnel doubled up moving things will get more work out of the same amount of staff.
The order filling method should be reviewed and if it is identified that a variety of SKUs are mixed-up in one place. If orders do not require items of this mix, pickers are wasting time. Another big waste of time is having the same SKU situated in multiple places inside the warehouse. Get the employees used of going to a particular place for each and every specific item so that they are just looking in one place and not traveling through the warehouse checking more than one place for the same item. These small changes can greatly improve the overall efficiency within your warehouse.