Within the distribution center, active floor supervision could help the managers to enhance performance in 3 key ways. Be sure to frequently walk the floor to stay abreast of problems.
By having management show presence on the floor regularly, it helps to identify which employees may need more training and which might be the next to be promoted to a supervisory position; it shows you consider the floor and everything that occurs there and the workers to be essential to the overall operation and very vital; finally, you could address issues as they arise.
Determine the Utilization of Space: Begin by checking cube utilization in your facility. Inspect if there is a lot of empty space close to the ceiling. Implementing narrower aisles and higher racks and particular forklifts which operate in those types of settings can really increase how you transport and store materials. What may not look like much wasted space could translate into thousands of extra dollars and square feet with a few adjustments.
Check for Obsolete Inventory: If you see a SKU or stock-keeping unit has not moved in over a year, it is definitely consuming valuable space. Also, if you have many half-full pallets that are staged or stored in aisles, you are also not utilizing valuable space to its full potential. By re-organizing existing stock and doing an inventory overhaul, much room can be made to accommodate things that are moving faster.
How is the Flow of Product? Check to see if the flow of products is both sequential and logical, by taking the time to trace how precisely product flows through your facility on a regular basis. Roughly 60 percent of direct labor within the warehouse is allotted to traveling from place to place. You could probably have less employees completing the same amount of work by being aware of product flow. Being able to move personnel to finish various other jobs rather than having employees doubled up transporting things would get more work out of the same amount of staff.
Review how the order filling procedure is happening. If you notice that a variety of SKUs are mixed-up in one place and orders do not need things of this mix, pickers are wasting time. One more huge time-waster is having the same SKU located in many places inside the warehouse. Get the staff used of going to a specific place for every specific thing so that they are simply looking in one place and not traveling all around the warehouse checking more than one place for the same thing. These small changes could vastly improve the overall efficiency within your warehouse.