I have several partners who are immersed in the world of WMS (world management systems). I am a person constantly on the look-out for quick and dirty solutions to small and medium-sized operations.
When we need to determine the level of sophistication for the information systems support, I argue for as much simplicity as possible. They, on the other hand, seem to always gravitate toward systems that can do everything but scrub the kitchen sink.
Why can't we have just a simple locator system, and print out all of the orders in product number sequence? That would be fine, but how would you manage the reserve inventory, they ask?
Or, what would you do when a product becomes obsolete and you don't need the picking location anymore? Move all of the other products one space to the left?
When an order needs a full case, or a full pallet quantity, would you take those from the pick face, too? Wouldn't it be better to break the order into separate picking tasks based on the unit of measure requested? I'm sure that it would be more efficient.
Should we send the pickers out looking for a product that is not there, or compare the order with on-hand inventory in the pick face, and only include those products on the picklist that we believe are there, and available for this customer?
Do you want to print out the picklists as the orders are received, or wait until it is time to process them and check the most current availability? Or, might we want to hold them until we have several orders for products in the same area, and pick them as a batch?
Do we really want to print them at all? Would it be more efficient and more accurate to use radio frequency terminals and scanners to direct the picker?
If we know that products are scheduled for receipt today, would we want to wait to pick the order until they were here? Or, if popular products have been on back order, do we want to wait until they have made their way to the pick face, or could we intercept them at the receiving dock and get them out today?
Where do you want to put the workstation for weighing the order, selecting the carrier and labelling the cartons? Or, would you rather pre-print the shipping labels based on weights in the product database and pre-established rules for carrier selection?
Do we care who received the product, put it away or picked the order? Or, should we just berate the whole staff for mistakes that we find? How would we establish expectations for the time required to perform a task? How would we identify the best, and worst performers? Wouldn't it be great to know right away rather than wait for the weekly, or monthly history report?
When do you want to shut down the operation for two to three days and bring everybody in for 10 to 12 hours to take the physical inventory? Wouldn't it be nice to check the inventory in each location periodically as the operator is there to perform a put-away or picking task? And have a staff party once a year to celebrate our high count and location accuracy?
These people keep asking me so many embarrassing questions that I'm afraid to argue anymore. Maybe that fully functional WMS package is a good investment after all.
Mr Borg is a trainer and consultant in logistics and supply chain management and director of SSM Group Ltd ( www.ssmgroup.org ), a training and consultancy firm specialising in logistics and SCM.