TBM Research Explores the Gap Between Manufacturing Priorities and Capabilities While operational leaders recognize the urgency to address key operational improvement priorities, many don’t feel sufficiently equipped with the strategies, tools and techniques to fully achieve them, according to TBM Consulting Group’s 2015 Operational Readiness Study.
In early 2015, TBM conducted a survey of executives and senior operating leaders in global manufacturing organizations with revenues ranging from $100 million to $5 billion plus. The purpose of the research was to understand how and why operational readiness is viewed as a contributor to strategic objectives for growth and profitability.
Top Five Critical Priorities
| ..... 51% |
| ..... 45% |
| ..... 43% |
| ..... 39% |
| ..... 29% |
We found that operations is generally seen as an asset to the organization because it tends to deliver annual efficiency gains, meet its objectives and is responsive to changing customer needs and market conditions. Respondents reported that the biggest gaps between organizational objectives and the ability to achieve them are:
- Alignment of operating activities with corporate goals and objectives
- The need to create additional capacity
- Measuring and managing operational performance.
Some of the greatest opportunities for driving operational excellence involve soft skills. Over two-thirds of respondents said their organizations needed to better align existing talent and skills with the changing skillsets needed to achieve their strategic objectives. As a result, talent recruitment, development and training are a top priority. The research compared responses between manufacturing businesses operating in North America, Latin America, EMEA and APAC. While priorities vary by region, the most frequently cited operational challenge was gross margin improvement.
Other universal challenges were delivery, asset performance management, and streamlining supply chains. Operational flexibility and responsiveness will always be critical to addressing such issues. Of course success must be measured by improved financial performance (See “Top 5 Critical Corporate Priorities”). If you’re thinking about these issues, you’re not alone:
- Is your operations organization contributing to the achievement of your company’s objectives for growth and profitability?
- Are you effectively translating operational improvements into clear financial gains?
- Do your operational leaders have broad experience across the business, strong financial acumen, and do they think with a customer-centric mindset?
What does Operational Readiness mean to you? And, are you operationally ready?