Dss Assignment 23-11-09

1. Introduction This assignment will look at the process of returning a price for a requested Cooper Bussmann electrical contactor (know as the Enbray range, which is outside Cooper Bussmanns core business of fuse manufacturing) for a customer. The reason for picking this process for the simulation study is to analyse the amount of time it takes from when a customer requests an Enbray part which is not set-up on the SAP Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system to point it takes for Cooper Bussmann to return a price back to the customer. The amount of time this process can take, can be is so great that potential orders are being lost. 2. Current Situation A customer will ring Cooper Bussmann Customer Service Team (CST), to request a price and delivery on an Enbray contactor. If the part is set up on the ERP system the customer will be given a price from CST and the may place an order for the part. However if the part is not set-up on the ERP system the CST will have to check with Technical Application Team (TAT) that the part request is genuine. If the part is not genuine the CST will transfer the call to the TAT, who will speak to the customer to give them the correct part number they require, which may or may not be set-up on the ERP system. The customer will then be transferred back to the CST. If the part is genuine CST will take the customer details and the part number of the item they require and explain to the customer that they will call them back with a price. Then the CST will fill in an Engineering Change Note (ECN) with the requested Enbray part number, which will be passed to the Data Management Team (DMT) who will process the ECN. The DMT will then seek approval from several Approvers before setting the part up. Once these approvals have been received the DMT will then set-up the part on then ERP system. Once the DMT have set-up the part they will inform the Pricing Team, who will set a price to the Enbray part on the system and will inform the DMT. The DMT will complete the ECN and inform the CST that the ECN is completed. The CST will then call the customer to give them the price and delivery date of the contactor, who may or may not place an order. This is all shown in Appendix A as Activity Cycle Diagram (ACD). The reason why all Enbray parts are not set up on the system is due to the fact when Cooper Bussmann migrated to the SAP software, it was decided only to structure parts that were sold in large volume on to system as there were to many part to do. 3. Stakeholders To identify the stakeholders the following criteria has been used “any individual, group, community or organization with a potential interest in the outcome of an Activity, either as a result of being affected by it or by being able to influence the

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project, in a positive or negative way”(nzaidtools.nzaid.govt.nz,2009). With this in mind the stakeholders have been listed, along with their interest in the project. The Project Champion will have the greatest interested in the simulation to see where improvement can be made and to justify the time and cost that will be spent on the simulation. These improvement will need to be shown to all stakeholder and higher management. They will also need to justify the project to all involved to get them on side to do the study. The Customer would be an important stakeholder because, if they do not get the information they require in a set period time, they may not place the order. Customers not placing orders is detrimental to the business, as orders means income to the firm. The Customer Service Team have a large vested interested in the simulation study as the process involves them more than any other group. They have to interact with the majority of the other groups involved and have to interface with the customer. If the process is more efficient it may reduce the time they spend on the returning a price back to the customer. The Technical Application Team would be an interested party to see if it would require less of their time in the process. The Data Management Team would be interested in the simulation study as they have to deal with pressure from other groups on completing the ECN. It can also take a longer amount of time to enter some parts on to the ERP system than others depending on their complexity, which can be wasted if the order is not placed after the customer finds out the price. The Pricing Teams influence on the process will minimal, but their overall effect on an order being placed will be quite high. If the price is to high the order may be lost and all the set-up time wasted. The Product Manager for the Enbray range will be interested in the process to see how many orders are won or lost. They will want to know as much as possible about the time being used to set-up parts on the ERP system and how many of these turn out to be completed orders. The company Directors will what to see why it worth doing the simulation and the possible benefits it might have to the business in comparison to costs and time invested. 4. Objectives The main objective of the simulation would be to see if the time taken to return a price for an Enbray part, which is not set-up on the ERP system to the customer could be reduced. It would be also important to see if this would increase the amount of orders that are placed customer. This would also hopefully reduce the time spent on process by the Customer Service Team, Technical Application Team, and Data Management Team.

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The secondary objective of the simulation would be to see if the price that has been set on the contactor is causing customer not to purchase them. This may not be possible until after the simulation is done. This is because the customer may not placing an order due to the time they have had to wait to get a price. 5. Benefits The overall intension of this simulation is to see if the above objectives are met so that the realistic benefits are achieved. The most important benefit will be to return a price to the customer for an Enbray contactor in the quickest time possible. This will hopefully also increase the amount of order placed by the customer fro Enbray contactors. The benefit of the objective and simulation on the Customer Service Team will allow them to improved their service, to all customers and not just the ones who inquiry about Enbray parts for the following reasons. • If there is less paper work to be filled in (completing an ECN form and taking down customer detail), it will allow extra time to answers more customer inquires. This will also lead increased customer satisfaction, which will lead to customer coming back to Cooper Bussmann to do more business. • They will not have to chase the Data Management Team to find out if the ECN they have raised has been completed, because the customer is chasing for a price. For the Technical Application Team it will allow them to spend more time on dealing with application inquires, and not confirming if a part is genuine or not. For the Directors, the Product Managers and the company as whole, it will make the firm more efficient, by cutting down the wasted time spent on setting up products which are not sold, which will reduce non value added operations. All the benefits will lead to the company making greater margins on the products they sell. 6. Data Collection The majority of the data will need to be collected by the Customer Service Team and the Data Management Team, but in return they will gain the greatest benefits as stated above. This can be a way for the Project Champion to get the buy-in of the two teams to collect data. The buy-in is going to be important to make sure that the data being collected accurately. The data that will need to be collected is listed below (and who will collect it); • The number of customers that inquire about an Enbray contactors (CST). • How many inquires for Enbray part are already set-up on the system or not (CST). • The number of calls transferred to Technical Application Team (CST). • The time taken to capture customer details (CST). • The number of ECN raised and the time taken to populate ECN to determine the average time to complete an ECN (CST). • The time taken to get all the approvals from the Approvers (DMT)

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• The time it takes for an Enbray part to be set-up on the ERP system to determine the average time taken to set-up a part (DMT). • The time taken for the Pricing Team to give a price to a part. (DMT). • Time taken to complete an ECN (DMT). • The overall time taken to get a price back to the customer (CST) • The number of customers who place an order for a contactor which was already set-up on the system and the customer who did not and the reason why (CST). • The number of customers who places an order for contactor which was not set-up on the system and the customer who did not and the reason why (CST). Some of this data may be already collected such the price given to a part and the time taken to complete ECN. However for the other pieces of data that needs to be collected it my be best to capture it on a spreadsheet with simply fields to be completed and not to over complicating the process of data capture. Once the required data has been identified, it will be important to determine the quantity of data that will need to be collected. If there is not enough data collected it may mean that the simulation is not accurate and the results given may not be correct. However Centeno and Carrillo (2001) state quantity does not mean quality, so too much data being collected, could take to much time causing frustration to and not add value to the simulation. For this reason it would be ideal to collect the data over a 2-4 weeks period. This would give enough data to for the simulation and to verify the simulation is accurate. 7. Timescale The initial part of the Project would be to get the buy-in from company director and find a project sponsor to support the product champion. There will also be a meetings require to get the buy-in of all the stakeholder and explain the purpose of the project. The next stage would be the data collection and to analyse the data make sure it is correct. Once the data is collect the simulation will need to constructed and verified using the data. This time period will depend on the type of software used (most like of the shelf) and people tasked with the constructing the simulation (in house or external contractors). After verifying the simulation, it can be used run the different changes listed. • Increasing the number of Enbray part structure on the SAP ERP system. • Change the number of approvals the Data Management Team have to wait on. • Increase the number of people in the Data Management Team dealing with ECN. • What would happen in the event if the number of customer calling about Enbray parts increased or decreased. • Increasing the number of people in the Customer Service Team. The next stage would be to analyse the output data from the simulation. This could take a significant amount of time depending on how the results are shown. This could

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be done on a spreadsheet or even on specialist statistical package which may speed up the process. After analysing the results a report will need to written to show the internal stakeholders the finding of the simulation. The report will contain the recommendation that should be implemented to meet the objectives, and what the impact it will have in terms of initial cost or savings. It will also state the impact it will have on the key stakeholder groups. It will need to be done carefully as not to isolate one group as they may require to do more work. Implementation of the new strategy will be very important as, this my require hiring extra staff. If extra staff is require the time scale of the project will increase as the recruitment process will need to be done. After the implementation stage there should be a period of monitoring the changes to proof how accurate the simulation was and if the implemented changes have been successful. It will also give an opportunity to review the project as a whole, and to see what could be done better in future projects. With this process it should be done in a “timely manner” (Centeno and Carrillo, 2001), so that it will show all internal stakeholders that simulation study is worth doing and that the result are given in an acceptable period of time. 8. Conclusion As with any project it very important to spend time on the planning stage to make sure that all the bases have been covered. It important to set out clear objectives which need to achieve, and the realistic benefits these will give. It is also important to get the buy-in of all the stakeholder, to guarantee their support through the life of the project. As for the simulation it very important that is verified using the data capture to make sure it give the correctly result and that results produced in given time frame. It also needs to be remember that the result seen from the simulation are a calculated guide to how the process would work if the different variables where changed. The implementation may differ slightly and may require tweaking to get close to the desired results. 9. References Centeno, M.A.,Carrillo, M. 2001. Challenges of introducing simulation as a decision making tool. Proceedings of the 2001 Winter Simulation Conference, Arlington, VA, USA Nzaidtools.nzaid.govt.nz .2009. Logical Framework Approach: Using LFA in Activity Cycle Management. URL: http://nzaidtools.nzaid.govt.nz/logical-framework-approach/using-lfa-activitycycle-management

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Appendix A: Activity Cycle Diagram Customer Customer Calls

Outside

Wait to be answere d

Wait for answe r

Customer Details Taken

Customer transferred to Technical Application Team

Customer Given Price

Customer Request Enbray part

Wait for answe r Hang Up

Check Part with Technical Application

Customer Orders Part

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Customer Service Team

Wait for answe r

Ring Customer Idle

Check Part System

Customer Request Enbray part

Check Part with Technical Application

Customer Given Price

Customer transferred to Technical Application Team

Customer Details Taken

Inform Data Management

Customer Orders Part

Create ECN

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Data Management Team

Inform Data Management

Idle

Process ECN

ECN Complete

Technical Application Team

Price Part

Pricing Team

Approve Part

Approver

Idle

Idle

Idle

Check Part with Technical Application

Price Part

Approve Part

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