Qk

id 13

BeforeImproving AfterImproving Too many emails from people being 350 people - 1 minute a week 350 out broadcasting it. minutes a week times 52 weeks equals 303 hours a year saved. Talk to transfer driver and tell him to He did not know this is a problem. not block the north dock. Easy fix. too much metal being thrown away. I've tried for years to get metal recycling in the CDC, but it continues to fall on deaf ears. Order pickers going to 8ft section of Moving 8ft section to last on the warehouse first. pick sequence helped with carring and moving long items through the warehouse. needed speed dial set on phone saved time not looking up numbers system in outlook In a email group that did not need to Not in that email group, less emails be in. (VMI Purching) to look at.

TheEffect Leave an out message on the voicemail, email, or Eclipse instructing people who to contact. Saves the driver using that dock a few minutes a day. Yet to proven. We are a leader in many areas, metal recycling should be one of them. I changed the pick sequence to grab the harder items last so we move them less.

Name Date Barry Boyer 8/25/2008

WasteType Over Processing

Tim Roth

8/27/2008

Transportation WE - Rochester

John Poswpisil

8/20/2008

Defects

Mark Schuster

8/7/2008

Transportation WE - Cottage Grove

Warehouse

Saved time

Steve Weitzel Jesse Dodson

8/28/2008

Over Producing WE - Rochester

Outside Sales

8/27/2008

Over Producing VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

44

Wastebasket in my workspace in the new building was in a position where I could not reach it without sliding my chair about 3 feet

Moved wastebasket so it is within reach from my chair

I use my waste basket Heather approximately 10 times per day so I Fleming saved 3 feet movement per use and about 3 seconds each time (so, 30 feet movement per day or 150 feet per week and 30 seconds per day)

9/9/2008

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Org Effectiveness

32

No process for vehicle maintenance.

Process has been created and implemented.

29 12 10

28 24

33

35

I was getting emails (There was 6 pepole in the Product file and Rebate group all where in the email group) for a group I did not need. Save time by not needing to delete emails that I do not need or in this caes all 6 of us do not need.

Branch Department VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Administrative Warehouse

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

Vehicles are being maintained properly because of the notification process. Can the cdc take the paperwork off By doing this i will know that i have The effect will be time saved for of the cross dock product and put it more product to find and i can do myself and the intown driver in with the other paperwork going to this before leaveing on my route. because he wont have to bring the branches.i missed one today missed product to me. because i didnt have the paperwork for it it was on the box. it cost me and the intown driver 25 minutes each.

Leorita Hauschildt

8/29/2008

Defects

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Administrative

Kevin Lawson

8/29/2008

Motion

WE - Rochester

Warehouse

Price increase announcements Spend much less time looking for show up our computers for sales lit, that may not be in the equipment WERNER has for sale litterature room. but there is no shelve space designated for the product catalogs and no catalogs.

J.D. Ryan

9/3/2008

Motion

WE - Cottage Grove

Outside Sales

If the manufacture contacts WERNER with price increase information, a reply back to ask for sales litterature would take 25 seconds. Can the purchasing people do that?

36

Many companies buy Holiday gifts more sales $$$, More exposure in More sales, more distintion from our J.D. Ryan for employees from gift catalogs. At our customers facilities. competitors as being a place to our Chilli Feed, many of out vendors shop for more items. show up with neat gift like products.IE Flashlights, leatherman tools, tool totes, screwdriver sets, hats, gloves, Thermos jugs, ETC. I would like to see a catalog from WERNER with a bunch of these items and prices for the customers to buy those EXTRA bonus gifts from WERNER instead of some unknown supplier with a once a year catalog in the mail. We could send this catalog to a list of cus

9/3/2008

Waiting

WE - Cottage Grove

Outside Sales

37

We have many " X" items on our More items to sell at our customers shelves the sales force, in and out, we may not know we have on the don't know about. Start with Bug shelves. spray, We have cases of bug spray.

Each week, put at least two X items J.D. Ryan on a display table in the sales area. ( there is plenty of room, and tables).

9/3/2008

Inventory

WE - Cottage Grove

Outside Sales

38

who's who for our customers, hope customer confusion will be vendors etc in the lighting quotes gone. dept. I have been working with Nycole in the marketing dept to creat a flyer with our pictures, work info etc. We hope to have this done in the next month.

We hope to have this solved in the Debbie next month. We hope this will clear Edman up who the customers need to talk with. quoteing a project, call quotes. running project call the PM's, gear, call them,and so on.

9/3/2008

Motion

WE - Cottage Grove

Inside Sales

39

Heather was taking time to scroll up and down within e-mails on her blackberry Inside Sales when out would not leave instructions on voice mail as to who to contact in their absence leaving customers unsure. Hours of valuable customer sales time correcting, crediting and returning material back from customers that are in a non returnable state. Today the inventory number for our laptops is located on the bottom of the laptop. When the laptop is seated in the docking station the number is not accessible without powering off the computer and removing from the docking station.

Heather is lightning fast with the "t" Time saved on every e-mail read and "b" buttons.

Kevin Powell 9/3/2009

Motion

WE - Cottage Grove

Org Effectiveness

Specific instructions are left on voicemail or emails are sent to customers letting them know the contact Focus face time sales calls on new business and growing sales at specific accounts.

In progress but will ease customer frustration

Barry Boyer 9/3/2008

Waiting

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Administrative

Train and educated our pick drivers Lou to understand product and what is a Bredemus legitimate returnable item.

10/4/2008

Over Processing

WE - Cottage Grove

Outside Sales

If we placed the inventory tag elsewhere on the laptop (perhaps on top)when requested to provide the number by the IT staff we can more easily locate saving everyone's time.

Saved time by IT staff and person calling.

9/4/2008

Motion

WE - Cottage Grove

Administrative

The ceiling mounted wireless projector in the meeting room caused dificulty for visiting presenters. We lost time in setting up and often caused delays.

I installed a serial cable through the ceiling tile and through the wall installed an outlet box and routed the cable through the outlet plate. Leaving a easily accessible hardwired connection to the ceiling mounted projector.

We now have a simple way for Mike Jensen 9/5/2008 visiting presenters to connect to the cieling mounted projector. By routing the cable through the ceiling and wall its hidden and looks great.

Waiting

WE - St. Cloud

Automation

40

41

42

43

Craig A. Amundson

45

Even though all items have a location, large reels of wire are always tough to keep in the correct place and be able to see from ground level if that truley is what it is. Sometimes you are getting a fork lift to lower a reel and it isn't what you are thinking.

Before a reel of wire gets put away now, it has a large tag attached to it so no matter where you are standing you can see forsure the type of wire it is before getting a fork lift to lower the reel down.

You are saving several minutes of Bob your time and possible someone Beckman elses by just having to guess that the reel you are getting down is reeling what you want, instead of having to find out different and have to put it back and keep looking.

46

BLACKBERRY USERS - SIGNING ONTO WEBSITE ON YOUR PHONE WWW.YAHOO.COM WHEN SIGNING ON YOUR PHONE USE M.YAHOO.COM FOR MOBIL USERS. WORKS ON MOST SITES

USING "M.THEN THE WEB SITE" IT LOADS FASTER, WITH OUT ALL THE ADVERTISING, CAN READ THE SITE EASIER.

WHEN I USE IT IT SPEEDS UP LOADING TIMES FOR THE WEB SITE I AM GOING ON.

47

Employees were unable to efficently use the training room because there were no clear instructions for set up of the room partition, lights, projectors, etc. Printing off emails sent to vendors

There is now an instruction sheet and box of materials for each large training room improving effectiveness of training sessions and reducing preparation time. DO NOT PRINT the email cover sheet for rebates

The training rooms can now be utilized by ALL employees!!

48

49 50 51

Werner submits rebates for 39 suppliers. This will save 39 sheets of paper per month/quarter/year Printing unnecessary report Do not print report from Hubbell, Saving paper, approx 10-12 sheets only view per month Making several trips to the Saving over 100 steps per trip, now Saving 100 steps per trip, approx breakroom for water/ice using the H&W mug for water and 500 steps day ice Submitted rebate claims as outlined I created a spreadsheet for This improvement helps us to get in alpha order resulting in accounts accounts payable that showed them our credit dollars used within the payable receiving the credit memos which vendors I submit rebate same month as submitting which after they had paid the vendor. claims and they filled in what dates increases our gross profit. they pay these vendors. Changed process to submit before these payment due dates.

9/9/2008

Motion

WE - La Crescent

Inside Sales

ROB 9/9/2008 RASMUSSE N

Waiting

WE - Rochester

Inside Sales

Kelli Lewis and Kirsten

8/25/2008

Waiting

WE - Cottage Grove

Inside Sales

Susan Alvarez

9/11/2008

Over Producing VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

Susan Alvarez Susan Alvarez

9/11/2008

Over Producing VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

9/11/2008

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

Lana Cobb

9/14/2008

Waiting

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Administrative

52

Vendor would send price files which had incomplete data. We would not know it was incomplete because nothing tell us it is incomplete. It would cause po# price problems.

Found another file in PDW to display on a report which would alert us of when a vendors data was incomplete. Now we display the price sheet effective date. If a suppliers price sheet effective date is old, we know their data is incomplete.

This will help reduce price problems Joe Wallace 9/11/2008 on purchase order and sales order side due to not knowing the vendors effective date.

Defects

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

53

After a price update we would find old data which we had to either manually edit to remove or run a eclipse purge which takes a very long time. The purge would not always remove all the bad data because of the way the data in indexed.

We found a way to translate old More reliable data and quicker turn Joe Wallace 9/11/2008 data with a PDW map. This opened around time. up a whole world of new possiblities. Now no data is missed and we don't have to stop and wait for the purge to finish which slows down the update process.

Defects

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

54

Often when someone closes out a job queue, it re-sends to everyone on the forward list. Then, the recipients open the queue & re-read it and start to investigate the original post, sometimes sending "I thought this was taken care of" replies to the sender.

Now when I get a job queue, I just Time re-reading & investigating Patty Treinen 9/11/2008 type shift-End to skip to the last post resolved job queues would be first. Then, I'll only go back to read eliminated. from the beginning if it's needed. (p.s. selecting "remove me from follow-up" on a job queue when it's still ongoing but no longer concerns you will prevent the above situation from happening in the first place.)

Over Processing

WE - Eau Claire

Inside Sales

55

I want home stressed. I took work I took the effective edge course and home. I would forget things. I could read the book. My life changed! not get my hands around big projects. My email in-box was out of contrrol.

I became more effective. Here are Joe Wallace 9/11/2008 my results. 1) How many hours per week do you expend on work (including thinking about it)? pre: 58.75 post: 48.75 diff: -10.00

-17.02% Decrease

2) On a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the highest, what is your current level of work-related stress? pre: 7.25 post: 3.75 diff: -3.50

-48.28% Decrease

3) What % of your current activity is actually spent on your goals, objectives, and proj

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Finance

56

The product file department gets many ques and emails reporting pricing issues. The issues span vendor bad data, human error, purchasing errors, etc. It takes time to trouble shoot each one. We wanted a method to capture how many of these reported issues are coming in and getting handling and what the root cause is.

We creates some unique Eclipse Tracking this information helps us UET codes to store the results after find process problems and vendor the root cause investigation is done. issues which must be addressed. Each UET point back to the original transaction so if someone wants to pull the details it is availble.

Joe Wallace 9/11/2008

Defects

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

57

Product file could not maintain items if we had nothing in house from the suppliers. Sales/Purchasing would send PF vendor emails with pricing and ask for the item to be maintained based on the email.

Create process to update products Reduction in PNMs. based on vendors email. Emails are scanned as attachment to the product file record in eclipse. These items are seperated with unique discount code. They will be maintained up until the next official vendor price change. The image attachment now is centrally located for all to see so if A/P or purchasing get quoted something different they can see the vendors quote.

Joe Wallace 9/11/2008

Defects

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

58

Have to ask employees for their computer\laptop tag # and sometimes this required them to undock their laptops or crawl on the floor to read off a number.

59

60

61

62

IT staff can look up these numbers easily on a website. No employee should be have to crawl or look up this number unless they are using a "generic" login at a counter system or warehouse. Asking Helpdesk for assistance Received permission to use the when shipping cell phone shipping area and box the equipment via transfer truck. equipment. Learned details on transfer worksheet and where to set the items for pickup. Labels for shipping were piled Doug Dawson and I moved labels together in a cabinet, around a onto racking in orderly fashion, now corner where you could not see much easier to see and keep track them. Couldn't see what needed to of. be ordered, not easily accessable for shippers. The light is always on Conserving Energy

Just sent the procedure to IT today Tracie but should be less time spent Henrickson looking up numbers and more time spent working on the problem the employee called us about.

9/11/2008

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp IT

I am able to take my package and Pam process without interupting anyone Glandorf or needing to wait for assistance.

9/11/2008

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

Labels are within easy reach for the Lynn Jess pickers and Erik can easily see what and Doug may need to be ordered. Dawso

9/11/2008

Waiting

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

If I am the last person to leave the Susie breakroom, I will turn off the light. Alvarez Hopefully more people will catch on. I have a practice at home, no more than 2 lights on at a time.

9/11/2008

Inventory

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

I would always print the e-mail I sent I choose not to print this page and to vendors for my rebate claim as just stamp the date on my claim as proof I sent it and on what verification. I still have the e-mail date/time. filed in a folder in Outlook as proof of sending if I would need it.

By not printing this page, I save Lana Cobb time (walking to and back from the printer) and there is a dollar savings on paper.

9/11/2008

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Administrative

63

64

Items on the third shelf in the high bay section of the CDC were at a height that required a ladder to reach. stored emails pertaining to a project or subject in outlook, while other information was stored on personal drive.

Beams were lowered for better accessability without the use of a ladder.

Time and steps were saved by ommiting the need for a ladder, let alone the safety issue.

Cindy Forsyth

9/11/2008

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

All documenation for project all Mary Kremer 9/11/2008 stored in the same folder in my personal drive. Resulted in quick location of all information I needed and cleared out outlook. Receive item, cross dock single line Cross Dock- Rather than receiving Rudy 9/11/2008 items,QA checks,Item goes to item putting that item in location and Thedford shipping waiting for sales order to drop which could be the next day!! We have the ability to receive item, cross dock item in a matter of minutes if you have any questions or would like to see how it's done feel free to come and see me I'll gladly show you how it's done

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Org Effectiveness

Were gonna add about 60-100 more spools in and wire will come in and be directly to cutting now so everyone has access to the wire. Changed the steps around so this can be viewed sooner in the process.

a week from saturday we will do this Ryan Grimm 9/21/2008 project. It should be solved

Inventory

moved emails to same location as other information(word docs, excel.....)

65

Receive an item, put item in location, wait for sales order to drop,pickers pick the item,QA checks item, item goes to shipping

66

Wire has a setup but there is a better way to go about it.

67

When doing a line update we are not catching a gp% change quick enough. We do have a process to catch these, but it is too far down in the process. Printed Employee Status Change Unprinted Employee Status Change Forms Forms

Updates won't leave the product file Joe Wallace 9/12/2008 department without some warning given to Joe or Chris to address the matrix.

Over Producing VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

Now the electronic Status Change Beth Moser Form is saved via our computer network. There is no need to print a copy for the employees file. The correct info can be viewed in Abra & AWC and the forms can be retrieved via the computer.

9/12/2008

Over Producing VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Org Effectiveness

Transfers dropped at 1:30. I wrote Transfers now drop at 7:00am. an e-mail that got the ball rolling on moving transfers to the early morning. When transfers were dropped late in the day they caused bottle necking issues because they are so large. They also caused a problem because the most orders drop around this same time, so the work was no spread out evenly. It creates a lot of idle time early in the day, and leaves almost the entire work load at the end of the day.

This is helping with the over all flow Nick Searle of orders through our picking queue. The work is now more evenly divided throughout the hours of the day, instead of all the work being clumped between 1:30-3:00. This is going to help, generally speaking, with over times issues on second and first shift.

9/15/2008

Defects

68

69

Transportation VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

WE - Cottage Grove

Warehouse

70

There was no stable training program for new warehouse employees.

I wrote a training program.

I put three new hires through our Nick Searle training program. The amount of errors that new employees usually make was significantly less with these new hires. When I questioned several "seasoned" employees, they all told me that the new hires didn't ask as many questions, raising the overall productivity of the warehouse. Each new hire needed less training as they learned how to do different jobs in the warehouse.

9/15/2008

Defects

WE - Cottage Grove

Warehouse

9/15/2008

Waiting

WE - Eau Claire

Inside Sales

I have concluded that considering the amount of time saved in asking questions, the amou 72

When customers or account managers would call a project coordinator wondering who was working on their project, the project coordinator would have to call around to all the other coordinators to see who was working on the project in question.

I created a form that lists off of the project coordinators and what projects they are running, the status of the project, the order number and the customer that gets emailed out to all of the quotations dept. and account managers every Friday. Now at a look any one of us can see what projects we are working on if we get any calls.

Before, you could waste up to 30 Brenda minutes trying to figure out who was McIlquham working on a project. Now at a couple of clicks to bring up the program, you are able to view all of the updated information. We also look more efficient to our customers because we are able to transfer them to the correct person or have a better idea what we need to do.

73

I had three different default printers, depending on what I was doing on the computer. One of the printers was on the other side of the warehouse(50 yards away from my work station) Jessica Carson informed me that our truck was to early at customer to pick up a return. I was going there that week so I picked up return and got it back to Jessica. Boxes on the bottom two shelves in the low bay area had "flaps" on them that made it hard to fit product in and pick product from the box

I was given a printer @ my work station.

All of my end of day reports Doug 9/16/2008 ( SpeeDee & FedEx) are now Dawson printed at my work station . About 40% of my eclipse printing is now done @ my area,(still some bugs to work out). The truck driver did not have to Jeff Schulner 9/16/2008 waste time giong back or waiting for customer to open up.

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

Waiting

WE - Eau Claire

Outside Sales

9/17/2008

Defects

WE - Cottage Grove

Warehouse

Document scan/email confirmation sheet printed from OD printer = waste of paper.

Put in a request with IT to reprogram the printer to keep the document from printing.

After cutting off the "flaps" or Nick Searle "wings" on these boxes, the product is now better accesible to the pickers and easier to put away for receiving. Which saves time AND frustration :) The confirmation document no Jen Engler longer prints after a document is scanned and emailed to someone. Paper is saved.

9/16/2008

Over Producing VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Org Effectiveness

74

75

76

Jessica konws that if truck has problem picking up small returns I can and will help out.

Boxes now have a bigger access area

77

VMI mugs were located in the main break room above the coffee maker. First, for shorter people it is hard to reach. Second, located above the HOT coffee machine. Not easily accessible so mugs are not being used therefore not cutting down costs of cups and not making VMI more "Green".

Re-did shelving so mugs can be Cabinet are better use of space. relocated to a differecnt cabinet that Rarely used supplies were located is lower but still close to the coffee were mugs were. machine. Re-doing shelving also made the cabinet more efficient to hold the same product as before (coffee grounds and filters).

78

WE HAD SOME BIG ORDERS LOST BECAUSE OUR STOCK WAS INSUFFICIENT.SO I SENT AN EMAIL TO RANDY AND WE IMPLEMENTED MONDAY MORNING MEETINGS TO GO OVER STOCK LINES 1 BY 1.

79

We would keep hard copies of vendor packing list for future refrence. Kept up to 1 year.

84

Joanne Laramie

9/17/2008

Inventory

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Administrative

OUR STOCK LEVELS INCREASED DRAMATICALLY.

WE HAD A NICE ORDER COME STEVE 9/18/2008 THROUGH,THE CUSTOMER SCHERBEL WANTED LARGER SIZE CONDUIT NIPPLES.HE WAS SURPRISED THAT WE HAD THEM NOW IN STOCK,THIS WOULD NOT HAPPENED A MONTH AGO HAD WE NOT GONE OVER THE INVENTORY TO DETERMINE WHAT WE NEEDED ON THE SHELF.

Inventory

WE - Cottage Grove

Inside Sales

We attach the packing lists directly to the PO by scnanning packing lists

we are able to find packing lists Bill Gilpin wuickly and easily without digging through piles of paperwork. Everyone has access to the packing lists not just the receiving department. We can now recycle our hard copies of the packing list at the end of each day saving spaced that was used to store them.

9/18/2008

Over Processing

WE - Cottage Grove

Warehouse

When a person is working on If the label machine is working 20se/sw, because of the label properly, that makes the shipper's machine not working,they are going job much easier. back and forth getting labels.

We need someone to come take a Dorothea look at the label machine. We need Bennette to order another machine if we need to.

9/18/2008

Waiting

WE - Cottage Grove

Warehouse

83

Assigning picker had to always look at customer label info. sheet or view order to determine if customer required labels.

Orders for customers requiring labels are flagged in the Warehouse in Process Screen, saving time for assigning picker, who no longer has to check if labels are needed, he or she is already notified by flagging.

Flagging orders requiring customer Lynn Jess labels saves time and money. Picker doesn't need to inquire by other methods about labeling or use extra bags in labeling process.

9/18/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

85

The person assigning the que assigns 2 or 3 branches on the same tote. The checkers are going from branch to branch using the same head tote.

If the que person were assigning the same branches to the same tote, that will be better for the checkers.

When assigning the totes to the same branch,the high-bay pickers and low-bay checkers can put the totes in front of that branch.

9/18/2008

Motion

WE - Eau Claire

Dorothea Bennette

Warehouse

86

Goal for Build a Better Body Challenge is to donate blood. Time away from work to meet this challenge.

Organized a Blood drive to come to By initiating the Mayo Blood Donor MARY our branch, so all could participate. Program, and establishing a blood HANSEN assurance program, Rochester Branch employees and eligible dependents are covered for processing fees associated with banked blood products, should they require a transfusion. These fees not covered by insurance will be waived. Savings of time away from work, part of H&W goal, Selfinsured savings for the company, and the biggest plus for every pint donated, three lives can be saved!

9/19/2008

Over Processing

WE - Rochester

Administrative

87

WHEN KEYING ORDERS IN ECLIPSE, I HAVE TO TOGGLE BETWEEN ECLIPSE AND OUTLOOK (WHERE THE FAXES COME IN TO ME), OR PRINT THE FAX OUT ON THE PRINTER. I AM CONSTANTLY TOGGLING BACK AND FORTH TO LOOK AT MY FAXES AND THEN BACK TO ECLIPSE. IF I HAD 2 MONITORS, I COULD INCREASE PRODUCTIVITY AND DECREASE ERRORS CAUSED FROM GOING BACK AND FORTH, AND SAVE PAPER.

I COULD SAVE TIME FROM TBD. GOING BACK AND FORTH BETWEEN OUTLOOK AND ECLIPSE, AND ALSO SAVE PAPER BY HAVING THE FAX ON MY 2ND SCREEN. THIS WOULD ALLOW ME MORE TIME FOR FOLLOW-UP ON BACK ORDERS.

9/19/2008

Motion

WE - Rochester

Inside Sales

88

Brooms and dust pan are many places in warehouse.

Two brooms, hand brush and two dust pans are located on shadow board for easy access in our location.

By having cleaning tools in an Quality organized area, anyone can find Assurance them and not waste time looking Team-and can return them to this shadow board for the next time needed.

9/19/2008

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

89

Continuously trying to find my Put my calculator on my computer calculator because i use it a lot with stand so I don't have to try to look budgets and marketing co-op funds through papers and clutter on my desk for it I used to have to complete work getting 2 screens is a simple using one computer screen. It was change, but lets you view double difficult to navigate through SMP, the information. allowing you to be Outlook, Eclipse, and have an more visually comfotable and internet browser open to look at a complete work faster. customer's business all at the same time. Even worse was trying to enter orders off of emails.

Problem was solved! I now know Nycole exactly where it is every time i need Gauger it!

9/19/2008

Over Processing

WE - Cottage Grove

Marketing

I can enter orders and complete and John McNee 9/19/2008 pre-approach research before calling customers much faster, not to mention increased efficiency when dealing with almost any task on the computer.

Waiting

WE - Cottage Grove

Inside Sales

Having to work around a couple of Can sort payroll checks without boxes of returned W-9s from having to be inconvenienced by the previous years that we need to keep boxes. but don't need to get into much. In the way when sorting payroll checks.

Asked Tom Durian if there was some place else to store them; he knew an area and took them there for me.

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

90

91

CHAD DAILEY

Shirley Schmeiser

9/22/2008

92

Multiple products per shelf and differnt products being stacked on top of each other. This makes put away and picking more time consuming and makes the shelf look unorganized. Products were put away where there was room with no rythm or reason behind it.

Shelf was seperated into sections. Products are now located to individual shelf sections with one product per location. Seperated white products from gray. Located items commonly picked together on same shelf i.e. 2" white covers with 2" white duct.

93

Paid for gas inside store.

Credit card at the pump.

94

95

The top moving items for that Abbas 22-Sep product line are now on the bottom Gabow / sections. This will make picking Mark Schus and put away more effecient by not having to look as long when going to these shelves. Not having to go to multiple shelves as often. The shelf looks great.

Wasted time in store, but cut back on coffee which would have meant another stop also. I would have to make several trips I now use my task list in Outlook to This not only made me more to the office to get catalogs, return enter in all the tasks I need to finish. productive, but also reduced the material, pick up orders, talk to number of trips I make to the office. specialists, pick up mail, etc. This reduces time and expense for Werner. WMI/WE Intranet for RDC RDC operational info was updated All info is now in one place where Minneapolis (Under CDC "Box" on and a link to an updated contact list any employee within VMI/WE can Intranet) as of 9-23-08 was added to go to get accurate updated VMI/WE Intranet Site under the operational information related to * Information was not up to date as CDC "Box" - RDC Minneapolis the RDC. Much more efficient and far as "cut-off" times for Speedee, accurate! UPS, Wire Cuts, and general information related to RDC process Internal emails to "WEV ALL" were and procedure. sent with this information in the past... sometimes with an * Also, there was no one place to go attachement to be reviewed. This to get a "contact list" for all Cottage info would be sent at different times Grove RDC Supervisors and Team and unless an employee would Leads... Mobile Phone Numbers, consolidate this info "somewhere" Nextel Numbers,Direct Dial on their PC, it would not be "handy" Numbers, and a summary of for review... Now it is! :O) responsibilities for each sup/lead.

Motion

WE - Cottage Grove

Warehouse

Wade Stien

9/22/2008

Motion

WE - St. Cloud

Outside Sales

Kayne Weiler

9/22/2008

Motion

WE - Cottage Grove

Outside Sales

Tom Hoffman

9/23/2008

Waiting

WE - Cottage Grove

Warehouse

96

FILE CABINETS FULL OF COPIES EACH BRANCH WOULD PRINT OF SHIPPED ORDERS OFF A DAILY REPORT OF ALL ORDER NUMBERS SHIPPED FROM THAT BRANCH EACH DAY. WE COULD USE THIS REPORT AS OUR SHIPPING REFERENCE AND WOULD NOT HAVE TO SORT THROUGH OUR FILED ORDER COPIES.

BY PRINTING ONLY ONE TIM 9/23/2008 CUSTOMER ORDER COPY, WE ERICKSON COULD POTENTIALLY CUT OUR PAPER USAGE BY AT LEAST 25%.

Over Processing

WE - Rochester

Inside Sales

97

Entering emails or Tasks between customer visits is slow when using the small keyboard on the BlackBerry. To enter lengthy messages I waited until returning to the office or at home in the evening.

After meeting with a customer I can Dan enter tasks or send emails related Rassbach to the customer meeting. I also use it throughout the day to answer emails. In addition to the time saved by typing on the full size keyboard, it is easier to respond to emails throughout the day instead of waiting until returning to the office or at home in the evening.

Waiting

WE - Eau Claire

Outside Sales

By purchasing a "Freedom Universal" folding keyboard that connects to the BlackBerry via Bluetooth, it is easier and faster to type messages and tasks.

9/23/2008

98

Starting last week all of our counts on the pick tickets were in pcs, rather than pcs, pal, bndl, wght.

We can get a sence of weather or not we can fit in the van. When our cage is full we know if we are looking a pallet,reel,coil, or bundle.

If this goes back to the old way we Tim Roth can get a better sence of what we are looking for when we are loading and trying to decide weather or not we can fit in the van or not.

9/23/2008

Transportation WE - Rochester

Warehouse

99

WE AND OUR CUSTOMERS SPEND WAY TOO MUCH MONEY SHIPPING PRODUCT UPS RED THAT WE HAVE IN OTHER BRANCHES.

WE CAN DEVELOP A RED TOTE/RED TAG PROGRAM WITHIN OUR OWN TRANSPORTATION TO PRIORITY SHIP ITEMS WITHIN OUR BRANCH TO BRANCH TRANSFER SYSTEM.

WE CAN PROVIDE BETTER, TIM 9/23/2008 FASTER SERVICE TO OUR ERICKSON CUSTOMERS AT A LOWER COST TO ALL.

Transportation WE - Rochester

Inside Sales

100

Too many keystrokes when entering orders by using the 'enter' key to move the cursor when entering an item on a ticket instead of using the 'arrow down' key Every month, it was just standard practice (been doing it for years)that we would print all of the Wellmark reports so that we can go back in history to check something if needed. My file drawers used to be full of reports that I never looked at.

less keystrokes, less time spent entering an order

Improves effiency when entering orders into Eclipse

Inside Sales

101

102

Dave Withrow

9/23/2008

Over Processing

No longer print these reports. More space in my office, and not Jessica Everything is saved electronically, wasting the resources by printing off Tesar so we can always go back and look unnecessary reports every month. at a report on Wellmarks system if needed. No need to waste this space and the paper involved in printing all of these every month.

9/23/2008

Over Producing VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Administrative

9/24/2008

Transportation WE - Cottage Grove

Inside Sales

Paul Decker 9/25/2008

Over Processing

WE - Rochester

Outside Sales

Scott Owen

Motion

WE - Owatonna

Inside Sales

Over Processing

WE - Owatonna

Administrative

When providing quotations to our We would see a direct result to our A more efficient, and customers, there is a significant gross profit and an increase in knowledgeable sales team. amount of cost associated with overall sales. freight. One of the problems with this is estimating that cost and implementing it into our quotations so we aren't eating that cost when the job is billed out, or losing a job because we put too much cost into it.

Jeremy Nauman

WE - St. Cloud

I propose we design and keep an updated freight “cheat sheet” for our entire WE team. 103

104

105

Customer files in office and at home Customer files all at home and also Driving to Rochester office to get created customer file in computer. files at end of day. Creating customer files in computer saved paper and file space. Saved transportation, scrap paper, redundant effort. Small catalogs all mixed up in my Labeled all my trays alphabetically I can very easily find the right trays could never find the one I and located the catalogs catalog when the customer is needed in timely manner with accordingly waiting on the phone customer on the phone for me to get the part number for them scanned a pile of tickets-unstacked bring up ticket then drag fax from done in about 1/2 the time and went and restacked pages then processed drop on desk top then never left my desk attached to tickets drop onto ticket

9/25/2008

Mary Stearns 9/25/2008

106

Large use and expense for copy paper for internal copy needs

1/2 of the daily printing paper costs Deb Ricci will be reduced.

9/23/2008

Defects

WE - Cottage Grove

Marketing

Small conference room was a clean and efficient mess. Cables, excess equipment, etc. Too much garbage going to landfill, More money in our coffers. If we do expecially metal. not have to pay for refuse and get money for the scrap metal, we can gain 2 ways. Too much garbage going to landfill, More money in our coffers. If we do expecially metal. not have to pay for refuse and get money for the scrap metal, we can gain 2 ways. Was variability in annual capital 2009 Budgeting Process regarding budgeting process (i.e. those Capital Asset Expenditures will be expenditures on fixed assets over more defined by Leaders. This will say $3,000) resulting in an result in less time spent on verifying inefficient process to go about if the expenditure was approved getting an expenditure approved and/or necessary. I would estimate and/or potential unnecessary future time savings of 20 hours expenditures. alone for just the accounting department. I would also estimate the elimination of $25,000 a year plus of future unnecessary capital expenditures.

problem solved

9/25/2008

Motion

VMI - Waterloo

Outside Sales

Defects

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

Defects

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

Waiting

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

I did not know what all of the print status were in Eclipse when it came to a ticket being in the "invoice" stage. I was always asking Patty in our office what they ment.

I do not have to waste my time or Brenda 9/26/2008 Patty's time asking her what all of McIlquham/P the different print status mean. I am atty T able to look at my form and find out what I need to know.

Waiting

WE - Eau Claire

Substancial Reduction in copy Prior to moving to our new location, paper costs a very large supply of old logoed letterhead paper was found. The paper was going to be tossed, but instead we decided to encourage people in our area, to use it for any printing that can be used for internal purposes where what's on the back doesn't matter. Once the old letterhead is gone, we will be doing the same thing with our paper to be recycled, by putting a large X on the irrelevant sid 107 108

109

110

111

I suggested to Patty to put something together that explained what the different status meant and she put together a document explaining them.

Bill Meyers

We will need a specific site for the John Pospisil 9/25/2008 metal recycling and we will need the support of everyone in the warehouse to make this work. We will need a specific site for the John Pospisil 9/25/2008 metal recycling and we will need the support of everyone in the warehouse to make this work. Reduction in time - see comments Mick Slinger 9/26/2008 in "After Improving" section. Reduction in waste - see comments in "After Improving" section.

Inside Sales

112

When sending the invoice files to Billtrust via FTP we had to send each region separately. This caused many issues if the files were sent to closely together. They would merge and become garbled on the Billtrust end. The file would have to be resent from our system causing delays in the customer receiving their invoices.

Started to send invoice files to Billtrust using ALL. This allowed us to send all the invoices to Billtrust in one file instead of 7-9 files daily.

The files no longer are getting Aimee merged and garbled due to only one Hardin file being sent. This saves time on both the Billing Dept end having to only process the one file instead of 7-9 as well as getting the invoices out to the customer in a timely manner.

9/26/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

113

when looking up orders and quotes with out p.o. field being populated wastes alot of time looking for orders I printed out all of CSM Quotes and correspondence that I received and filed them for follow up and document reference for the entire department.

will save lots of time

yes, for me. this should be done company wide.

9/26/2008

Motion

VMI - Waterloo

I am now converting all of the correspondence, paper and electronic, to an adobe document and saving to the GMS Shared Drive on the network.

This allows us to centralize and Robin gives easy access to documents Amfahr and correspondence for the department as a whole. This diminishes the need for future filing cabinets, misfiling documentation and saving paper by not printing all documents.

9/26/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Automation

115

With so many price increases throughout 2008 there were literally hundreds of e-mails sent out this year pertaining to a price increase. That many e-mails are bound to get lost, deleted, or discarded throughout the year if they are not saved. It's very hard to keep track of price increases for this very reason.

Now all price increases will be If a customer, account manager, Andrea K. documented on one easy to read buyer or anyone wants to find out Wellington spreadsheet. They will now all be in about upcoming price increases or one sortable, filterable, accessable when a certain price increase went file. Great for time management! into effect than all they have to do is take a look at the spreadsheet. No more fumbling through old or archived e-mails in the hopes they may have saved it, no more going into the product file and using a calculator to see how much of an increase a vendor had, no more guessing at whether or not there may or may not have been an price increase because now they w

9.26.2008

Over Processing

WE - Cottage Grove

Purchasing

116

Everyone writing their own pick ups Returns department writing all pick Problem seems to be solved. All with their own wording and style. ups. pick ups are being directed to Drivers would get confused with returns. We are using the same incomplete information. wording and making sure that all information is complete.

9/26/2008

Over Processing

WE - Cottage Grove

Purchasing

114

scott davis

Jessica Carlson

Inside Sales

117

Every lighting project we need to add lamps to every fixture and then price them. If we get the project then we would have to submit a list of lamps for an SPA from Philips lighting. We would have to wait and pray that we would get the prices we need to write the job. If the pricing levels came back too high we would then have to either negotate with Philips or go find them somewhere else.

We now have a quick reference to price lamps at 4 different job levels that will be accepted. We have shared the list with the other lighting quotes people and they were thrilled. We can price lamps more competivly and quicker with more margin.

We thought if we had a Brian prenegotated list of lamps that we McBride, use all of the time we could just John Beau refer to that list and plug $'s that we know will be accepted by Philips. Also, we could same time by having it at our finger tips. We wouldn't have to go thru the catalog nearly as much or thru eclipse. John & I made a list of the lamps that we use 90% of the time. All 4 of us went to our other lamp sources and armed ourselves with competive feed back on where we needed our lamp prices to be. We had Nick

118

We need to put magnet street sighns on the end of the gray shelving - so when the put away process is being done all like product will go into the same area. Sending Ques and Emails to remind a buyer to order a stock item. This creates more mail to the buyer and slower turna-around on the urgent ones Idle time waiting for sales to exit the ticket to start purchasing

All like items will go in the same area.

Not having product scattered all over the WHS.

Less ques and emails to read therefore freeing the buyer up to answer the more urgent request faster.

Less ques and emails and faster DEE KAHLE 9/29/2008 turn-around on the urgent requests.

Less time wasted waiting to do Less time wasted waiting for sales Christina purchasing and less time sending to exit tickets so we can perform the McFadden ques to ask them to exit the tickets. purchasing portion. Stops constant requests for sales to exit tickets.... This has not been implemented at this point and would request best senario in effectively getting this point across to sales department.

121

Receiving for the freight department was over by the shipping department, and by the end of the day they were running into each other with forklifts and pallet jacks. Also the freight desk looked very disorganized sitting where it was at. This also brought the Small parcels and freight department together as a team.

There is more work area to do their The effect is better a team and job and it is much more organized better work enviroment. and they seem to be able to ask question of each other to see what works best. Allen Bradley is closer to the shelves to get put away easier also.

122

Lack of organization and no idea what we have/don't have for spare demo equipment.

119

120

123

Divided up all spare parts into 7 different categories and placed lables on cabinents to easily find and identify spare parts. VMI has been ordering Absentee I created an Absentee Calendar Calendars to keep track of time off. with Microsoft Word. We can make For the amount of cards we would these on our own rather than need to order each year, it costs ordering with just the cost of the around $250.00. cardstock and ink!

9/26/2008

Randy Meyer 9/29/2008

Over Processing

WE - Cottage Grove

Inside Sales

Transportation VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Purchasing

9/29/2008

Waiting

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Purchasing

Chris Knudson

9/29/2008

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

Spare equipment is now easier to find and now everything is much more organized.

Ben Foley

9/29/2008

Inventory

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Automation

Saved our company money!

Erin Clark

9/29/2008

Inventory

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Administrative

124

always looking for customer e-mail address when sending quotes thru eclipse.

Information loaded in eclipse

125

Were issuing mutliple PO's per week to manufacturer while only receiving one shipment per week.

I now only look at this manufacturer The effect was the time spent Travis once per week when issuing ordering from this manufacturer was Albertson purchase orders. cut in half and by letting orders build up, we get prepaid freight a decent percentage of the time. This saves us money and saves me time during the week.

126

I used to print out every email if i now i use the task feature in outlook Saves paper, less trips to copy was waiting for response-it was my and works great. It pings me when it machine. Keeping it on the task list is over due in red. computer and having it ping me when over due saves from paper being lost, clutter on my desk. I am work better if my desk is organized. Problem: Small Conference Room Still in the works. Correction: Initial thought was to put temperature is uncontrollable. in an exhaust fan to remove the hot When several people are in the air. After some discussion it was room it gets very warm. decided that we may need to get a Example: when we had our quote to see what it would take to Continuous Improvement Meeting get a thermostat installed to better maintain the temperature. There are times when we have customers attend meetings in the room and we should correct the problem and not put a Band-Aid on it. Current Status: Waiting for H&H Heating to give us a quote.

127

128

129

Customers commenting that it Return ALL E-Mails and or Voice seems like people do not care about Messages received B4 noon by or their needs and or requirements. B4 leaving for the day, Return ALL E-Mails and or Voice Messages received after noon B4 noon the following day. POS (Point of Sale) reports POS reports document updated, documentation. Cumbersome, loose streamlined and better execution. leaf and somewhat disorganized.

When customer gives you his/her e- Craig mail address, you can enter that Mariette information when you are in the "body" of their bid, by using ketys, alt -f4. That will open up a window where you can enter such information

9/29/2008

Motion

WE - St. Cloud

9/29/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Purchasing

kim robertson

9/29/2008

Over Producing VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Administrative

Mike Schneck

9/30/2008

Defects

VMI - Waterloo

Outside Sales

9/30/2008

Waiting

WE - Cottage Grove

Inside Sales

My goal is to have these reports Phil Christian 9/30/2008 done by the 10th of the month which is rare. By addressing the "house keeping" of the documention, I will save time, the flow will be much better and I probably will be able to meet my personal goal of the 10th of each month. It will also help in training for a backup in my absence.

Waiting

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

This makes sure that the customer Jim Barnes knows that they are important to me and Werner Electric. It also forces me to manage my time to better take care of our customers.

Inside Sales

130

Entering lamp totals in an order the quotes group manually calculates lamp totals from the quote worksheet. The probability of error is high…..

131

The probability of entering an Julie Hay incorrect order has been reduced and time has been saved checking and rechecking for errors.

9/30/2008

Over Processing

I would print a Direct PO out of I email the PO to myself directly out Eclipse and then scan it to my email of Eclipse and save on the network so I would have a copy saved on the network.

Biggest effect is that I am not over- Jodi Junge using paper by printing the purchse order and then throwing it out as soon as I scan it. This saves the company money. Another effect is that I am saving myself time by not having to walk to the printer and then walk to the scanner to scan my document.

9/30/2008

Over Producing VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Administrative

132

we had a locker full of old junk that i went thru and pitched everything we kept just in case someone might that wasn't worth keeping and need a bolt, screw, floor tike etc. consolidated the lcker into a small tool box.

i was able to get rid of the old locker bo franklin and about 80% of the items inside that we'll never use. cleaned up the appearance of the warehouse also.

9/30/2008

Inventory

VMI - Waterloo

Inside Sales

134

One of our inside guys was replying to eclipse messages by forwarding the message. This does not leave a trail of what happenend in the change log. At our bi-weekly quotations meeting everyone was curious as to where we were in relation to making our bonus program. Patti Koenen was the one responsible for running the numbers if she had time.

Messages will now appear on the log and cover our tails.

More efficient way of communication. WE can now look at the change log and figure out what is going on with a ticket

10/1/2008

Waiting

WE - St. Cloud

Inside Sales

With Patti's help, I created an EXCEL document that breaks down our bonus program by month with graphs so everyone will be able to see where we are in relation to the bonus program on a weekly basis.

This freed up Patti's time by not Brenda 10/1/2008 being the one responsible for this. McIlquham/P Also, this will allow everyone to atti K know where we are in relation to making our goal and what more we all can do as a group to meet or exceed it.

Over Processing

WE - Eau Claire

Inside Sales

136

Loading emails into the Q drive from customers, vendors, and internal customers is very time consuming and some emails become very repetitive with many continuous repsonses.

I try to keep up on my emails on a daliy basis and delete continuous strings of repetition and then import the final email once all answers are completed instead of every email that goes back and forth on same subject matter.

The effect is I am able to keep Cathy Davis 10/1/2008 control of my emails and get them filed into the correct folders in a timely manner. I feel in the long run I have solved my problem and I am trying to maintain emails at a more productive level.

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Administrative

137

Southwire copper wire and flex cable products not having all items with a current price.

On going process but what gets updated will cause less problems.

This is a process when new items Sue get added. When pricing is up-toSorensen date nothing needs to be done. When they're not it could cause us to lose money if any of the items have been quoted to the customer. If product hasn't been updated it's more likely the cost is higher than what's in Eclipse, than we lose margin.

Over Processing

WE - Cottage Grove

135

I created and use a spreadsheet that groups like lamps together and calculates totals with quantity of lamps per fixture type included.

(If this doesn;t make since let me know. Do I need to give you the steps we are going to implement this?)

Kim Berger

10/1/2008

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Administrative

Purchasing

138

Hubbell Wiring's product file is not correct because IDW did not add net. This will cause many deducts to have to be written for overcharges. A-B can only enter one e-mail address into their system to have MCC workups automatically mailed to me. Now that we have an additional person in our group and if they worked up the MCC and I was out of the office, they would have to wait until my return for me to forward their workup to them.

It should not be necessary to do deducts to correct the invoicing issue.

This was reported to PPQ on Laurie October 1 and I will be watching the Fellows product file for correction.

I had Tracie set-up a abmcccenterone report "group" email that now includes both Mike and I and we now have the capablility to add any new names to the group that we need if we expand the department.

In an effort to try and set up a better Dan McGuire 10/2/2008 reporting system for our A-B MCC reports that are generated through the CIRCE main frame computer, I have asked Tracie Hendrickson to set-up a “group e-mail address” to include both Mike and I that the Centerone reports would be e-mailed to. A-B can only have one e-mail address loaded at a time. P.S. You should add "QUOTATIONS" under the "department" drop down. Thanks

140

New records come into the PDW with each weekly IDW load. These new records only get sync'd a few times a year to the product file. No way to seperate vendors by this large import. If we could sync more often it could reduce our PNM items.

We created a new report that shows Reduction in PNM. all new records. We download this report to excel and then run the sync utility off catalog number.

141

No simple way to share Quick Kaizen's

139

142

143

10/2/2008

Joe Wallace 10/2/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

Waiting

WE - Cottage Grove

Defects

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

Automation

Now there is a simple way to submit Quick Kaizen's to the Continuous improvement team. 1 out of 3 invoices from 3M came to With Laurie Fellows, Vic Slaymaker, us with wrong price and we had to Joe Wallace, Shawn Gerdes and short pay (with documents detailing Dan from 3M we kept digging back line by line) to the root cause and found an automated way for our 3M purchase orders to be sent with the right info. Now we are getting bills from 3M that match our purchase orders.

Now that the Quick Kaizen form is Derek Day 10/2/2008 rolled out people from all branches can share their quick Kaizen's. We've eliminated a lot of frustration Team effort - 10/3/2008 and the extra work it took to process submitted and pay our 3M invoices. I would estimate our time saved to be 5 minutes times 220 invoices a year. That's over 18 hours of wasted time removed on our side. 3M would also save time spent posting our payments.

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp IT

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

when inside slaes in Davenport needed to reprint a pick ticket we had to walk downstairs to get the copy and scan and email to the customer. I timed the process it took aprox 12-14 minutes to complete.

Problem solved I tested it along with Rodey Tharp 10/3/2008 Becky and it works saving many steps and time.

Motion

VMI - Davenport

I spoke to Anne and she was able to add the upstairs printer in our sales pit to print and we can walk five steps scan and eamil to the customer. Working on trying to email direct from Eclipse alos

Inside Sales

144

In dealing with defective ballasts that have been returned to us by customers, I would have to physically go out to the warehouse, locate each ballast individually, struggle to decipher their date codes, which are often illegible or partially obscured, and create an Excel spreadsheet listing part numbers, quantities, corresponding date codes, and our cost for each. All of this information would then be sent to the manufacturer, in most cases ADVANCE TRANSFORMER, in the form of a RGA request.

I had learned from my discussions with a counterpart in Cedar Rapids, that he does not gather all of the date codes, but rather sends the manufacturer a list of part #'s and quantities only, and that it sufficed. This is contrary to how I was trained. I was able to conduct a return that would have ordinarily taken me up to 1.5 hours to complete, from begining to end, in less than 30 minutes by utilizing this method.

If my first experience is at all Reid Regnier 10/3/2008 indicative of what can be expected, I will not only reduce the amount of time and effort required to perform defective ballast returns by as much as 2/3, but the resulting improvement in efficiency will enable me to do these returns more frequently, as it will not require so much time to be blocked off or for me to leave my desk. There is a constant stream of defective ballasts coming in and replacements going out, so this has drastically improved my ability to d

145

The pickers have to go pick up the empty totes from the shipping area at least 3-4 times a day when we run out of totes to assign to new orders. Picking up totes and restocking them in the toting area usually takes about 15 mins, so we probably use at least 45 minutes each day picking up totes.

I would like to suggest that when This has not been implemented yet. James the members of the QA team com e Remington over to pick up orders from the greys that are completed, instead of bringing a cart to pick up the orders, bring a palletfull of totes with (the pickers can help unload the totes when they bring them), and then bring the finished orders back on the empty pallet. We should save time by not having to leave to pick up totes, and the QA team would be coming over to pick up finished orders anyways.

146

Losing unsaved files throughout the week, due to computer errors or frozen software, has set me back hours of work many times.

To eliminate these losses I have placed a reminder on my monitor that reminds me the save a file everytime it catches my eye.

Since my Quick Kaizen I have yet to Nick Stanley October 6th, Defects lose a file, because of an error or 2008 frozen software, that wasnt saved over 5 minutes ago. The result was more time to use for other projects that wasnt being lost due to computer errors.

WE - Cottage Grove

Marketing

147

ENTERING IN SHORT PART NUMBERS. SYSTEM SITS AND SPINS.

PLACE A PERIOD AFTER PART NUMBER TO END THE STRING OF NUMBERS. EXAMPLE (W34.)

THIS PROCESS SPEEDS THE TIM MOORE 10/7/2008 ORDER ENTRY WITHOUT HAVING TO TYPE IN THE MANUF. BEFORE PART #.

WE - St. Cloud

Inside Sales

10/6/2008

Over Processing

WE - Cottage Grove

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

Waiting

Administrative

148

I would have to take time to reset the default on the scanner to PDF because it defaults to TIF before scanning documents to myself to be sent out in e-mails. (Most recipients are atuomatically set up for PDF files) If I forgot to reset the default I would have to go back and repeat what I just did only setting the scanner up for PDF and then resending the e-mail.

Saved time in having to scan again & re-send e-mail attachments to reps. & account managers. Saved reps. & account managers time from having to call me and let me know they were unable to open the file.

Changing the default on the Lynn scanner to PDF instead of TIF. Samuelson More people are set up to receive and open PDF files instead of TIF files. I not only save time for myself but for my other co-workers that have run into this same problem. Account managers are not able to open TIF files on there palm pilots but are able to open PDF files so it saves them time having to contact me and reps. are also saved time from having to call me to let me know they are unable to open the file or go through extra s

10/7/2008

Over Processing

WE - Eau Claire

Inside Sales

149

As Project Coordinator, many times I was given a total PO dollar amount and the cost of the items from different vendors. Had to juggle numbers around to come up with individual sell prices. Being in Outside Sales connecting and disconnecting laptop in office can waste 5 to 10 minutes because of having to crawl under desk to hook everything up.

Brenda McIlquham has an excel form you plug the available info in and it does all the math. Form is available to everyone in the quotations department.

The new excel form saves time and LoWayne eliminates the math errors. Also Rust very easy to change info and quickly get new results.

7-Oct-08

Over Processing

WE - Eau Claire

Inside Sales

Now what took 5 to 10 minutes takes seconds.

10/8/2008

Motion

WE - Cottage Grove

Outside Sales

This is an on going process we will Mark Burgart 9/18/2008 continue to monitor and perfect. From the first week results above it appears to be working. This was relayed to all sales. This was an idea brought up by Brian Clark and Rudy Thedford. I met with Rudy to review their process and we together came up Following is a way to streamline the with the above solution. process:

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Administrative

150

151

Docking station would be the easiest fix but due to budget constraints i searched out a spare power strip and dedicated Ethernet cable so that all connections are on top of desk. Single line item orders/generations Cross docking - This term simply were received, located on the shelf, means the ability to receive product, picked at a later time which is process the sales order wasted time, energy, and immediately, and stage for shipping movement. eliminating the need to locate the material on the shelf to be pulled at a later time (which is wasted time, movement, and energy).

Todd Eide

If you have single line item releases use ship when available or ship complete. This way receiving can process the order immediately after receiving the product and prep for shipp 152

Freight Coordinators photocopied outgoing bill of ladings and then forwarded to the scanning department (Abby) to be attached to the corresponding sales order.

Freight Coordinators forward original bill of ladings to scanning department for attachment to corresponding sales order.

Saves freight coordinators time with Amy Korsmo 10/8/2008 the photocopy step taken out and also saves the company money in paper that was just tossed once scanning was done.

153 154

Auto signature only worked on new Now it appears on all emails I am emails I was sending out. sending including response and forward. material was being transfered way called buyer and had them bump up to often, not enough on the shelf for are stock to cover 3-4 day lead. sales orders. ie fuses troffers etc..

Save me a ton of time typing in my signature information.

Derrick Samson

10/8/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Inside Sales

less material being handled too kevin buckli 10/8/2008 many times. stock was better for customer. less transfers for mncdc to handle with less chance of damage. I would send all job queues with I now change the status of my I do get quicker answers from some Sarah 10/9/2008 newitem as the status. Many queues to Freight, Urgent or since I have been changing the queues that were simple questions something with more detail to help status of my queues. However would take weeks for answers. the receiver recognize quickly what there are still some people who the queue is about. must be queued 3-4+ times and still do not answer the queues. had to send manifestes off to Des can now scan manifest here into got rid of the extra steps of having Ruth Caves 10/9/2008 Moines to get scanned into Eclipse, eclipse, do not need to send to to send to DSM, Wait, and then file. wait for them to get sent back to DSM or file. Ottumwa, and then file. Printed items, walked over to the do not have to go to the fax no more wasted time waiting, Ruth Caves 10/9/2008 fax, dialed, then faxed and waited to machine, print or wait to make sure printing and dialing the number to get the confirmation that the fax the fax went ok. can do it from the fax. went ok. computer at our desk. it would be nice if we could get have all numbers and people listed less time searching for people and bob 10/10/2008 some of the things on the VMI by lacation. numbers calling in to the phone aringdale extranet completed. the employee pool. directory would be a good example.we all have spent time trying to think of a person who is at a different branch and can not remember the last name, if the directory was up and running you could check out the branch and look up who is working there. also trying to find co workers cell phone numbers would be nice.

Transportation WE - Eau Claire

159

new employees having trouble with better training of new employees eclipse. and old on the eclipse system.

there are many things that can be bob done in eclipse that so many of us aringdale have never been taught. smooth operations, less stress,time savings, fewer mistakes are just a few of the things that could happen with better training.

160

Quote customers from different branches over the phone.

Faster locating of orders or bids in Eclipse. Sometimes it is hard to locate a bid or an order in Eclipse with all the ship to's in the same account.

155

156

157

158

When quoting the customer I make sure that I give them the quote # in Eclipse, and tell them to put that # on their po or give it to the next salesperson they talk to. they talk to.

Dave Ward

Inside Sales

Waiting

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

Over Processing

VMI - Ottumwa

Inside Sales

Motion

VMI - Ottumwa

Inside Sales

Waiting

VMI - Mason City

Outside Sales

10/10/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Mason City

Outside Sales

10/10/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Mason City

Inside Sales

161

we spent several hours tracking All orders to Deere are delivered by POD's for shipments to John Deere. the Ottumwa delivery truck. they would not accept UPS tracking numbers as proof.

This allows us to pull up the Mike Stewart 10/10/2008 manifest very quickly and provide a hard copy signature to the customer. What used to take inside and outside sales hours at the end of the month has been cut down to just a few minutes.

Over Processing

VMI - Ottumwa

Outside Sales

162

I was emailing and faxing to B&B After emailing the switchgear quote Electric all switchgear quotes. In to Wayne, he would in turn, fax the addition, I was emailing Wayne quote to B&B Electric. Duren, a copy of the quote also. He in turn, would contact B&B to see if anything else was needed for the quote.

I send anywhere from 3 to 10 Fred Diercks 10/10/2008 quotes a week to B&B Electric. I still email the quotes, but Wayne does the faxing. It saves me approximatly 5 minutes per quote, which in a weeks time is anywhere from 15-50 minutes a week.

Over Processing

WE - Rochester

Inside Sales

163

Would have to fill out daily fork truck Electronic copy of Daily fork truck Solved the problem of trying to find Hobart safety check form, sign off and file safety check form is electronically paperwork for specific date. Allows Nguyen away in cabinet. filled out. File is saved under Safety quick access to any date remotely check file folder accessible by without having to bother local company L drive warehouse personnel to find and check their paperwork from past/previous dates.

10/10/2008

Motion

VMI - Muscatine

Warehouse

164

Printer always provided banner or cover sheet. Everyone agreed this was a waste of paper. Orders possibly (and have) shipped to wrong location

165

Recieved directions from IT to disable banner/cover sheets.

Trees are saved again. Problem sovled.

Kevin Bennett

10/13/2008

Over Producing VMI - Ottumwa

Marketing

Customer rec product at correct jobsite

Please pay attention to the "ship to" on the paperwork. Too many times it has the home office of the company in that field and not the jobsite where the material is needed. Added 3 sets of new lights with motion timers in darkened areas.

John Huffman

10/13/2008

Transportation VMI - Ottumwa

Warehouse

John Huffman

10/13/2008

Motion

VMI - Ottumwa

Warehouse

10/13/2008

Motion

VMI - Ottumwa

Warehouse

Waiting

VMI - Ottumwa

Inside Sales

166

Dark Areas around product making Well lit resulting in correct items reading part numbers difficult being picked and shipped resulting in picking wrong items. Main ights were installed prior to shelving and product resulting in shadows in areas including the important Allen Bradley isle. Would have to leave area to better lighting to read part numbers

167

I CAN NOT GET A PICK TICKET BACK INTO THE4-1/2X5-1/2 PACKING LIST ENCLOSED EVVELOP.IT TAKES EXTRA TIME TO REFOLD THE PICK TICKET ANS SOME TIMES GET ANOTHER ENVELOP

I FOLD THE PICK TICKET AT BR.4 THE PICK TICKET WILL GO IN GREG STERTING AT THE LINE UNDER AND OUT OF THE PACKING LIST GUITER THE SHIPPING ADRESS (1)BACK ENVELOP EASILY EAVERY TIME FOLD (2)FRONT SAVING TIME FOR ANY ONE FOLD (3) BACK FOLD WHAT IS DOING THE MANIFEST OR LEFT (4) CHECKING A PICK TICKET FOLD IN HALF WITH SHIPPING ADRESS OUT.

168

The counter area at our branch was lacking different books that we needed at the counter for references......took time, customers were waiting, didnt even have enough books to cover all 3 of us here.....

When through all the books the inside salesmen had and figured to use the same ones at the counter, organized in alphabetical order. Got new books for the counter...............

Spending less time looking for the Ryan Walker 10/13/2008 books, just reach down and pull the one you want.....makes my job easier and the counter area run smoother..............great for the customer.......not running around looking for books anymore!!

169

I spent less time searching for my I have added a small organizer commonly used catologs and had a bookshelf directly beside me to hold better organized work space. just my daily used catalogs and reference material. DESK CLUTTER WAS MAKING THINGS ARE EASIER TO KEEP I AM ABLE TO ASSIST THE THE JOB HARD TO DO. TRACK OF CUSTOMER QUICKER AND AND FIND WHEN NEEDED BETTER BY KEEPING THE ESSENTIALS AT MY FINGER TIPS AND ORGANIZING A PLACE FOR THE REST. All pick tickets printed in Waterloo All pick tickets are now scanned into No one at the later date will need to after end of month, was boxed up the tickets starting 10/1/08. go upstairs and throw away the box and placed upstairs to be destroyed of tickets 7 years from now. Since in 7 years. the tickets from Cedar Rapids are already scanned in, we no longer need to keep. At the end of the month, we are not looking for tickets that the signature wasn't captured.

Barry Steinhart

10/6/2008

Motion

VMI - Ottumwa

Mike Ries

10/14/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Inside Sales

Norma Barlow

10/14/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Waterloo

172

There were no tools such as taper, I set up a little station by the printer stapler, etc. by the printer for for employees to use such as a employees to use. stapler, staple remover, taper, post it notes, pens, pencils, and paper clips

I noticed many employees at the work station in Sales that needed such tools as listed above. They either had to go back to their desk or would ask another employee for item needed. By setting up items for employees it has saved time both for the employee that needed item and does not take time away from work for the employee being asked.

Diane Glass 10/14/2008

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Inside Sales

173

Lines Minerallac & Cully are Created a super buyline (&Min/Cul) purchased separately (must make so we can order both lines together their own prepaid po's) but we are with the same prepaid moving most of the Cully line to requiremnets. Acorn and the balance of the Cully line will be available to us but it will be hard to make prepaid po's making delivery to customers slower and may incur freight charges if they can't wait.

We will still be able to buy needed Vic Cully items without waiting to make Slaymaker prepaid requirements so customers won't wait long for products. This will also reduce invoices from MIN/Cully and give us 1 less po to cut for the same products and by having Cully requirements reduced, it will not make po's so large that it's hard to check in(recieving time) which is why we never bought together before the product change from Cully to Acorn.

10/14/2008

Waiting

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Purchasing

174

I receive RMAs from vendors via fax or email. I would print off and would make additional copies to send to vendor and keep a copy for my self to scan and attach to PO#. After attaching I would throw the copy away.

I created a File in Outlook named Carrie RGA and started to save RGAs into Gillespie this file immediatley after I receive. Once PO# is created and product shipped I am able to go into this file and slide the RGA into the order.

10/14/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Davenport

170

171

I was spending needless effort finding the same catalogs I was using daily.

Stopped wasting paper and time saved scanning. Also I will keep this in mind for other documents I can save instead of printing. I will try to be paperless and more organized in Outlook (thats another Kaizen!)

Inside Sales

Inside Sales

Inside Sales

175

Account Managers had to call a Project Manager if they required information about an awarded lighting project.

Account Managers can now view the information themselves without waiting for someone else to help them. They can also access the information after hours

I created a folder system on the Steve Day network drive for a central location to collect all of the information for an awarded lighting project. This gives the Account Manger's 24 hour access and also reduces the time it takes them to get their information. It also frees more time for the Project Managers.

10/14/2008

Waiting

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Inside Sales

176

Buyers would have to queue the sales guys to change their tickets if a nonstock item was trying to be ordered in less than standard package. The sales guys would then have to call the customers back to see if they could change the order qty.

All nonstock items in the system, and being pulled from IDW will now have a sell pkg loaded if a buy package is provided except for a few select lines where we can always break standard package.

This will cut down on the number of Angie queues the buyers sent out. It will Whitman also notify the sales person immediately when they try to enter a nonstock item in less than standard package amount what the standard package quanity is. This will make us more proactive because we can then notify the customer immediately instead of having to call them back at a later time.

10/15/2008

Inventory

WE - Cottage Grove

Purchasing

WE - Cottage Grove

Automation

Credit also needs to be given to the RCSMs for the idea and to Anne for helping me to implement the mass load! Thank you! 177

Insufficient features in the SMP or eclipse to manage our day to day business for sales and automation. Its difficult to get a accurate sales data or manage our opportunities so the WE team is synched up. Its difficult to predict the business outcome for the current year or plan for next year.

Tools that will give us the live sales and opportunity data so that will help us to manage our time better and easier to figure out strategy to meet our goal for the year. The live information also will help us to be more efficient in business planning for next year. Enter any opportunity in SMP as project and other is that I enter all of the key activities like meetings or phone calls. SMP then sends a email to account managers and management so everyone is synched up. This avoids any redunda

Helps us to be a better account and Mahendra business managers and ultimately Patil increase our market share and more profitable.

10/15/2008

Motion

178

Inventory of 52 skids of ADM fixtures were put wherever there was roof in the building. They constantantly were being moved around to make rook for lifttruck and stock access. For pharmacies that have $4.00 generic prescriptions, I just had them fill the Rx the standard way. The claim was submitted to insurance and I only paid $4.00

Readjusted empty pallet racking beams and consolidated skids into like parts to accomodate oversized pallets.

More than 65% of the skids are now Jeff Doore / on racking and arranged in like part Bill Rowlet numbers. Can easily move around the warehouse until material ships later next year.

10/9/2008

Transportation VMI - Keokuk

I ask the pharmacy to not submit the $4.00 prescription to insurance and I still pay $4.00. I still get reimbursed from my cafeteria fund if I submit the receipt using the cafeteria fund form.

By not submitting the $4.00 Rick Lorenzo 10/16/2008 prescription to insurance, the number of claims goes down and this helps our insurance renewal rates which in turn helps our bottom line.

179

Over Processing

Warehouse

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Automation

180

181

We almost always get our daily shipments in cardboard gaylord boxes. We have been throwing these away. The issue was with Cost Savings reports forADM/Supplyforce.

We will now be saving these and Avg cost per box is $8 which we Craig sending them back to the CDC say were tossing. Now avg savings/year Ocheltree 25 at a time. will be at least $1200

10/16/2008

Defects

VMI - Mason City

Inside Sales

Motion

VMI - Davenport

Outside Sales

10/13/2008

Inventory

VMI - Keokuk

Inside Sales

10/17/2008

Defects

WE - Eau Claire

Inside Sales

Mike Golden 10/17/2008 (and all GMS

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Inside Sales

Rebecca Soike

10.17.08

Over Processing

VMI - Davenport

Inside Sales

Larry Westlund

10/18/2008

Over Processing

WE - Mankato

Automation

Now we fill out the form, email it to the correct person at ADM, and simply ask them to fax it directly The old way was to phisically visit back to Destiny, This lets them print each person at ADM and get sign and fax when it is convienient signatures from them, and then fax for them, rather than me trying to these forms to our Destiny track them down, and go through Upah.This often took days of my the process. time.

This gets Cost savings to Destiny Greg Tigges 10/17/2008 on a more regular basis, and saves me hours of time.

182

High temperatures in warehouse

temperature decrease

183

Paper and time waste for me and time saved for the customer.

By using the Eclipse messaging system to myself and post dating the message for the date of followup has improved on the following; More proactive to the customer, Saved on paper & also saved on time for the customer & myself

counter area is cooler and a savings Bill Rowlett of $86.00 a month on having a couple of rows of high bay lighting off No longer using as much paper for Lynn follow-up, the eclipse system Samuelson queues me on that date when I need to follow-up instead of going through the paperwork in project files. It saves the customer time because it serves as a flag for me to contact the customer regarding there ship dates so they don't have to call me which in turn saves me time without interruptions.

this saves Motion as well as Waiting time

I believe this saves on defects scrap paper & motion - customer calling & me being proactive so as not to have as many interruption 184

GMS Customer parts were hard to GMS Customer parts are stored in find and paper work was not easy to boxes identified by Sales Order#. follow. Paperwork is files separately so it is easy to sort old orders from new.

185

Direct shipments delivered without customer PO numbers resulting in product waiting on the dock and a phone call to our customer service When quoting Motor Control Centers to our customers I typically have printed out the Rockwell pricing and workup.

186

The old system required reviewing all customer parts to determine which ones had been in our possession for too long. The new system makes it quicker to check for old orders and follow up regularly.

I put the customer PO number in Customers can receive their the ship-to address so vendors copy products in immediately and reduce the PO number as they copy the calls to find the PO number address information Now when quoting a MCC I save Now I use much less paper and everything electronically and only require no file space. Will backup print ones that need to be faxed. computer weekly. Trying to obtain as many customer email addresses to eliminate faxing all-together.

187

We were spending extra time by writing our name and dating the packing slips after they had been put on a manifest.

188

EVERYDAY I HAVE TO GO TO PUT IT ON MY DESK TOP. START TO GET MY SIG. PAD UP. Multiple areas with literature and a file for every supplier tabbed in a information from suppliers on top of drawer for quick access my desk

My return shelf was above my head. Move shelf to lower area. I would have to find something to stand on or if it was light enough coax it to the edge with pen - and if it was heavy, I was concerned that I could be injured. Mr. Bytnar a new laptop computer If he gets a new one not just another one he should be able to get a lot more work done.

189

190

191

192

193

We are making sure that the This alone saved me a couple of Travis signature line and date are filled out minutes at the end of my route Parsons on the manifest. today by not having to flip through all the paper work and figure out which pages I needed to sign and date. I only had 6 orders. This will save us alot of time when we get back on our larger deliveries.

10/20/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Des Moines

Warehouse

NOW ALL I HAVE TO DO IS CLICK Gary Black ONE TIME SAVE ME TWO STEPS I now can find exactly what I am Randy looking for from each and every Moberg supplier without hunting. I am saving time and energy as I work with suppliers on projects and finding new products for our sales team to sell.

10/20/2008

Motion

VMI - Des Moines

Inside Sales

21-Oct-08

Over Processing

WE - Cottage Grove

Administrative

Easy access and items on shelf more easily viewed.

Jeri cain

10/21/2008

Motion

VMI - Des Moines

Inside Sales

Darcie Notton

10/21/2008

Waiting

VMI - Davenport

Administrative

Kristen Blake 10/22/2008

Motion

VMI - Des Moines

Inside Sales

Dean Evans 10/22/2008

Over Processing

WE - Mankato

Inside Sales

Mr. Bytnar has a very old and slow computer. We always have to wait for things and he sits and waits when this could be useable time not slow time. Inside sales people had to perform Call when complete orders can be Talking with Anne Niebuhr, Solar an extra step to check if a call when handled immediately rather than Eclipse will be rolled out Nov 8th complete order was complete. sitting idly waiting to be changed to and that will allow Eclipse to be a different status. more of a windows environment with notices and messages. As a CSR and entering orders on Now using dual screen operation, This has effectively made my job single screen, you would first print able to open faxes and enter on the flow better, I'm able to spend more off orders from faxes and them other screen, and the attach copy time entering orders without delay enter them into system, and then right to order for anybodys or being interrupted by printing of file them monthly in case you reference. faxes or being side tracked by other needed to review order entry. employees. I'm able to find the top of my desk and cleaned up the clutter to make a clean working environment. Saving both paper and wear and tear on office equipment.

194

When we have a fumble on an order because of a shortage etc. first: The warehouse very seldom hears about it unless it was shipped from our own branch. When the item that was short does come in for shipping to the customer, a copy of the so. has been with it. But it has all the items showing. There is generally a note written beside the short item that it is an iou item. Example of this is s5306407.1, 12thhnorangsolid. We have no way of this to be manifested for delivery and it can't be tracked.

There should either be another Bob Sturm generation put on the same so. Shortage is trackable which the customer might not like? Warehouse guys and delivery know An nic. so. could be entered with all whats going on. of the info and it would be able to be on the manifest for tracking purposes.

195

VMI corrugated shipping cartons the sizes we have are not oblong enough especially the smaller cartons. These are squared. We either have to use a recycled box that we save (recycled boxes takes up space) or move up a larger size to fit the product that needs to be shipped. The larger boxes are usually to big and need innerpack.

More variety boxes to choose from to fit product in appropriately and avoiding wasted space and extra inner packaging. Doing away with recycled boxes that take up space and re-using other mfg/cust logos.

Im suggesting to re-look at our Barney Miller 10/23/2008 shipping cartons and sizes and see if we can possibly add a few more inches to the existing cartons.

Over Producing VMI - Davenport

Warehouse

196

When we needed an item picked up E-mail the copy of the credit to the from a customer for a credit. We warehouse for pick up. Done!!! would put the credit in eclipse then fill out a pick up request form by hand and make a special trip down to the warehouse to give to them the form.

No more duplicating efforts of Greg Punelli 10/23/2008 putting the credit in eclipse and filling out paper work again by hand. Then making a special trip downstairs to deliver the paper work.

Over Producing VMI - Des Moines

Inside Sales

197

Bi-weekly reports printed then worked by 3 people.

Save time, paper, keep file on system drive. (Do not need to keep report in a box for 30-60 days.)The report is worked better from excel. It would be a more user friendly calendar.

198

199

200 201

Bi-weekley report is down loaded into excel. The repoert is worked form the excel file, and sent to the other 2 pepole to work. The MKT calendar has a default If the default were set at 6:00 AM to showing the 8:00 AM to 8:00 PM 6:00 PM, employees would more time line. If a meeting is scheduled easily notice early morning events earlier such as 6:00 or 7:00 AM, you and I would not hear the comment have to scroll up to see details. "what meeting?".

10/22/2008

Motion

VMI - Des Moines

Warehouse

Jesse Dodson

10/23/2008

Transportation VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

Carol Penning

10/23/2008

Over Processing

WE - Mankato

Administrative

Motion

VMI - Des Moines

Inside Sales

Over Processing

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Inside Sales

Waiting

VMI - Davenport

Old literature and garbage was Put labeled containers for recycle I don't have to sort through Greg Punelli 10/23/2008 always set on tables or on the floor and garbage for everyone to put everything that people just drop off in the literature room. there garbage and old catalogs into. on the tables and floor to try and throw away later. to much time spent trying to find going to move all files to 1 cabenit looks like it may take awhile to Buzzy 10/23/2008 propoer files accomplish this but we will see large benefir from this Davenport Counter Personnel were Mike Grace and Mike Chaplin in Customer Satisfaction Lorie Julian 10/24/2008 unavailable to pick up pages. Muscatine became the back-ups so Customers refused voice mail. the Customer would be able to speak to a person as they desired.

Administrative

202 203

204

205

Faxes could not be identified in the Processed Faxes file, appeared in a Generic Format. Pipe desk and area around it was a cluttered mess.

Had to ask Zac Doyel for copies of files, information, emails etc.

WE HAVE A CUSTOMER THAT HAS BEEN DOING ALOT OF WORK AT AN INDUSTRY. WE DELIVER ALMOST DAILY TO THEM. WE WOULD HAVE TO CHANGE THE SHIP TO ADDRESS TO THE THEIR JOBSITE EVERYTIME WE HAD AN ORDER DELIVERING TO THEM.

207

scrambled for current info on a-b products

209

210

Organized and extreme time saver locating a received fax.

Lorie Julian

10/24/2008

Motion

VMI - Davenport

Pipe desk is clutter free and it's much easier to work in that area. We can also identify items that don't belong on or near the desk much more quickly than before. This will save us both time and also keep me informed of ongoing projects with my customers

Brandon Weems, Josh Kell

9/26/2008

Inventory

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

Glen Everhart

10/23/2008

Waiting

VMI - Des Moines

Dustin Den Hartog

10/24/2008

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

Over Processing

VMI - Keokuk

Inside Sales

Inside Sales

Set up a shared drive folder for Baker so that he and I can share info without having to ask each other or try finding the info. when packing and shipping full skid We put a shipping station within ten We eliminated 40 steps for every orders team members would walk steps of the skid staging area. skid sized order that we shipped. from the skid staging area to there we also eliminated the possibility of respective shipping benches to print any kind of distraction for team shipping labels for the orders. this members traveling longer distances. involved roughly 50 steps.

206

208

Each fax is labeled by Company, PO number, page length, and person the fax was sent to. Performed a 5S in the pipe desk area.

WE CAN ENTER ORDERS UNDER I ASKED MARIE ANDERSON TO MATT 10/27/2008 THE CUSTOMERS JOBSITE SETUP A SHIP TO ADDRESS FOR CAMPBELL ADDRESS THAT IS ALREADY THIS JOBSITE. LOADED IN THE SYSTEM.

had current info at hand at desk, all saves time when you and arevmi current catalogs moe efficient customers have current product catalogs FedX orders came to us in any From 12 noon on, FedX comes over Don't need to sort through piles of colored tote, could not easily only in blue colored totes, we can totes looking for FedX orders, identify these orders to have them easily identify these orders and saving time for me and Doug. ready to ship on time, may need to have them ready to ship when FedX sort through many totes to find. arrives. duplicated copies of will call pick print out only one printing of ticket - less expenses on paper & wasted tickets -- alot of extra usage of for customer only. Our records are time of printer cartridges & time paper being tossed away in the system. Eliminate paper waiting for second/third copy to print usage & reduce expense of paper & ink cartridges. All pick tickets and transfers printed Counter computers are set up to Warehouse personel will not have in the counter area. print in the counter area only. All to go to counter area to check for pick tickets and transfers will now pick tickets and transfers. Counter print on the warehouse printer. personel will not have to sort thru warehouse pick tickets and transfers to get customer copies of their tickets. Saving steps and time for warehouse and counter personel.

Administrative

Outside Sales

scott edfors

10/27/2008

Motion

VMI - Davenport

Lynn Jess

10/27/2008

Motion

VMI - Cedar Rapids - CDC Warehouse

Bob Heckroth

10/28/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Davenport

Inside Sales

Michelle Polzin

10/28/2008

Motion

VMI - Carroll

Warehouse

211

Box labeled "RETURN TO BRANCH 10" and email sent to br 9 employees to place material in box and return every week. Shelf is clean and free of clutter and inventory not needed at Branch 9. No freight instructions for accounts Freight instructions pop up in the outside the Des Moines area. yellow box and are given in the internal notes for everyone to see.

Elimates excess inventory and makes product easier to find.

213

214

212

215

216

217 218 219

Non stock shelf was cluttered and product hard to find. This also added to inventory $.

Thad Sand

10/29/2008

Inventory

Anyone entering an order will know Cindy Avey how to ship the orders and not cost VMI unneccessary freight charges.

10/29/2008

Transportation VMI - Des Moines

I was picking up the billing tickets at I will no longer have to go back and least twice/day from the CDC. forth. This will save me approx. 3045 minutes per day to work on other billing areas.

I had to walk across to the CDC at Linda least twice a day to get billing Keenan tickets. I discussed w/Todd Pierce and Trent Deneve. They agreed that the driver's could take the billing tickets to the Service Center from the CDC at least twice day, morning and afternoon. The driver's will collect the tickets/manifests, put into the green VMI bag and deliver to the reception desk at the Service Center. The green bag will ensure the tickets stay together and get to Billing to process. This will go into effec

10/29/2008

Transportation VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

When printing pick tickets I would have to walk across the room to get to the printer. We had just on person set up as a notary in our Cedar Rapids and CDC locations. If she was out of the office or on vacation, we need to wait to process documents that needed to be notarized. The scanners and the e pads at the counter were not fuctioning properly. The customers are having to sign all copies and time is being wasted on both ends.

I can spend more time giving my full attention to the customer at the counter, and avoid excess travel. We now have three notaries in this building. We will always have someone here that can notarize document that require it.

I moved the Carroll pick ticket printer over to the counter.

10/29/2008

Motion

VMI - Carroll

10/30/2008

Waiting

VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Finance

The new scanners and e pads will The counter is fully fuctional for the Nick Fischer 10/30/2008 get the customers out in an efficient customer to come in, get there manner. parts, sign the e pad and get out the door. You know what the say " time is money". This problem is solved.

Waiting

VMI - Sioux City

Warehouse

having to get on and off the forklift and the delivery truck to open garage doors. All the mini lamps were scattered on the shelf and there were also loose lamps on the shelf. I drove the big Q truck for all of my deliveries, which runs on diesel that we were paying around $3.69 a gallon!

not having to get off forklift to open by putting garage door openers doors. in,its faster,safer,and easier loadind/unloading trucks. All the mini lamps and loose lamps It is much easier to locate where the were placed in plastic bins lamps are and which lamps you according to part number. need. I got our blue Chevy truck back from The effect is that we will be saving Waterloo(they were using it for flood the company around $1.60 per reasons)now I can use this truck gallon of fuel use!!!! most of the time and we are only paying $2.09 a gallon of unleaded fuel!

Bruce Mohr

I have set up to other people in my Josh dept to be notaries. Now we have Andregg three notaries here and there should be very few instances where all three are out at the same time.

VMI - Sioux City

Inside Sales

Inside Sales

Inside Sales

david schieffer

10/30/2008

Waiting

VMI - Carroll

Warehouse

Nick Hamstra

10/30/2008

Waiting

VMI - Sioux City

Inside Sales

Corey Coen 10/30/2008

Transportation VMI - Mason City

Warehouse

220

I was printing and filing e-mails

221

taking time to e-mail all employees too shut down shut down one of their eclipse sessions if they are running more than one so other can get on. Currently, product from our supplier is being shipped in to the branch, and unloaded and then reloaded on to our truck for delivery to our customer. This process is wasting time, labor and not to mention, money. (These are bulk loads, and mainly to our Interstate customer).

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Created files in outlook to save esaving time and paper lynn hast 30-Oct mails instead of printing Find a way to see who keeps using wasted time and fustation when on Paul Decker 10/30/2002 running 2 session and shut them road trying to log in and can not. down for a day.

Motion

VMI - Sioux City

Outside Sales

Waiting

WE - Rochester

Outside Sales

Supplier ships product directly to our customer's job site, and we have our resources there to unload product per customer's request. This will eliminate the stop at the branch, wasting time and labor, and once again, money.

Customer receives product at job Shad Comer 10/31/2008 site in a more timely fashion. Customer sees that we are making the commitment to service them more efficiently. Cost savings in Labor and Time.

Transportation VMI - Sioux City

Warehouse

Doing away with my desk and having a stand up work station.

Motion

VMI - Des Moines

Warehouse

CLUTTER SEMI ORGANIZED.

ORGANIZED NO CLUTTER MADE ROOM FOR 20 MORE FEET OF SHELF SPACE IN THE WAREHOUSE. Unsafe because of location and Organized and a safe work area for outdated as for the organization. shipping and recieving. I have been printing all my in I am now trying to handle the faxes coming faxes and emails. and emails at my desk without getting up to walk to the printer every time, a 2 screen unit will help even more. The original spa tracking on the K The revision of the spa tracking that drive was required "busy work" on we have brainstormed and put into our part, and was mostly kept to place to start in Nov, will no serve a provide information for the supplier much more valuable and multi reviews, to track information on how purpose. our suppliers do on getting us spa renewals.

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Health and Wellness materials on my desk

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With limited space available for reference catalogs and materials I had to locate the desired catalog from three possible locations.

Moved the scale, and blood pressure machine to our office cabinet.

BOB STURM 11/1/2008

Completely reorganized shipping Bob Sturm and recieving. My trying this approach I am saving Jim paper and saving time by not having Wittmaack to leave my desk and walk to the printer.

10/30/2008

Motion

VMI - Des Moines

Warehouse

10/31/2008

Motion

VMI - Carroll

Inside Sales

The past couple years we have kept Amy an SPA tracking spreadsheet on the Grossman K drive, solely for the purpose of having the information available for supplier reviews, so we would know if we were getting the spa renewals in a timely manner that would fall under our expections. Sandy and I brainstormed and combined our own ideas along with what we learned at our most recent "best practices meeting" that we attended with our Minnesota and Wisconsin partners. We also have listened to our internal customers

10/31/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Carroll

Finance

Craig Gehring

10/31/2008

Transportation VMI - Sioux City

Outside Sales

Ken Weite

31-Oct-08

Motion

Inside Sales

My desk is now more focused on the work of the day instead of materials that were being used 1 morning a week. Reorganized my work area and This resulted in time and motion consolidated the most often used saved when researching product reference materials at arm's length information and part numbers. from my workstation and the less often used farthest away.

VMI - Des Moines

229

Over Processing

VMI - Carroll

Outside Sales

Troy 10/31/2008 Muenchrath

Motion

VMI - Sioux City

Inside Sales

All returns are in one area designated to inside sales people. No product around sales persons desk. The door between inside sales Install spring hinge on door to office and warehouse being left automatically close the door, so that open after someone enters the someone does not have to close it if office. it left open. This will also keep the warehouse noise out of the inside sales offices. Product samples, demo's and Product samples, demo's and No longer will the warehouse have catalogs are delivered by the catalogs are taken to a specific to carry the products to my warehouse to my desk. Once I shelf location in the warehouse. desk...eliminating wasted steps. received the items I would typically Additionally, I am able to review the open the container and carry the items at my pace in the warehouse, items to my vehicle or literature eliminating additional steps required area as required. to throw packing materials away.

Travis Doyel 10/31/2008

Defects

VMI - Carroll

Inside Sales

Glen Cornelius

10/31/2008

Motion

VMI - Carroll

Inside Sales

Scott Wiederin

10/31/2008

Motion

VMI - Carroll

Outside Sales

234

Had a hard time going back and Now I can easily go back and find locating undocumented lost sales the undocumented lost sales. because I was busy or for whatever reason.

Mike Scaletta

10/31/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Sioux City

Inside Sales

235

The rebate department personal did The rebate department now has the not have authority to create or set authority on the K drive for each of up SPA data files on a shared drive. us to view, create, and update SPA data files of our own or that of each others.

Sandy Wittrock

10/31/2008

Defects

VMI - Carroll

Finance

236

With the new personal in the warehosue and counter, there was alot of wasted time determing what material went where in the counter. So, we barcoded some tags that would hang on the pegs for the counter product.

Now when putting stock away at the counter, everone knows what gos where. There is know more gussing or looking in the warehouse location backstock.

Matt Young

10/31/2008

Motion

VMI - Sioux City

Inside Sales

237

Had to reel out wire from an extension cord to the wire cutting machine, each time it was used. (across the warehouse floor)

Installed a festoon at ceiling height so there are no nords on the floor. Minimal cost using materials from stock (less than $40)

11/3/2008

Motion

VMI - Keokuk

Inside Sales

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I had been carrying loose catalogs in the back of my car. They get ripped and bent. Wasting resources. Everyone looks in every kitchen cabinet until they find what they need.

I bought a plastic tote to organize and contain the mess.

The trunk is neat and I have more room for Repairs and products

David McCool

People can go to, or even give directions to someone less familiar to get appropriate supplies.

I labled the metal cabinets in the kitchen area so office supplies, food utensils, vendor videos, and promotional materials can be found quicker and easier. Cleaner work area and easier process for delivery driver and warehouse to keep product organized. Problem solved and works nicely.

Cluttered desk area and unorganized product returns.

With the help of Allen we found a report that lists bids or orders. I can go through this report fairly quckly and find and document lost sales. I found that this is also a great tool to aid in quote follow-up. We now have the K drive available for our next matrix department goal which is to maintain SPA data on a shared drive, elimating paper, and also giving all department personal access in ones absence. Less time is spent putting material away as well as pulling orders and everything stays in the same place, no moving material around unless it is determined by a few of us to do so.

Savings of 1-2 minutes each time a Jeff Doore wire cut is made. Eliminates any extension cords that are on the floor, tripping hazards and the machine getting stuck rolling over the cords..

31-Oct

238

ship via (ot) possbly could be deleted. The (OT) designation leaves you to assume that the (ot) involved. In some cases it takes a text message or a phone call to get it right. So - even if the current system is mostly workable -- the reduction in efforts and the % of error can be reduced - Keep in mind that - the person who places an order where it is believed to belong - may not be the last person to come in contact with that order -- and a different determination may be the result.

239

Working between HR and the WBU The relationship and level of was not professional or efficient. respect between the WBU and HR have improved.

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all locations (including the CDC) should have (S0?) and (P0?) ship vias. An S07 = ship vis branch 7 truck. A P07 = pick up at Branch 7

Correct routing of orders will no Steve longer depend on decifering text or Brinkerhoff phone calls. Any person viewing the order vis the "system" should be able to tell what exactly should happen. The time spent and errors made as a result of the "OT" desigantion will go away.

The overall training of the management team in the west is much better. We have set the expectation that the WBU’s goal is to be 100% compliant in following HR procedures. continuous time involved in sorting the "gate keeper" also put the name less time serching for faxes... easy faxes that had no customer names of the customer, and type of fax in organization on them the subject line. easier for the reciever of the fax to sort at a glance instead of borrowing into the fax Conf. Room was a mess and looked Looks like a conf. room. Plus not having half the front of the like we were a distributor from the room filled with junk makes us look 70's. There were old monitors and better to our customers. t.v.'s just sitting around Notices and messages on Eclipse only to Branches and not email. These messages should also be sent via email so everyone who do not get eclipse would get the message's email. When the Clive Branch needed paper (for their copier and printers) they called me and I ordered it from Excel, Excel delivered it to us (on the 2nd floor), one of the warehouse guys would come and get the paper and carry it back downstairs to the warehouse and then take it over to Clive on the transfer truck, then finally unload it from the transer truck to the branch.

Outside sales without Eclipse but have blackberry's would get the messages via email.

Over Processing

VMI - Iowa City

Inside Sales

Dave 11/3/2008 Lichtenauer

Defects

VMI - Des Moines

Administrative

Dean Evans/Patti Koenen

11/4/2008

Over Processing

WE - Mankato

Inside Sales

Rod Smith

3-Nov

Defects

VMI - Des Moines

Administrative

11/5/2008

Waiting

VMI - Des Moines

Outside Sales

11/5/2008

Transportation VMI - Des Moines

Keeping everyone current with Don Brown updated messages and important notices that do not get to eclipse because they are out of the office or do not have off site eclipse access. I called Excel and set up another The paper goes directly to Clive, the Jackie deliver to address. Now, I order the warehouse personel doesn't have to Vangilder paper and Excel delivers it directly move or transport the big heavy box to the Clive Branch. of paper.

11/4/2008

Inside Sales

244

Everyone in branch filled out a Vacation requests will be sent to paper form to request vacation time. me in email format.

245

Overhead door in warehouse being able to come down at any given time. Vendor quotes received via e-mail are printed and filed for later reference.

Door can't come down unless someone is standing right there.

247

We have had a problem with staff removing tickets from the printer, taking what the need, and placing what they don't back on the printer stand instead of returning to printer. Picket tickets get jumbled and hard to find. We've been trying to catch the culprit(s) but they've been elusive.

Placed a mouse trap on the printer stand so as soon as tickets are placed on printer stand..SNAP!!!! This will reinforce the need to return tickets to printer.

248

Paying for water to keep outside plants and lawns growing and staying green.

retain rain water from our building reducing our water bill. into storage tanks that can be used to water lawns and plants at a later time.Check into wet land tax credits

David Bowstead

249

High electrical bills for lighting warehouses at locations Driving by a customers address with a CDC truck to have it unloaded then reloaded in a branch truck to be delivered the next day.

Install sky lights to bring in natural light during the day. Possible night delivery directly to the customer for a fee.

David Bowstead David Bowstead

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Vendor quotes are attached directly to the Eclipse order by simply dragging attachment and scanning.

LOTS OF CALL BACKS AFTER LEAVING FOR DELIVERIES.

We eliminate some of the paper Jeremy Reed 11/6/2008 usage waste (40+ employees x 5-10 requests per year). Also making it easier for me to file and track with email format. The door can no longer come down Scott Black 11/6/2008 when somebody is parked in the way. No longer a need to go to printer to Jeff Coon 11/7/2008 get a hardcopy of vendor quote and file. Easy for purchaser to reference vendor quote from Eclipse with a click of the mouse. Within 5 minutes of placing mouse Thad Sand 11/7/2008 trap on stand we caught our first victim....The new guy. We explained the importance of keeping tickets on the printer.

reduce electrical bill Saving time and money on deliveries

Defects

VMI - Des Moines

Inside Sales

Defects

VMI - Des Moines

Outside Sales

Over Processing

VMI - Burlington

Inside Sales

Motion

VMI - Sioux City

Inside Sales

11/7/2008

Over Processing

VMI - Davenport

Outside Sales

11/7/2008

Over VMI - Davenport Processing Transportation VMI - Davenport

Outside Sales

Motion

VMI - Sioux City

Warehouse

11/7/2008

LETTING PEOPLE KNOW WHEN I LEAVE THE BUILDING FOR DELIVERIES. THINGS ARE DONE RIGHT THE FIRST TIME. Personal Idea, implemented for Saves Fuel in the larger vehicle. some time. Checking delivery racks One employee going to the in the morning prior to leaving the customer site. office. if the truck only has one or More face time with the buyers, two boxes going to a location and (and generally improved customer you are calling on that account service perception) anyway. Going through the back entrance, gives you the opportunity to meet more contacts within the facility and find out more about things that might be upcoming.

LESS TIME WALKING AROUND AND SAVING ON MILES FOR DELIVERIES.

My 20MPG vehicle saves fuel over Rusty Bouler 11/7/2008 the 10MPG vehicle that the delivery drivers use. Better Customer Service Perception More opportunities.

Over Processing

VMI - Burlington

Outside Sales

Birthday cards for employees. Time going to the card store and money.

People say it is ok they do not have Darcie to remember to sign cards and alot Notton of people did not care for them.

Motion

VMI - Davenport

Administrative

We are saving $155.00 a year and my time going to the card store.

TOM 11/7/2008 THOMPSON

Outside Sales

11/10/2008

254

everyone shareing the electronic equiptment with no protection from the spread of germs.

purchased a large bottle of germx for the area we share the most.

255

Had to move aroumnd to much to get to my trash bin and recycle bin LOST TIME SEARCHING FOR INFO ON SPECIFIC JOBS IN FOLDERS

moved them closer to me

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Test I would receive a request for a quote on a panel board either by email or fax and not have all of the information. That would lead to calls to the salesman who would then have to call the customer and then call me back.

I hope this will cut down on the spread of germs and viruses and cost VMI less in doctor visits and illnesses. Eliminated much wasted movment

Bruce Ruggles

Bruce Ruggles FOUND QUOTE MUCH FASTER CREATED MORE JOB NAME SCOTT AND COULD GET BACK TO SPECIFIC SUB FOLDERS UNDER EDFORS CUSTOMER FASTER SPECIFIC CONTRACTORS IN OUTLOOK Test Test Test I have now put on the company This saves me a ton of time in Derrick website a form with drop down calling people back and waiting for Samson boxes and mandatory information information to accurately quote areas that our sales people or even Cutler Hammer panels. our customers can fill out and submit directly to me with all the information to accurately quote a panel.

11/7/2008

Motion

VMI - Des Moines

Inside Sales

11072008

Motion

VMI - Des Moines

Inside Sales

11/12/2008

Waiting

VMI - Davenport

Inside Sales

11/11/2008 11/13/2008

Defects Waiting

VMI - Burlington Outside Sales VMI - Cedar Rapids - Corp Inside Sales