Salmat’s warehousing and distribution facility at Prestons processes millions of pieces of field marketing material for delivery each week with processing volumes rising and falling by millions, week-by-week.
Lean and MOS tools are being used to optimise the capacity and capability of their facilities. However, what impressed the site visitors was the culture; a change which Salmat has achieved in three years. The site visitors noticed:
The trust placed in employees
The help and support offered to employees
The teamwork
How all the key people were brought together
The focus on process issues and not blaming people
A great ambience, busy but calm
Positive, engaged, happy staff
Good relationships between staff
As one visitor put it, it was ‘pretty inspiring’. Cultural change is difficult, but culture is a key to the sustainability of a good work environment.
Salmat has found numerous benefits in having satisfied staff. The team is achieving great results. Among the things that contribute to their results are the sharing of ideas and roles, maintaining excellent reporting, and keeping meetings to a 15 minute limit.
”The passion management has for their Lean journey was very evident.’’
Richard McBurney, Millform
The journey for Salmat isn’t over. They are introducing more technology, as some site visitors noted it is a labour-intensive business with a lot of manual handling and potential for automation.
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