EFESO’s solution provides a sustainable transformation for your operations management, supported by digital technology which will help businesses grow faster.
Our approach always starts with understanding the business context, the data, and our clients’ current situation. This could mean a deep dive into operational management and processes systems, an assessment of IT and operations technologies, or an assessment of the human dynamics such as leadership and behaviors. EFESO aims to create the future of factories in a close tandem manner
The resulting analysis then serves as input for a program of improvement design, covering processes, human factors, and digital technology, to be implemented while supported by strong program management.
For EFESO, ‘implementation’ means working closely together in tandem with you, step by step, in order to deliver sustainable results in the best possible way.
EFESO is a JIPM (Japan Institute of Plant Maintenance) certified company.
40% - 60%
decrease in
customer claims
20% - 30%
increase in
Overall Equipment Efficiency (OEE)
95% - 98%
level of
On Time In Full (OTIF)
24% - 40%
increase in
Productivity
15% - 20%
decrease in
Transformation cost
20% - 30%
decrease in
Material losses
Do you find your North star of Operations aligned to your business strategy?
A business’s Operations Strategy should be aligned to the business’s overall business strategy. To define your operations strategy, you should start by answering these key questions: Are we fully exploiting Operations to deliver on the business strategy, and maximize value creation? What are the key levers that impact on our targets? Do we need to design or redesign any operations? Do we need to close a gap in operational performance? How do we integrate sustainability drivers in a profitable way? How do we get the most value out of innovation and digitalization? Do we need to consolidate capabilities, or do we need new ones?
Our teams will support you answering these strategic questions to help you drive your operational strategy forward, supporting you with an implementation roadmap, and helping you to specify the relevant targets and build the business case.
Is your network of manufacturing sites, distribution locations, production lines, and machinery organized in a way that supports your operations strategy in the best way, helping to contribute to the corporate growth strategy, fulfil market and customer requirements, deliver any required cost reduction and earnings-enhancement targets?
Companies consider optimizing their operations footprint for both internal and external reasons—growth, responding to a geographical shift in markets, customers’ demand for a global presence, aggressive new players in the market, or to rationalize plants acquired through previous acquisitions. Typically, an assessment of a business’s operations footprint might precede a longer transformation project within the organization.
We help our clients manage the entire transformation process, starting from assessing the original ‘as-is’ situation, defining their target network configuration and network collaboration opportunities, identifying the business case, and building the roadmap for implementation until successful implementation including the adoption process for managing the potential impact on different stakeholder populations.
In manufacturing businesses, incremental change is a constant. And often, a business reaches the point when incremental change will no longer deliver benchmark-class excellence. In such cases, a major change of the operating system might be needed, a different factory set-up, different organization, or a different approach to maintenance management. If that is the case, then Design for Operational Excellence is the approach that can be used to define and implement the required major changes.
Identifying upcoming challenges, assessing ‘as-is’ processes, factory layout, organization, leadership and technology—all of these impact the development of the required ‘to-be’ operating system. Evaluating the gap between the ‘as-is’ and ‘to-be’ operation systems then defines the business case, and the process of closing that gap is supported by a roadmap for implementation. Finally, to firmly anchor the results in the organization’s ‘reality on the ground’, a change-readiness check at the beginning of the transformation helps to identify key responsibilities and relevant stakeholders.
Our experts will guide you in the process from assessment and design, all the way through to sustainable implementation.
Your operational excellence has brought you expected gains in growth, cost reduction, and flexibility. Now you want to move the curve up. The time has come to explore the full potential that digital technology brings. The Future factory (also called Smart Factory) as we see it at EFESO is connected, adaptable, efficient and scalable. It represents the core of Industry 4.0, can predict change, and has the ability to quickly adapt to meet customer demands. We support organizations on the development of their digital roadmap, including IT/operations technology/ET and data science in order to move from simple connectivity, via information and knowledge, all the way to prediction autonomy utilizing Artificial Intelligence (AI).
EFESO start from a consideration of the company’s strategy and derived digital strategy, combined with a bottom-up assessment of digital opportunities for use cases. This provides the ‘big picture’ of available opportunities, both at a site level, and as a global operation. This picture is then translated into a full digitalization roadmap covering all business processes (quality, maintenance, logistics, productions, etc), as well as a business case that includes the resources required for implementation, the resultant cost savings, and the impacts on the main business drivers. Nor do we only look at ‘smart’ manufacturing processes and the opportunities for digitization: we also advise on the organization that is needed to support this digital transformation, and what adoption measures have to be taken to deliver the full engagement of all employees and stakeholders.
EFESO has a strong capability in Industry 4.0, with experts in the different IT/operations technology topics, and also a database with over 450 use cases from which our clients can benefit.
Sustainability has shifted from a “nice to have” to a core component of business strategy for many companies.
Industrial sustainability will give you access to new markets, expand your scale with the right economics, and change your ecosystem dynamics to enhance competitive advantage – to make sure you can continue to do business in a profitable way.
Is your business in urgent need of better operational performance, in order to match volume needs? Does it need to improve quality or service, or simply impact cost and productivity in the short term?
In which case, EFESO has the approach to boost operational performance by assessing relevant workstreams, and installing clear performance management, roles and responsibilities, along with the development of leadership and performance behaviors. Supported by focused project management of structured improvement activities, clear milestones and deliverables, within three to six months the first impact on results is clearly visible. The integrated element of human dynamics then ensures that this short but intense approach is sustainable over the long run.
Boosting operational performance can be applied in different areas such as production, maintenance, quality. Often it is applied across the whole manufacturing facility, resulting in breaking down the internal silos that otherwise act as barriers to site-wide improvement.
Does your business need to create one single standardized way of working across the business? EFESO has applied its globally-standardized World Class Operations Management (WCOM™) approach within multiple global companies in multiple industries, in each case impacting those businesses’ bottom lines. Every EFESO consultant masters this approach, which means that we can work in a uniform way across the globe.
Our approach delivers a solid operational excellence strategy, combining a clear storyline (‘why’), with strong governance (‘how, who and when’) to ensure effective and efficient delivery of local projects (‘what’).
The first step is to ensure clear alignment of the program’s objectives with company strategy being the basis for a group-wide roadmap. Typically, we start our programs on selected pilot sites, followed by a roll-out across the company. All local projects have a toolkit with customized and standardized methods, and with tools available in all the relevant local languages. After a short assessment phase, resulting in clear targets, and a masterplan for how to achieve them, the local implementation will be monitored closely. A customized training academy helps speed up the transfer of capabilities from EFESO to our clients, and increases the ownership of the program at all levels. In addition, the integration of change management, leadership development, and digital methods and tools drives results tomorrow, as well results today: a truly embedded and sustainable approach to Operational Excellence.
Process Kaizen Engineers, the future leaders of the Operations world
To keep pace with today’s fast-moving developments in technology, there is an urgent need for organizations to focus on developing their own capabilities. This is especially important for those roles in which a strong technical background needs to be combined with highly developed leadership and managerial capabilities.
It is this specific need that led EFESO Consulting to create – and continuously develop – its Process Kaizen Engineers (PKE) Development Programs.
Facts and figures
Since the early 1990s, EFESO’s PKE program has delivered hundreds of sessions to multinational companies worldwide.
Over 300 sessions in blue chip companies
More than 6,650 certified participants from over 24 countries (including the USA, UK. Brazil, Germany, China, India and France)
Over 10,450 completed projects
Cost of training paid back within an average of 3 months
Availability in 22 languages
Adoption of PKE by many clients as part of company qualification programs.
Why start a PKE program?
A hands-on approach for rapid development
In PKE programs, high potential engineers and young managers within an organization are provided with a deep level of training in all of the essential theoretical and technical aspects of their job. These sessions range from Problem Solving, Maintenance, Quality, Focused Improvement, Lean Flow, Sustainability, Education & Training, Safety, to Industry 4.0.
The first phase of the program is conducted in a practical way through interactive learning, simulations, group Gemba [1] exercises and coaching. This establishes a common base of understanding for the key second phase, which is the realization of a live project, led by the aspirant PKE within their own organization.
Fostering digital transformation
A strong emphasis is placed on fostering digital transformation. The new PKE 4.0 certification program aims to develop PKE 4.0 Kaizen Engineers within an organization, who are needed as driving force for achieving efficiency gains through digitalisation projects and use cases.
In the 4.0 certification program, traditional PKE engineers are able to extend their current competence by learning proven Industry 4.0 approaches, methods and tools. They gain practical experience through the systematic use of process data and digital technologies in order to eradicate costs and solve problems more efficiently, with the goal of increasing value creation.
They learn how to make an impact on organizational development and team motivation and how to exploit digital opportunities for performance improvement. . In the process they acquire new digital skills needed to tackle future challenges.
An essential part of the PKE 4.0 certification program is the 4-day course on Data & Advanced Analytics, either on-site or virtual-based training. During this course, the attendees learn how to apply Analytics tools and platforms for collecting, visualizing, and analyzing data. They also learn how to use data for optimizing processes in production and supply chain as well as how to develop Industry 4.0 specific use cases. After having accomplished this 4-day course, attendees will get a certificate as “Industrial Data Manager” from ROI-EFESO.
Implementing a real improvement project
The core of any PKE program is the realization of a real project with bottom line impact for the company. This will be led by the aspirant PKE and will address a key issue for the company – typically the reduction of costs and lead times. This hands-on approach means that the learning is consolidated and that the transfer of knowledge sticks.
The project’s savings must be documented, and a final examination of the project is conducted in order to certify the qualification of the Process Kaizen Engineer.
PKE, a qualification program which is cash neutral for the organization The practical realization of projects provides real benefits and savings to the organization and will pay back the cost of the program within a year.
Leadership development
During the course of the project, the aspirant PKE leads a team of colleagues. This offers them the opportunity to develop their leadership skills, supported by on-the-job coaching from EFESO’s experts.
A generation of leaders with a strong background of continuous improvement
In addition to covering the cost of the program, one of the benefits for the organization is the creation of a generation of future leaders able to apply improvement techniques throughout the entire organization.
PKEs can be seen as experts focused on continuous improvement, able to eradicate losses and break the traditional siloes among functional areas, thanks to their cross-functional mindset and ability to create a dialogue among the various functions of the organisation.
Building self-confidence and credibility of young managers
PKE programs can be considered as an exercise in accelerated job rotation, in which individuals gain experience and are tested on the job.
Future PKEs learn to communicate at all levels of the organization, from the shop floor to senior leadership. A PKE will hold a respected position inside the organization and be regarded as a reliable and competent colleague who holds a horizontal vision of processes.
An accelerated career
Becoming a PKE results in a multidisciplinary mindset, acquired by facing complex problems in different area and finding solutions connected to processes, people and technologies. The PKE qualification becomes a career accelerator due to the relationship and visibility acquired in the different levels of the organization.
Blended learning
Recently, PKE programs have also been provided in hybrid modality via blended learning. These alternate self-learning paths to create a common base of knowledge, with on-line interactive sessions in which participants, working in teams in virtual labs, solve complex problems by applying the theory learned. This is combined with live physical events, which are essential to test the depth of understanding that the engineer has acquired. This prepares the trainees for the traditional project phase, which is the key to obtaining the final PKE certification.
[1] A Japanese word meaning “the actual place.” In lean practices, the gemba refers to “the place where value is created,” such as the shop floor in manufacturing, the operating room in a hospital, the job site on a construction project, the kitchen of a restaurant, and the workstation of a software programmer. A popular approach in companies who implement lean principles is called “Gemba walks,” which denote the action of going to see the actual process, understand the work, ask questions, and learning from those who do the work (showing respect to them).
Is your business driving an operational excellence program, but is not entirely satisfied with the impact, role, position, and effect of the manufacturing organization’s middle-management leadership? Have you run multiple leadership training sessions for middle management, but once they are back in their day-to-day roles, the impact is lost?
EFESO has developed a proven approach called Leading Performance that develops leaders from shopfloor to the boardroom, coaching them in how to lead performance, in both the short term and long- term.
In our approach, we identify the Leadership practices best suited to a company’s values, and from these practices we align the corresponding behaviors that we would expect to see in practice. The process involves following some basic steps:
Step 1: Defining the desired leadership (a leadership framework).
Step 2: Selecting High Impact Moments (HIM)—for instance, a daily factory meeting, or undertaking Gemba rounds.
Step 3: Translating the leadership framework into concrete behaviors for the selected HIM.
Step 4: Developing specific leadership skills that will be effective in respect to the HIM.
Step 5: Coaching and facilitating leaders in applying these leadership behaviors and sills, so as to have the desired impact on performance.
Our Leading Performance program has been proven to deliver a solid operational performance impact, in a sustainable way.
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Implementing a World Class 4.0 Manufacturing for an A&D company resulted in a ROI x 2.9
The Client, a global Aerospace & Defense player wanted to develop a 4.0 World Class Manufacturing (WCM) system and a digital strategy for both the Group and its local sites.
They also wanted to generate additional savings on transformation costs (compared to “traditional” WCM budget), as well as to support the management, control and reduction of the Covid-19 risk.
The approach
We supported our Aerospace & Defense Client by:
Results
Launching an Operational Excellence program for a MRO solution provider
The Client is a leading independent Maintenance, Repair & Overhaul (MRO) solution provider, specialized in APU, engine parts and landing Gear MRO, for civil and military aircraft. After the merger of its 3 main divisions, the Group identified the need to develop a common Operational Excellence program mainly targeting:
Approach
EFESO supported the Client by:
Results
Business process results:
Maintenance and Repair processes results:
Achievements for cultural change facilitation:
End-to-end retail value chain
Improving competitive performance by applying a LEAN approach in an end-to-end retail value chain.
The client is a major retail chain in France. They wanted to create a sustainable and differentiating added value for customers.
Challenge
Increase service levels and product On-Shelf availability without negative impact on financial results.
The Supply Chain Director needs to increase competitiveness by driving the optimum service/cost level to positively contribute to the bottom-line results, ensure that the company is ready for future business opportunities, build a Supply Chain recognised for excellence by clients, partners and stakeholders, and build a relationship of trust and collaboration with partners to achieve more common goals.
Solution
« Boosting performance by acting on Value, Flow, Asset and People dynamics»
Together with EFESO Consulting, a plan was built for a project that would last 18 months and would involve 3 manufacturing sites, 19 DC’s and 4 stores. The team deployed VSM which in this scope was a novelty to the retail industry. Working closely together the team described current and ideal state. In the process of mapping the current state a number of losses were clearly identified by looking at activities that did or did not add value. The second benefit of the VSM was the achievement of a level of knowledge and collaboration required to realise the future state in the end-to-end value chain that had never been attained before in the company.
Result
« Improving your results today, securing your results for tomorrow »
Thanks to the use of the VSM approach 5 areas were defined across the full logistics chain.
The project teams realised the following results:
Additionally, as a result of the increased collaboration, there were environmental results:
Due to the success the client has decided to take this approach further into the organisation and to other suppliers to increase service levels and customer satisfaction even more. The project ROI was 5.4 to 1.
« EFESO, a new consulting experience »
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