In the distribution center, active floor supervision could assist the supervisors to improve performance in 3 key ways. Be sure to walk the floor on a regular basis to stay abreast of issues.
By having management show presence on the floor on a regular basis, it helps to recognize which employees may need more training and which might be the next to be promoted to a supervisory position; it shows you consider the floor and everything which happens there and the employees to be essential to the overall operation and really important; lastly, you could deal with problems as they happen.
Determine the Utilization of Space: To start with, you must determine the cube utilization within you workplace, making sure to examine how much empty space is located near the ceiling. Implementing higher racks and narrow aisles and certain forklifts that operate in those types of settings could really increase how you move and store supplies. What might not seem like a lot of wasted space can mean thousands of extra dollars and square feet with some adjustments.
Check for Obsolete Inventory: Like for instance, if a SKU or stock-keeping unit has not moved in more than a year, then it is considered to be consuming valuable space. As well, if you have a lot of half-full pallets that are stored or staged in aisles, you are also not using available space to its full potential. By re-organizing existing stock and doing an inventory overhaul, much space can be made to accommodate objects that are moving faster.
How is the Product Flow? Take the time to trace how precisely product flows in your facility on a regular basis. Check to see if the flow is sequential and logical. About 60 percent of direct labor within the warehouse is allotted to traveling from one place to another. You can probably have less personnel finishing the same amount of work by being aware of product flow. Being able to move employees to complete different other jobs instead of having employees doubled up transporting objects would get more work out of the same amount of staff.
Review how the order filling method is taking place. If you notice that a variety of SKUs are mixed-up in one location and orders do not need things of this mix, pickers are wasting time. Another big time-waster is having the same SKU situated in multiple places in the warehouse. Get the employees used of going to a particular place for every specific thing so that they are simply looking in one place and not traveling all around the warehouse checking more than one location for the same item. These small changes could greatly enhance the overall efficiency in your warehouse.