Assignment: Introduction to Human Performance Technology

Case Study 5: The WS Upgrade Challenge

Warehousing Solutions or WS as they are known in the warehousing industry, have been in business for more than 50 years.

Their work philosophy and environment are renowned in the industry. WS treats its workers well, generously sharing profits and providing good benefits for its employees and their dependents. A few years ago, WS gained nationwide attention by announcing a college tuition program for employees whose children achieved a certain GPA in their school work. Because of this, WS's employee turnover numbers are some of the lowest in the industry. WS's employees are fiercely loyal to their company and the average employee length of service is 15 years. The average employee age is 42.

WS's warehousing operations are mainly based on materials of fairly large dimensions, usually stored on pallets. These pallets are moved around by fork lifts and placed directly on trucks moving the merchandise out. Typical items warehoused by WS are office furniture, heavy equipment for air conditioning and heating, some building supplied and other similar products.

The typical work process for a WS warehouse employee involves receiving a sales order from the customer support folks. This sales order is usually a printout indicating the product sold and the shipping destination. The employee will then go to the "map" - a large book that shows the location of different products within the warehouse. After consulting the map, the employee will then drive the forklift over to the general area where the goods are located and visually looks for the exact item. Once the item is located, he/she will bring the pallets over to the shipping area and the shipping specialists will inspect the goods, wrap and ship them accordingly. A single shipment, because of the large size of the items, could take several hours to prepare. Once the shipment is completed, the operator stamps the sales order with a "completed" stamp, signs his name to it, and places it in the "complete" bin in the office area.

WS has just signed a very lucrative contract with one of the country's largest retailers to warehouse their entire jewelry line including watches. These items are kept in much smaller boxes than typically used in a WS warehouse. Also, a typical sales order for this kind of merchandise is for much smaller volume (two or three watches, for example).

Because of this, WS has decided to take the plunge in building a brand-new warehouse a few miles south of its main site. This new, state-of-the-art warehousing facility will feature the company's first ever ASRS (Automatic Storage and Retrieval System). The ASRS in a robotic device that pulls the merchandise from a huge set of bins that store the merchandise. Operators using this new system will sit in front of a computer terminal where they will download a sales order coming from the sales department. They will then issue the appropriate commands to the ASRS to bring down the matching merchandise. Once the merchandise is brought down and checked, they will send a notification to the shipping department via the computer program messaging interface and place the merchandise on a conveyor belt together with the printout of the sales order.

There will be 400 WS employees transferring to the new warehousing facility together with another 200 or so new employee that will be hired later once the volume ramps to full capacity.

After a long and thorough job search, you have been hired by WS as the senior Logistics Systems Manager. You will be in charge of creating, overseeing and managing the training program for the 400 workers that will be transferring from the old warehousing facility to the new one.

Most of these employees have never used a computer for work. Some have computers at home but only use them casually for Internet surfing or e-mail. Most are eager to move to the new facility but also a bit nervous because they will need to not only relearn their job; they will need to learn how to use a pretty complex computer program that involves multiple screens, data entry and some barcode scanning.

The new facility is almost built and WS management has informed you that they expect to move the employees in about 5 weeks and they'd like to see their training start as soon as they're in the new facility or even before then. The software team who has been working on the new software is offering two of their best programmers to help you as SMEs and you also have a team of 4 training specialists with skills in programming, ID and web design. You have a budget of $150K to get the project started and management wants to see your strategy and plan in one more week.

Ideas to consider:

• What will be the first steps you take to get this project moving?
• What will you spend your budget on?
• What kind of training will you provide (blended, web-based, hands-on etc.)
• How will you make use of the SMEs assigned to you?
• What does your project timeline look like?
• How will you know you've been successful?

You will need to present your strategy proposal to a Management Review Committee (MRC) who will have the ultimate approval authority for your project.

Case Study 4: http://www.expertsmind.com/library/what-will-you-spend-your-budget-on-51744784.aspx