If you’re considering ERP software, whether you’re looking to change vendors or buy your first system, it’s helpful to think about what it should do for your shop. What will make a particular ERP system a good fit for your job shop? The four points below are a great place to start. Helps You Get Your Job…
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Getting answers to your business questions doesn’t have to be hard. All you need is good ERP software. It can keep your shop organized and make finding information a breeze. If you’re using spreadsheets or not using software at all, you could make a dramatic difference in your shop just by implementing an ERP; slash the time and effort…
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Things change quickly in job shops, and it’s important to make sure everyone can keep up. However, it’s hard to talk to people on the shop floor while social distancing. The more your shop is optimizing for things like profitability and meeting due dates, the more often you might need to communicate with the folks on the…
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If your shop is having scheduling problems, it’s common to assume that they are because of the scheduling department. That may be true sometimes, but there are many other reasons your scheduling department may be having trouble. Those reasons might come from different departments in your shop. Below are the four most common sources of concern for your scheduling department from other areas. Purchasing Sometimes, scheduling problems can come from purchasing….
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When you boil it down to essentials, a successful job shop sends out its jobs on time and makes money on every job. Getting to this point can be difficult, especially if your shop uses paper to track everything. It’s hard to know if you made money on a job if you don’t know how…
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2020 has hit hard. As manufacturers reopen and continue to find ways to keep their employees safe and their machines running, efficiency and improvements become even more important. Technology can help any job shop become more efficient and keep it running. Below are three ways ERP software can assist a shop post-lockdown to run even…
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Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software encompasses many things. You probably know it can help you run your entire job shop, but what exactly does that mean? In general, ERP software helps your shop operate more efficiently and gives you the data you need to run it better. Specifically, it can help improve your job shop…
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Over the years, ERP software has been changing to help fit its users’ needs. Most recently, those needs have made software that is safe, accessible, and smart. Imagine being able to hold all of the information you need to run your shop in the palm of your hand, and access it from anywhere. What if…
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Running a job shop is difficult work, and each has specific needs. However, there are four building blocks, along with a good ERP software, that can help any job shop. With accurate invoicing, a broad customer base, great customer relationships, and efficient scheduling, any job shop will have a great foundation to succeed. Accurate Invoicing…
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Many people have been working from home over the past few months, and one of the side effects they’ve seen is fewer meetings. There’s a joke that many meetings could have just been emails. Now people are seeing the truth behind that. There are many things in a machine shop that you can’t do from…
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5S is a method for organizing workspaces and entire shops to be more efficient, effective, and safe. 5S started in Japan as part of the Toyota Production System, and it’s one tool used in lean manufacturing. However, you don’t need to implement lean manufacturing or know anything about the Toyota Production System to use 5S…
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Every shop wants to improve productivity but making that happen can be tricky. Once productivity goes up, so does the bottom line and all sorts of other things, but getting started can be difficult. This is especially true if you’ve already tried to make your shop more productive and have run out of ideas. Below…
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You’ve probably heard the expression, “Time is money.” Nowhere is that truer than on the shop floor. The longer a job takes, the more it costs to run, which means that tracking this time is critical. To get the most accurate numbers, consider job time tracking software. Often the part of an ERP system, job…
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Scheduling can be one of the most complicated parts of running a shop. Each job is just a little different, particularly if you’re running a job shop. That can make it hard to schedule and make sure that each job finishes by the due date. This process gets even more complicated when you’re trying to…
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Make-to-order manufacturing shops are always on their toes. Jobs are constantly coming in and going out with different needs, order sizes, materials, and parts. On top of that, orders that are already in production can change in quantity or time frame. Then, you have last minute rush orders from big clients that need to make…
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Should You Take That Rush Job? One of your best customers calls with a special request. They have a job that they need completed as soon as possible. Their project is already behind schedule, and they need a particular product to move forward. If you can finish the job, you’d be doing them a big…
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What To Do When Your Customers Aren’t Happy With Your Turnaround Time Your shop isn’t using shop scheduling software. And so it has happened again. You missed a customer’s deadline. And to compound problems, you have more jobs in the production queue that are already behind schedule. You can tell from conversations with your customers…
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How do you manage your shop schedule? Do you use scheduling software? Or do you have a simpler system, such as a whiteboard, a spreadsheet, or maybe even a bunch of post-it notes on the shop wall? If you have resisted the urge to invest in scheduling software, now may be the time to reconsider….
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What do you see when you go out to the shop floor? Tools everywhere? Materials and parts laying around? Team members milling around, having casual conversations? Work piling up? You’re not alone. One of the things that makes running a shop so difficult is that you have to straddle the line between the office and…
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Scheduling the shop floor is by far the most challenging task for job shops and make-to-order manufacturers. There are many factors that come into play when trying to determine the best possible schedule on any given day. Here are just a few of the challenges for job shops trying to schedule their shop floor and…
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Scheduling the shop floor is by far the most challenging task for job shops and make-to-order manufacturers. There are many factors that come into play when trying to determine the best possible schedule on any given day. Here are just a few of the challenges for job shops trying to schedule their shop floor and…
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The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities. – Stephen Covey As a job shop owner, you know it’s not always easy to arrange jobs for smooth transition and flow from one batch to the next. Scheduling machines and manpower can be hard enough, much less scheduling for…
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Of the many challenges facing today’s job shop owner, scheduling has to be among the toughest. Obviously, production and manufacturing scheduling software helps take much of the guesswork out of running your shop efficiently, but scheduling is still part art, and part science. Variables such as customers changing orders, vendors letting you down, data not…
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Implementing a robust machine shop software solution offers many benefits to small and mid-sized manufacturing and fabrication shops. Foremost among these benefits is the ability to track production every step of the way. A quality shop management software package – for machine shops or any job shop – can be customized to meet the specific requirements of…
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