Enterprise-wide Data Automation Reduces Cycle-time by 92%  

A company had a manual process for collecting information from its customers in written form.  This led to long delays in getting critical customer information to the appropriate organization within the company’s multi-site environment.  With a cross-functional team, Perfect Formula created a data warehouse and a web-based portal which became the central information repository.  We reduced the time required to deliver critical information to the appropriate teams from 60 days to 5, a greater than 90% reduction, allowing the organization to respond much more rapidly to critical customer needs, and to assure business-critical actions are completed on time.

Redesign of Procurement Process Saves $100M

The third largest school district in the USA needed to change the way it procures items and services throughout a school year. Perfect Formula applied LEAN, Six Sigma and change management methods to create a process that meets The District’s goals for reduced complexity and shortened cycle-times. The new process leverages a yearly, cross-functional planning methodology with 40% fewer steps, maximizes use of existing expertise, and generates a written plan that is aligned with district-wide goals and budgets for the full fiscal year. This created the foundation for delivering $100M in reduced costs for the school district over the next three fiscal years.

Improved Data Management Process Increases Customer Satisfaction by 20%

Perfect Formula was requested to implement an “off the shelf” business process management (BPM) system to streamline the order-entry-to-cash collection process and tools for a manufacturing company. The Company’s existing system was a collection of low-automation ad hoc tools, and high-automation homegrown tools, resulting in an abundance of wasteful process steps.  After analysis of the enterprise data systems already available within the company, the solution was designed and implemented in Oracle. To expedite deployment, a key design decision was made to minimize the amount of customization along with the corresponding IT support requirements. The final solution utilized a common database supporting all the required applications, and a consistent look and feel throughout each module. We also created system training and documentation, and customized policies and procedures for each new process based on the needs of the organization. Deployment of the new enterprise-wide solution allowed management to make decisions faster and with many fewer errors. The data became visible across the entire organization quickly, resulting in improved quality and efficiency, and a corresponding increase in customer satisfaction of 20%.

Creation of Dashboard Improves Efficiency 10% and Reduces Cost 15%

A Fortune 500 manufacturing company needed to reduce cost and improve customer satisfaction for one of its businesses. As part of this initiative, Perfect Formula was asked to transition their software engineering organization from an existing data analytics tool to a new ‘platform design dashboard’ which would be used to manage the business’ overall product strategy. The final solution was a portal that leveraged Oracle, .Net, Hadoop / Hbase, and Google Visualization technologies in conjunction with an enterprise data warehouse. The result was improved efficiency for the engineering organization of 10%, and a 15% reduction in associated system support costs.  Once built, Perfect Formula successfully executed the transition of the 3000-person engineering organization to the new web-based portal in only 2 months by using several change management techniques. These included creating and delivering kickoff communications, providing group training, holding user forums, delivering one-on-one support, and building on-line help into the portal itself. The result was an improved use of data analytics by the engineering organization of 10% in the first 6 months of use.

Product Knowledge Database Saves Fortune 500 Company $25M

The engineering organization of a Fortune 500 electronics manufacturer needed to track the ongoing technical changes made to their global product line in order to maintain quality, safety, and regulatory compliance. Changes that could affect these performance characteristics included raw materials, components, suppliers, internal and 3rd-party software, and manufacturing location. Perfect Formula designed a knowledge management system that categorized changes based on the potential risk they pose to product performance, and then generates product test plans to mitigate that risk. By integrating this process into the client’s existing Quality Management System (QMS), not only was the cost of implementation kept exceptionally low, but minimal modifications to the existing Change Management Process were needed. This assured rapid and complete adoption by the engineering and quality organizations worldwide. The resulting reduction in the Cost of Poor Quality (CoPQ) is estimated at over $25M in the first 3 years of use.

Work-Request System Leverages Existing Enterprise Software to Transform Product Support

A global company involved in the design and manufacture of complex electronic devices needed a more efficient way to manage the Sustaining Engineering (SE) activities required for shipping products. The client’s vision was for an enterprise-wide work-request system that is on-line and self-service, provides requestors limited access to monitor status, and supports key Project Management (PM) functions to improve and standardize management of hundreds of requests across multiple products and customers. It was also highly desirable to extract meaningful data from the system to provide a foundation for metrics development associated with the SE phase the product life-cycle. Using the client’s existing Microsoft Enterprise software applications, Perfect Formula successfully designed and implemented a system that meets all of these critical requirements. Use of the system quickly brought order to a process that had previously been almost completely ad hoc. For the first time it was possible to obtain and analyze consistent data relevant to the SE function. Availability of this data quickly led to the creation of metrics for project cycle-times, cost saving related to product quality improvements (CoPQ), improved accuracy of resource planning, and the ability to measure and publish a credible Return on Investment (ROI) for the entire SE organization. The result showed that, contrary to previous assumptions, the Sustaining Engineering was actually a profit center for the company, with CoPQ reductions and enhanced revenues from increased customer satisfaction more than paying for the cost of the SE organization.