In the distribution center, active floor management can assist the managers to improve performance in 3 main ways. Be sure to regularly walk the floor to stay abreast of problems.
By having management show presence on the floor regularly, it helps to identify 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 all goings on there and the workers to be essential to the overall operation and extremely important; lastly, you could deal with issues as they arise.
Determine the Use of Space: To start with, you must determine the cube utilization within you workplace, making sure to examine how much empty space is located close to the ceiling. Implementing narrower aisles and higher racks and certain forklifts that operate in those kinds of environments can greatly increase how you store and transport supplies. What may not look like much wasted space can mean thousands of square feet and extra dollars with some adjustments.
Check for Obsolete Inventory: If you notice a SKU or stock-keeping unit has not moved in over a year, it is definitely consuming valuable space. Additionally, if you have numerous half-full pallets that are staged or stored in aisles, you are also not using available space to its full potential. By doing an inventory overhaul and re-organizing existing stock, a lot of space can be made to accommodate faster moving items.
How is the Product Flow? Make the time to trace how exactly product flows in your facility regularly. Check to see if the flow is logical and sequential. Around 60% of direct labor in the warehouse is allotted to traveling from place to place. You could probably have less personnel completing the same amount of work by being aware of product flow. Being able to move employees to finish other jobs instead of having personnel doubled up moving items would get more work out of the same amount of staff.
The order filling process must be reviewed and if it is identified that a variety of SKUs are mixed-up in one location. If orders do not need things of this mix, pickers are wasting time. Another big waste of time is having the same SKU situated in multiple places inside the warehouse. Get the employees used of going to a particular location for each and every particular item so that they are simply looking in one area and not traveling all over the warehouse checking more than one location for the same thing. These small changes could greatly enhance the overall efficiency inside your warehouse.