Within the distribution center, active floor management could assist the supervisors to enhance performance in 3 key ways. Be sure to regularly walk the floor to stay abreast of problems.
It helps to identify which workers might need more training by having regular presence on management on the floor. These regular visits can be used to see who may be the next to be promoted to a managerial position; it shows you consider the floor and everything that happens there and the workers to be essential to the overall operation and extremely vital; lastly, you can deal with problems as they arise.
Determine the Use of Space: Start by checking cube utilization in your facility. Inspect if there is a lot of empty space close to the ceiling. Implementing narrower aisles and higher racks and particular forklifts which operate in those kinds of environments can greatly increase how you store and move supplies. What might not look like a lot of wasted area can translate into thousands of extra dollars and square feet with some adjustments.
Check for Obsolete Inventory: If you notice a stock-keeping unit or SKU has not moved in more than a year, it is certainly consuming valuable space. In addition, if you have many half-full pallets 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 could be made to accommodate items which are moving faster.
How is the Product Flow? Take the time to trace how exactly product flows in your facility regularly. Check to see if the flow is sequential and logical. About 60% of direct labor within the warehouse is allotted to traveling from one place to another. You could potentially have less employees finishing the same amount of work by being aware of product flow. Being able to move personnel to finish other jobs instead of having personnel doubled up transporting objects will get more work out of the same amount of employees.
Review how the order filling method is happening. If you notice that a variety of SKUs are mixed-up in one location and orders do not require items of this mix, pickers are wasting time. Another big waste of time is having the same SKU situated in many locations inside the warehouse. Get the employees used of going to a specific place for each specific item so that they are simply looking in one area and not traveling all around the warehouse checking more than one location for the same item. These small changes could vastly enhance the overall efficiency in your warehouse.