Managing a shop floor is no easy task. Your employees make mistakes, equipment breaks, rush orders slip in, jobs ship late, and days are long. On top of that, there is the constant demand to reduce costs and increase quality. It’s a real pressure cooker.
These two manufacturing modes are just what you’d assume. Make-to-stock manufacturing is where finished goods are built to inventory. The demand associated with make-to-stock is typically driven by a forecast. Additionally, a mix of forecasting, inventory quantities driven by planning policies, and actual demand can drive planning and scheduling for make-to-stock manufacturers.
Before I get into the best costing methodology for a work-order-driven manufacturing company, let me define both methods. With standard cost versus actual cost, the discussion centers around how the ERP system values an inventory or labor transaction. Here is how the different costing methods calculate the value of the transactions.
Manufacturing ERP solutions and manufacturing processes go hand-in-hand. Your manufacturing process is typically defined by how you make what you make: the materials needed, the operations required, and the sequence of those steps. An ERP digitally supports any given manufacturing process by giving users a tool to help them execute, track, and analyze results of that process. When the tool used to support manufacturing process planning changes (like replacing Excel sheets with a new ERP), the processes typically change, too.
The types of consultants are: project managers, manufacturing consultants, finance consultants, and technical consultants. All of these individuals are typically engaged in a new implementation and used for varying consulting and technical efforts. There are a select number of consultants who are versed on the three primary areas of manufacturing, finance, and technology; we are proud to have these rare talents on the Visual South Professional Services Team. Please remember that the team helping you implement the software is just as important as the software itself . Our consultants exist to coach you on how to successfully use the application.
At Visual South, we have decades of experience implementing ERP software. I personally have been with Visual South for 20 years, and spend a lot of time working with manufacturing companies. Some of our customers are looking to get the most out of their Infor ERP, while others don’t have a solution and need help evaluating which ERP platform is the best fit for their company. Regardless of where they’re at in their ERP journey, I have found that just about all of these companies are working to have better manufacturing process control. How they do that is highly dependent on the tools they use to manage their business.
CloudSuite Industrial (SyteLine) is a sophisticated, robust ERP solution with a full complement of functionality that provides solutions to enterprises of all sizes. ERP software depends on processes, and tools to support those processes, along with people who understand how to do their jobs. Think of the software as an airplane—even the newest, best model still needs a pilot, so training is key. A plane is no good if the person commanding it does not know how to fly it.
There are multiple uses for field service management software, across many different industries. This type of platform is widely used by companies that do service and repair work in HVAC, electrical, commercial, and industrial maintenance industries. It’s also used in the repair industry itself, where work is performed onsite and remotely.
Infor VISUAL ERP is a solution built for small to mid-market manufacturing companies. The primary customer for VISUAL ERP is organizations that use a work order to produce their product, as opposed to those in a highly repetitive or process manufacturing environment. These work-order-based companies could be make-to-order, configure-to-order, make-to-stock, engineer-to-order, or a combination of all of these.
A recurring theme we’ve seen with companies over the past 25 years is they want to know their total manufacturing costs. Not only do they want to know these costs, but they want to trust the numbers are accurate, and be able to make important business decisions with that knowledge.
