Production & Delivery Resources

Matrix Key:  Financial Viability - Production and Delivery - Resources

"The waste of plenty is the resource of scarcity." - Thomas Love Peacock

It should be no secret to business owners that in these challenging economic times, managing resources well is essential to being profitable.  In the Financial Viability quadrant of the WholeLife Matrix, we dig into resources management as part of a successful production and delivery system.  The first question to ask is, what exactly are we managing?

Every production and delivery system has four key resources:

1. Facilities and Equipment
2. Inventory
3. Labor
4. Management 

When you break your system down into these four parts you accomplish two things.  First, you identify more clearly what needs to be managed within each of the four resources.  Second, you begin to see how they affect each other.  Each resource should be managed and measured in different ways but also in the context of the entire production system.  A breakdown in any of the four will have serious impact on the rest.  The key is to manage all your resources both independently and collectively if you want your company to succeed.

We continue to offer our Deeper Dive into the Whole Life Matrix, a free bi-weekly discussion of different elements of the WholeLife Matrix. To join the Deeper Dive, email Ralph@Consulting2Win.com, with "Deeper Dive" in the subject line.  We will send you the log-in information for the call.  

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Measurements of Performance

Matrix Key:  Financial Viability - Production and Delivery - Measurements of Performance

"In God we trust...all others bring data." - W. Edwards Deming

In business, you can't just amble along and hope that things are going OK.  The only way to measure your success is to do just that, measure your success.  But what do you measure?  And when?  There are literally hundreds of potential performance measures.  Using the WholeLife Matrix, we divide these measurements into four key areas within your production and delivery system:

1. Management - how do you know if your executive leadership is doing a good job?
2. Company - what do you measure to best showcase your company's financial performance in the marketplace?
3. Individual Job Descriptions - how do you and your employees know what is expected of them?
4. Rewards and Consequences - how do you hold the organization accountable for your measurements of performance?

It's important to develop standards that are relevant to your company and that are challenging,  yet attainable. Too many metrics make the focus of your production on the metrics and not the product.  Too few takes the focus away from "doing it right."  You must take the time to develop a set of performance measures that you can calculate quickly and review often.  You can't win the game of business if you don't have some way of keeping score.

Are you ready to win?