The need for speed and agility in operations has become increasingly important in today's business environment. Companies are looking to take advantage of automation to make their supply chains more efficient, flexible and resilient; to make their finance and accounting more intelligent; to facilitate procurement and to implement autonomous processing in all their companies. They want to be more agile and faster in their operations, and they want their employees to focus on more meaningful and higher-value work. That's where workforce optimization comes into play.
It's a strategy that combines the efficiency of automated workforce management with the flexibility of an agile, skills-based approach to talent. By optimizing the workforce, human resources and operations can harness the workforce not only to respond, but also to thrive in rapidly changing environments. Ask Land O'Lakes, a Minnesota-based agricultural cooperative. Four years ago, the company implemented Workday to create an administrative base with automated workflows and a single data source.
Like many companies at the beginning of the pandemic, Land O'Lakes had no idea of the magnitude of the disruption that the crisis would cause. However, since the cooperative had already begun to rethink its workforce optimization strategy, it was able to respond and adapt quickly. As a result, Land O'Lakes was able to adjust some aspects of its business model and rapidly redeploy workers. The operator sought to increase customer service, employee engagement and speed, while improving efficiency.
Therefore, organizations must pay constant attention to the strategy, structure, processes, people and technology dimensions of the operating model. In fact, these sectors are experiencing significant changes due to digitalization and new entrants, and are responding by radically changing their operating models. This means optimizing the entire operating model in terms of strategy, structures, processes, people and technology, seeking flat and fluid structures built around high-performance multifunctional teams, instituting more frequent prioritization and resource allocation processes, creating a culture that allows psychological safety and decoupling technologies. With a workforce optimization approach, companies can do more than overcome business disruptions: they can emerge stronger.
This is done in an agile spirit, experimenting and iterating to make it a success, with the intention of demonstrating commitment, ensuring early profits and creating a starting point for the broader operating model. Automation can help optimize operations by reducing time-consuming processes such as automated order processing and shipping. This doesn't necessarily replace the need for human effort but it does help increase productivity. There are several inventory applications on the market that collect data needed to determine an optimal repeat point and include an automatic notification feature that alerts when inventory is running low.
The ability to track, view and manage inventory levels across the supply chain in real time gives information on how to optimize inventory to meet demand while keeping costs low. There are several ways to optimize costs while keeping your business agile - from buying products closer to home to reduce transportation costs to optimizing inventory based on demand. An agile business model has always been important in all sectors but agility plays a key role in e-commerce - from meeting customer expectations to optimizing operating costs. For Nuuday, and for others who are driving a transformation, it is vital to have a new coherent operating model that goes beyond changes at the team level and also encompasses the connective tissue between them.
To complete this process quickly there needs to be commitment from all stakeholders involved - from executives who set direction for change initiatives down through employees who must embrace new ways of working. In conclusion, operations can be optimized for speed and agility by taking advantage of automation technologies; implementing an optimized workforce strategy; adjusting business models; paying attention to all aspects of the operating model; tracking inventory levels; buying products closer to home; optimizing inventory based on demand; creating a culture that allows psychological safety; decoupling technologies; experimenting with agile changes at team level; embracing new ways of working; committing from all stakeholders involved.
