Going "Lean with Green" through Enterprise Solutions
“Earth Hour” observed on Saturday 28th Mar, 2009 from 8:30 to 9:30 PM across the world. While this is equivalent to switching off China's emissions for less then six short seconds, it shows our concern for climate change. It also means, Companies have to comply with stricter regulations in coming future.
We are hearing Lean from long time, now the focus is shifting to “Lean with Green”. While “going lean” was more of a business requirement, “going green” is becoming necessity with more and more regulations flowing in. While, one is being driven by being able to stand in the market against ever-growing competition, the other is for standing on the earth itself!
As a philosophy, lean means, “Eliminate waste”. Anything, which is not adding value to product from the customer’s point of view, is waste. Waste need not necessarily related with material, these can even be applied to Financials. There are companies which are moving towards lean accounting.
Let’s see, how best-in-class Enterprise Solutions can help your company become “Lean with Green”:
- Supply chain efficiency improvement through Advanced Planning combined with Transportation management system, will result in reduced transportation, one of the major sources of greenhouse gas emission. It also optimizes the receiving & shipping process, hence minimize waste. What’s more, with accurate forecasting, scrap can be reduced, resulting in reduced recycling requirements.
- Asset management is another area where small investment gives good returns. EAM can provide all energy consumption data, which will help in preparing & implementing an energy saving strategy. Preventive rather then reactive asset maintenance, will result in efficient asset usage with minimize downtime.
- It has been proven, that any best-in-class ERP system, improves production efficiency, optimize resource usage & reduce wastage. All these conform to lean objective & help company become green. Implementation of E-Record & E-Signature, which enables paperless shop floor, should also be part of company’s green initiative.
- Company may want to change their product features, to make them more environment-friendly. PLM solutions come to rescue here, which can reduce ‘time to market’ significantly, and thus help you stay competitive.
- To know the success of Green & Lean initiative, it is necessary to have well defined KPI with appropriate monitoring. BI applications do just that.
With all these advantages, we have just scratched the surface. Enterprise Solutions touch all business functions of your company, and with most of the ‘Best Practices’ already built in, it is just matter of implementing the correct module, and Voila ! You are on way toward "Lean with Green" !!!
