Control towers are about providing transparency across organizations – giving companies the ability to spot problems and identify ways to improve operational performance.

By helping businesses to establish their control towers, we enable leadership teams to see where the company needs to focus its attention – and where changes can make the biggest difference in the shortest time.

The creation of a control tower function usually happens in five stages:

The initial step is to parachute our team of consultants on site for approximately 3-4 weeks to inspect the business – its existing processes and supporting infrastructure. This deep dive will also look over the key financials, so we understand everything from the range of SKUs to the utilization of company assets and resources.  

We assess the robustness of the sales and operating planning (S&OP) process, the accuracy of the demands signals, and the quality of both the management and the backend systems that support functions such as distribution. Finally, we evaluate the visualization tools available to the leadership team.

Working with existing systems where possible, we build a vendor agnostic supporting tool kit that provides the transparency needed across the organization. This helps us to build the control tower, from where businesses can see a digitalized version of their entire operation.  

This cockpit view allows leadership teams to identify where problems exist, such as capacity issues or areas of inconsistent performance. This will quickly show which issues are having the biggest consequences and need to be dealt with first.

When organizations have full oversight of their operations, the control tower can also act as a command center. From here we can run models to show how operations can be optimized, and then decide a course of action. 

These insights can help companies explain why processes need changing or why new solutions should be introduced. This enables project managers to gain buy-in at all levels of the business, from the leadership to the shop floor – helping to bring harmony to organizations.

When a course of action has been decided businesses can then draw up a roadmap. This will show where the company needs to go and what steps need to be taken to get there. 

To ensure they take the shortest route, work streams can be created to prioritize the projects that will have the biggest immediate impact.

By drawing on insights taken from the control tower, businesses can then start to implement projects that will help them to achieve operational excellence.

When there is so much global disruption impacting the chemicals industry, businesses need to see what is happening along the entire value chain, and in real time. We are helping companies to establish control towers that provide this oversight and make the invisible visible. This enables businesses to spot early warning signs and respond, quickly.