Leadership

Front-line leaders are critical to maintaining high standards for safety, quality, productivity and cost.

Our client – a multi-plant manufacturing corporation- was experiencing uneven and inconsistent results, which hurt profitability and competitiveness. Initial diagnostics and worker feedback pointed to wide differences in the skills and capabilities of front-line supervisors as a probable contributing factor.

We worked with plant management teams, to fully understand the desired c competencies for supervisory success, and then designed and implemented a comprehensive supervisory bootcamp program to implant these critical competencies and behaviours in front-line leaders. Part of the implementation involved also providing training to senior managers in the plants on the required competencies to ensure proper follow-up and reinforcement in the workplace.

Results:

The pilot plant experienced a significant and immediate improvement in key metrics, and that improvement continued over the next 12 months, resulting:

• an average profitability gain of several hundred thousand dollars per month (moving top-line costs to bottom-line results)
• safety and quality improvements across the board
• significant improvements in line worker morale and engagement

We repeated the training in the other Canadian plants, with similar results, and the company adopted this program as standard training for all front-line leaders across its entire manufacturing, warehousing and distribution operations across North America.