Case Royal A-ware Food Group
Royal A-ware Food Group | UC Group’s team helped the group to decide on a new direction.
Royal A-ware Food Group | UC Group’s team helped the group to decide on a new direction.
Royal A-ware is a traditional Dutch family business with a passion for food. It is one of the largest cheese processors in the Netherlands and specialises in producing, ripening, crafting and packing cheese, as well as producing and packing cream and various other fresh dairy products. It ships products for its customers – cheese producers and all the major European retail chains – across the world.
With no timely replacement available for the Warehouse & Transport (W&T) Manager, the client needed an interim manager, as well as a Planning Manager (total: 50 FTE) at short notice.
The W&T Manager is responsible for the finished products until they are shipped.
Products are stored in a fully automated pallet warehouse (capacity: approx. 5000 pallets). Orders are received by Customer Service and sent via the ERP system to Planning on a daily basis. Around 700 pallets are sent out daily, but their number can rise to 1500 a day at peak times. After checking, orders are released for the warehouse and the external forwarders are notified.
These activities had to be taken over from the departing manager with only a few days’ notice, as well as managing the forecast peak in orders leading up to the festive season in a rapidly growing economy and very tight labour market. On top of that, there were the annual negotiations with transport companies.
The client needed someone to take on day-to-day management, to recruit a new manager and team leader, and then to onboard and transfer responsibility to the new recruits. At the same time, the client wanted to further improve existing processes and working methods.
In dialogue with the W&T and Planning team leaders and employees our professional was able to form a clear picture of the existing situation as the basis for moving forward.
The transport companies were also invited to discuss contracts and contribute to an action plan for ensuring sufficient capacity during the festive season.
It was soon noticed that sickness absenteeism was on the high side, while employees demonstrated little initiative and were very passive, possibly owing to the management style of the previous manager(s).
To make changes and improve processes, we first needed to restore the team’s trust and confidence. We did this by delegating and by making employees feel responsible for their tasks. This quickly translated into positive changes, into growing confidence and trust among staff in themselves and in the UC professional, and into a gradual decrease in sickness absenteeism.
An interim team leader was put in place for Planning from November onwards so as to ensure the team would be properly managed. Keeping all the operations running smoothly and calmly in very busy periods is crucial. Our client reported that they chose, wherever possible, to bring in a UC partner because we share the same basic values and vision and know each other well. That’s the optimal way to make a client’s life easier, as also proved to be the case here.
The extra touch lay primarily in the strength of the UC Group network. Being quickly able to bring in colleagues and call on UC partners for specific knowledge and expertise means we are very good at making life easier for our clients.
Another key factor was the decision to delegate authorisations and responsibilities to employees and to trust in their professionalism and approach. By underpinning this trust with clear agreements on the way forward we then enabled them to flourish!
Remi den Broeder, Divisie Operations Manager AWare.
