In May 2021, the interim manager was commissioned by a medium-sized industrial group based in Germany - Industrial Packaging and Industrial Handling - to manage a newly acquired company as CEO on a day-to-day basis. At the same time, the interim manager also acted as interim CFO and interim CRO. His tasks: Restructuring, transformation and integration.
Optimizing production and the product and process portfolio
The interim manager's restructuring results included creating transparency as an ongoing task, designing the production flow and optimizing the product and process portfolio, as well as deciding how to deal with a chronically unprofitable product area. The transformation was based on the results of the restructuring. Here, the interim manager focused on structure and culture as results of the strategy, on leadership as a task based on responsibility, example and trust and on managing the company with the methods required for this. In integration, the interim manager focused on the external presentation of the group of companies, consolidation in a group-wide ERP system, comprehensive knowledge management and the avoidance of program and performance gaps, as well as a group-wide project to allocate articles according to profitability aspects.
Successful focus on production flow as a driver of profitability
The basic prerequisite for achieving the goals of restructuring, transformation and integration was the creation of a goal-oriented working atmosphere. Here, the interim manager laid the foundation for a solution-oriented and agile collaboration between all parties through weekly management meetings, a streamlined project structure and monthly business reviews. He reduced the need for written decision papers to a minimum. As a result, paths were shorter and decisions were more frequently made and implemented on site.
The interim manager consistently adhered to the Toyota principles (reduction of waste, imbalance and overload) when designing the production flow - the driver of profitability. To streamline the product portfolio, he developed a two-dimensional ABC analysis, the results of which were implemented using the Pareto principle. When streamlining the process portfolio, the interim manager used the capacity utilization and maintenance history of the machines and systems as a basis and developed batch size classes for capacity planning.
Instead of the expected decline, the return on sales increased to 4 percent
In the mandate, the interim manager was able to significantly exceed the results formulated in the decision paper for the M&A project. Instead of a return on sales of minus 8.5%, he increased the result by 4.0%. The main reason for this significantly positive deviation is the now largely undisturbed production flow, to which the interim manager had subordinated all other goals. Thanks to this production flow, the high sickness rate, difficult material supply (steel wire and steel strip) and frequent unplanned machine downtimes could also be managed better than expected.
As expected, the success of the project has resulted in strong positive feedback from clients and employees. However, for reasons of Group tradition, a manager who has been with the Group for a long time will take over as Managing Director at the turn of the year.
