Gradual software implementation allows users to find comfort zone An interview with John Cullip, President Cullip Tool & Die, Elkhart, IN (219.293.8251) Big shops may have the financial resources and personnel to change the way they do business almost overnight when they make changes in their information systems. However, at Cullip Tool & Die of Elkhart, Ind., a small shop with changing personnel and a 40 year history of successful operations, that was not the approach shop management took to automation. When John Cullip, the shop's second generation co-owner, decided the growing business required a more up-to-date approach, he also decided the best way to go about making the change would be gradually. The shop has 15 employees. That count includes John Cullip, both his parents who still play an active role in the company, and the shop's administrative support personnel. When increased production volume prompted shop automation, Cullip recognized the need for a software vendor who not only understood the situation, but could also provide enough product support and flexibility to implement the program the way he wanted to. "Scheduling was the main reason that we went to a computerized system. That's what pushed us to automate. Although we're not a terribly large shop, when we started running more jobs, I wanted some kind of scheduling capability to help us become more efficient as our shop grew," John Cullip recalls. That growth came primarily in the form of machining. The shop, which Dale Cullip founded with tool and die work in the 1950s, added a make-to-order machining division, Machining Specialists Company, in 1990. Cullip Tool & Die was still using the manual system put in place when the business was founded before turning to a computerized shop management system in October 1996. Coincidentally, that was about the same time the shop received a sales call from Bill Rippey, a sales representative from Henning Industrial Software of Hudson, Ohio. Rippey gave the Cullips a demonstration of Henning's EstiTrack shop control program. He also mentioned that the Windows version of the program, Visual EstiTrack, was about to be released, and that some attractive pricing options were being offered on the introductory modules. The price incentives, the modular nature of the system, and the fact that Henning's founders have a strong industrial background, including managing a small family shop, were enough to convince the Cullips that their search for a software system was over. "The price point was very attractive, and still is attractive today," Cullip said. So was the ability to take implementation of the system at a pace shop personnel were comfortable with. "My secretary was new when we purchased the software, and my current plant manager has only been here since April 98. We had some other things going on in the business at the time, so it was really convenient to say, 'Look, let's do purchase orders.' And that got them familiar with being in the system, and using that much of it. When you're coming from manual, you're changing your whole thought process, so there were some real issues that we needed to take care of." One of those issues was not hardware. Because of a rotating purchase schedule, the shop had most of the computers it needed. The shop ran the software on Windows 95 until December 1998, when a Windows NT server was purchased for a six work station network. Four of the workstations are in the shop's offices, and two reside on the shop floor. "I'm probably not the best read as far as how quickly you can get this thing rolling," Cullip says. "But we have another story to tell, that you can put in a little bit of the system and learn to use that part of it and get comfortable with it before adding any more. That's exactly what we've done with it. We weren't ready to just jump off the bridge with it, so we implemented it a phase at a time. We started out with purchase orders. We're still actually in the process of implementing some things." Cullip says using the software has made the shop a better company by standardizing operations and the information available for each job. It has also ensured that the information is available at a moment's notice in a standardized format. "As we got into the system, one of the benefits we noticed was the fact that we all have the information at our fingertips. I can sit in my office and find out what's been ordered against a specific job. My plant manager can have instant access, whether we're here or not, to go into the system and find out if a job has been written up as a shop order. When my secretary's writing a job up, all of the quoting information is available for her. That all used to be manually passed along. Now that information is available for us electronically. That's a big benefit of the system, to have access to all of the information when you need it and only having to input it once," Cullip said. "Before the shop was computerized, those little pieces of information were stored in several different areas. We had to run all over the place if somebody wanted to know if something was ordered for a particular job. You try to keep track of it, but when customers called up and wanted to order a particular part, we had to go to the files and dig out that paperwork. Now everything's right at our fingertips." After the shop's employees were comfortable using the purchase orders, Cullip moved to adding shop orders to the system, a step he says made an immediate impact on the shop's operations. "That was the biggest thing for us because of the difference from the way we had done it in the past. Once we got the shop orders in, we could start using the scheduling and the routers," he recalls. "Using the routers made a huge difference. Now we have a router that follows the job through the shop - start to finish - showing the operations and everything done for it. We never used to have anything like that before." One benefit derived from the routers is the information they provide on jobs. For instance, notes on cycle times let the operators know where each job needs to be and how many hours they have to complete it. The routers also store instructions on particular jobs or operations. Once those instructions are in the system, they can be used every time that job comes in, according to Cullip. "Those instructions are there for the operators every time, telling them what they need, all the way down to shipping. They also help us keep track of what has shipped and the quantities that should be going. It really gives us information out on the shop floor that used to be just a verbal exchange," he said. In addition to the routers, the other major benefit of entering shop orders into the system was that it gave the shop the ability to use Visual EstiTrack's scheduling module. The shop uses the program's original Automatic Priority Scheduling, but plans to switch over to the more recently developed Drag and Drop Scheduling module when implementation of the rest of the program is finished. Cullip uses the scheduling module to place jobs on workcenters and show their schedule loads. The machine operators then make adjustments on the shop floor based on the jobs' delivery schedules. Using the scheduling system has proven to be a major plus for the shop, as its management expected when the search for a shop control program began. Cullip looks forward to using the drag and drop module because of its higher precision, but he is willing to wait for his employees to learn the system rather than pushing the implementation. The shop's three primary users of Visual EstiTrack are Cullip, the plant manager, and the secretary. Among the three, there is a division of labor to further organize the tasks that are performed. One of Cullip's responsibilities with the program is to enter the shop's quotes into the system. His use of the estimating module is unusual because of the shop's split between tool and die work and machining. The estimating was initially developed for machining jobs, but according to Cullip, the system is flexible enough for him to be able to adapt it to his quoting needs for tool and die work as well. He does that by using the system's setup columns to include hourly rates for die design and work, bringing the prices together from a worksheet which is included in the estimating module. On the worksheet, he enters all the material costs for the job, represents the die-maker as a workcenter. He enters each phase of designing and machining a die under the operations. "It loads the system with the amount of hours required, and it really works well. Then we just use the worksheet in the quote where we can fill in the materials," he says. "It all comes together on the final page where you're doing one piece, it's one die. Then when a quote is turned into a shop order and all the order costs come in, you can see them against your worksheet. Or a work in process (WIP) report actually shows hours that we have spent on the job versus what we estimated." The only difference between his use of the software for die design and machine estimates is that the machine estimates can be used over for repeat or similar jobs. Dies are so unique from job to job that there are very few times when he can go back into the system and reuse an old estimate. The uniqueness of each die also makes it difficult to use the system for tracking run times and operating efficiencies on die work the way Cullip does for its machining jobs. The information for tracking jobs is put into the system by Cullip's secretary, whom he says is really the hub for the shop's use of the program. She enters the time tickets from shop cards into the system, as well as all sales, and some purchase orders. She also uses the system to track incoming invoices, and run all of the WIP reports used by the shop for billing purposes. The plant manager does the shop's scheduling; running reports which give Cullip the shop floor schedules and release dates. He also prints the routers and distributes them to the machine operators. Their three pronged attack on the shop's administrative duties helps keep things flowing smoothly, and Visual EstiTrack plays a part in keeping that flow of metal, paper, and information moving through the shop. In fact, keeping tabs on the information in the shop is one of the biggest improvements installation of the program has made, according to Cullip. "The routers went a long way toward making us more efficient out in the shop. In general, just having everything at our fingertips, knowing that everything is there in the same format for recall. When you're doing things manually, you're going to need the same information in different places. Here the advantage is you put it in one time and you can use it everywhere you need to," he says. Another benefit of using the system has been an indirect boost in customer service, according to Cullip. "We're a better company - I feel that it's improved our customer service, and I think it will continue to do so even more in the future, because it makes us more effective in-house. It's a little more transparent to our customers, but it certainly has helped to make us more effective in terms of on-time delivery. We've been averaging between 90 and 95% on-time delivery this year and Visual EstiTrack is part of what helps us along with that," he says. "The guys on the floor still have to make it happen, but it certainly gives us an edge in keeping on top of jobs." That's the kind of functionality that has Cullip excited about his shop control program, and committed to his long-term implementation plan. The other reason he's excited about the program is the service he gets from its vendors. "One of the things that I really like about Visual EstiTrack is the response we get from Henning. If we have a suggestion, if we have a need, if there's a problem in the program, they are very quick at addressing those issues. Now, as the program has matured, they're adding features, but they're just as quick to respond to our needs. When I needed little adjustments to make the software work better for die work, they've been great," Cullip said. The next step in the shop's use of the program will be its invoicing features. Cullip also plans to convert the shop from the accounting program it currently uses to Henning's new integrated accounting system, Visual Books, which also has the same modular design. "Bringing invoices online is our next project, and we're really excited about them coming out with Visual Books and having a totally integrated solution. It's going to cut down a lot on us having to do double entry. We're going to begin using invoicing next just to get one step closer. Hopefully, the first of the year will be the time that we make the break and go to the accounting system too," he says. "I think they do a great job servicing us, and we're pleased with the program. A lot of times, small shops need to take their time. It's been a slow process for us, but we're doing more and more every month using the system. At this point, we've come a long way, but we have not even tapped into the potential of the system." |
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