Focused Minds is helping Orkla streamline its operation.
Orkla is a leading supplier of brands to the grocery trade, institutional food services, specialised retail, pharmacies and the bakery market. The Nordics, the Baltics and selected countries in central Europe are Orkla’s principal markets. The Orkla Group also occupies a strong position in certain product groups in India.
The group is conducting a long-term project to streamline its operations as a whole. Part of Orkla’s efforts involves analysing and running projects to identify potential streamlining opportunities and to implement the activities.
Focused Minds has formed part of the team assessing these potentials, and the work consists of analysing operational activities, management structure, attitudes and behaviour aimed at finding areas for improvement.
The projects began with preparatory work that included a visit to the company and the joint creation of a plan to assess potentials. Improvements the company itself believed to be possible were also discussed on this occasion. The company was tasked with extracting data and information in preparation for project start. In the next step, the team established project baselines and drew up a detailed schedule for implementation.
Implementation covered data analysis, value flow analyses, observations in the factories, interviews and workshops. This intensive work took place on site for a number of weeks with strong support and involvement from the company’s employees. Good social skills, experience and expertise in various fields were important for the project team to enable it to quickly make sound assessments, pose the right questions and, together with the employees, come up with any necessary concrete proposals for improvements.
The projects were concluded with a compilation of results that were then presented to the company in collaboration with the employees. The presentation illuminated:
- The limitations of the current operation
- Available opportunities for improvement in terms of activities, the work environment and economy.
- Activities that must be carried out to achieve the identified potential.
The projects discovered potential for a significant improvement of conversion costs (the cost of processing the products). Focused Minds worked on the projects in general but also contributed with its special skills areas.
