Is business good, are the orders flooding in? Is the accountant happy with your turnover? If so, now’s the time to find ways of making your business more efficient.

Don’t sit back and rest on your laurels. Preparing for the worst is smart business, and boosting business efficiency is a proven, timeless defence.

Here at PRV Engineering we have spent the past two years investing heavily in plant, staff and facilities.

However, as we understand from experience, investment is not just about machinery and a new-look shop floor. You don’t automatically become more efficient.

Yes, it can certainly help to capture efficiencies. However, the gains could prove transient if you don’t look at your business, from top to bottom, and prepare accordingly for the future.

Here we look at FIVE ways to fine-tune your business, moving forward

1. If you are serious about becoming more efficient, spend some time evaluating your weaknesses. Even the best engineering firms will admit to making mistakes and botching orders. Evaluate the line. Where and how often does it break down. It could be that equipment needs changing or more or better staff are needed.
2. Review your client list. Are there any bad clients lurking in your portfolio? You know the ones. They always pay late, they don’t respond to your calls about not paying the invoice and they take up far more of your time than they should. So get rid of them. Learning to be selective with your customer base is a tough lesson, but if it saves you time and hassle, it’s worth it.
3. Once you’ve priced out what it would cost to get your factory in peak condition, why not set some realistic goals for improvement. Assign teams to implement your desired changes. Make sure you don’t interrupt existing workflow, but check-in on progress regularly. Presume nothing as you pursue greater efficiency in your operation.
4. Make sure your staff are cost-effective. Do they all have the necessary skills to do their jobs? Are they motivated to do their best for your business? If they pick up on the possibility that the business might be failing, productivity may drop and valuable staff might leave.
   Sometimes you may have no choice but to consider reducing staffing costs, through reducing hours or making redundancies. Remember that making redundancy payments could increase costs in the short term, and may cause the remaining employees to feel insecure.
5. Reward creativity. Give your staff members an interest in seeing the transformation through to a successful conclusion. Either recognise breakthroughs verbally and in companywide communications or design a rewards programme for sharing the fruits of success with everyone who contributes to making the factory function more efficiently.

Here at PRV Engineering we are always looking at ways of becoming more efficient. Have you made changes in your business which has led you to become more efficient? Have you made errors in judgement that have made you less efficient? Why not let us know?

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