Business optimisation for global chemicals business

The situation

This global Chemicals business is one of the top 10 crop protection companies in the world in terms of size. Supplying global markets for herbicides, insecticides, glyphosate, fungicides and seed technologies, the company has substantial operations in North and South America, Europe, Asia and Australia.

However, the overall sector is highly competitive, dominated by large-scale players as well as being highly regulated, and increasingly is being impacted by unseasonal weather. Against this backdrop the company’s network of manufacturing facilities was becoming challenged in terms of all key performance indicators: unit costs, productivity and Health, Safety, Environment and Quality (HSEQ). As part of their overall strategy with the mission to ‘grow a better tomorrow’ the company engaged Advisian to support the transformation of their manufacturing operations.

Our approach

Advisian worked alongside the client to steer the most radical transformation of their operations in the company’s history. They had completed a rationalisation of their global portfolio of plants and the remaining hub locations needed a step-change in performance. Using Advisian’s ‘deep domain knowledge backed by real-world experience’ four key operations in the United Kingdom, Austria, France and Australia underwent a dramatic improvement in performance. This was achieved by working very closely with the client’s teams, developing the business case for change, quantifying and agreeing on the benefits, and then delivering a detailed plan that tracks sustained results. The program was flawlessly implemented.

Advisian worked with the client during the Scoping and Analysis Phases, utilising a critical set of tools and processes. The analysis identified common factors that impacted most of the plants such as challenges with culture and behaviour, cost management, production planning, and business metrics and planning. There were also opportunities for improvement that were specific to certain operations such as maintenance optimisation that impacted down time, materials flow and warehouse management, contractor and shift management processes and customer service processes.

Results

Many good projects fail because of poor or ill-informed implementation – our ability to mitigate this from happening is a core differentiator for Advisian. Our professionals have the experience, respect and authenticity, backed by a set rigorous processes and tools, to coach and lead transformational change. We are measured by actual sustainable results achieved through changes in behaviours backed by people, processes and systems.

Some of the performance improvements included:

• Unit costs in plants reduced by up to 25%
• 15% to 30% increase in labour efficiency and flexibility
• Headcount reductions of 26%
• Decreased shut downs by 50%
• Across-the-board improvements in safety metrics
• Reduced waste
• Increase in product quality, and
• 30% improvement in customer service levels.

More significantly, through the use of Advisian’s Execution Control System (ECS^SM), front line coaching and change management in each location emerged from the implementation with a new high-performance culture, with a set of values and behaviours that ensure continuous improvement.