Production management seems to be harder than ever to balance. The countless changes that impact your schedules and productivity can have you feeling like you’re endlessly putting out fires to keep production on time. Modern cloud manufacturing software makes it possible to get off the hamster wheel and start being more responsive to changes, rather than reactive all the time.
4 Ways to Automate Production Management with a Cloud Manufacturing ERP Software Solution
1. See Order Changes in Real-Time
Spreadsheets and manual processes make it difficult to respond to production demand when there is no way to predict breakdowns, delayed deliveries, and shortages. And, when you are finally alerted to those changes, it can take a long time to cascade that information through your disconnected processes to make sure everyone is up to date.
Acumatica Manufacturing edition automatically enables production forecasting by collecting and analyzing data related to your costs for materials, labor, machines, tools, overhead, and outside vendors. If you’re about to have a shortage, you can create purchase and/or production orders for the necessary parts from a single screen. Acumatica is constantly and automatically updating work in process (WIP) reports and dashboards.
2. Quickly and Easily Coordinate Project Activities
Project-centric manufacturers are able to create production orders directly from tasks in the optional project accounting application. They release and schedule production order operations for shop floor employees. Cloud manufacturing ERP software empowers users to monitor production orders from the configurable production dashboard.
Acumatica streamlines your processing for outside vendor activities. Production managers can easily track shipments and costs related to subcontracted services such as heat treating, painting, coating, or assembly right in your software.
3. Monitor in Real-Time
Monitor production in real-time with the production manager and production meeting dashboards for insights into work center utilization, work queues, order status, past due operations, late orders and operations, and works in process (WIP).
Acumatica provides detailed reports, including actual vs. standard/planned costs with labor, material, machine, tool, fixed, and variable overhead details. These reports are updated in real-time and adjust automatically to show you and your teams the most recent information.
4. Material Lot and Serial Number Tracking
So many companies struggle with the ability to maintain full lot and serial number traceability throughout the lifecycle of the item. Without automated software, it can be difficult to see details such as purchase receipts, inventory issues, and shop activity transactions.
Now, with modern cloud manufacturing ERP software solutions, you can create and assign lot and serial numbers for finished goods using configurable number masking. You can also enforce finished good lot and serial number selections when issuing lot or serial controlled components and raw materials to production, thus retaining one-to-one traceability for multi-quantity production runs. Acumatica Cloud Manufacturing ERP has a lot and serial number allocation screen so you can see after-the-fact matching of the component lot and serial numbers with finished goods lot and serial numbers.
If you are interested in this topic, you may be interested in learning more about the financial, operation and manufacturing KPIs.
Trust the Experts
If you’re ready to get the production management automation your teams need to succeed, contact us today to discuss how Acumatica Manufacturing Edition can eliminate manual processes, save time, and help you become a manufacturing powerhouse.
We have Acumatica experts ready to help guide you on your journey to optimal materials planning to ensure your company’s growth. Nothing replaces a live presentation, so please reach out to us to schedule a demonstration for your business. Call us at 800.331.8382, or send us an email at info@cfbs-us.com today.