The client
An American entrepreneur relocated production from Western Europe to Hungary, which included manufacturing, storage of food materials, automated packaging, and delivery throughout Europe.
The problem
The company turned to Interim Ltd. because its production efficiency was significantly below expectations. Their OEE (Overall Equipment Effectiveness) had previously been 80%, which the company wanted to increase further. In comparison, after the relocation, this figure barely hit 60%. This was compounded by significant delivery delays, leading to fears that customers would turn away from the product.
The solution
The problem was solved by one of our interim managers who had previously gained experience in manufacturing, and quality management in a multinational food company and many well-known Hungarian companies. Building upon this knowledge, after a careful assessment, he concluded the following:
- The owner and the quality manager did not speak Hungarian, so direct communication with middle managers was very difficult.
- The managing director had previously worked as a trader in Eastern Europe and had minimal operational experience and knowledge.
- During the technology transfer, the transferring company delivered the machinery and equipment incompletely and did not provide the necessary technical, technological, and maintenance information, which was not perceived by the receiving side (due to, among other things, a lack of language skills).
- During the transfer, there was a complete lack of a plan and a project manager responsible for its implementation.
The interim manager's objective was to ramp up the production process, and the following measures were implemented:
- He reviewed the technical state of the packaging line and proposed immediate measures to improve availability and maintenance.
- It was necessary to promote production discipline by introducing process measurements.
The result
Thanks to the experience of the interim manager, he was able to make the changes acceptable to the owner. Although it was not smooth at first, doubts turned into satisfaction over time.
By the fifth month, the target was achieved, and our interim manager was given the task of relocating another production line as a full-time project manager.
At the end of what was originally planned to be a six-month project, the client offered our interim manager the position of managing director, which he accepted.