Crown Bevcan – making good things better

The PSI monthly process at Crown Bevcan has always involved senior management focusing on the needs to balance Production, Sales and Inventory (PSI) across this multinational manufacturing group. Information was collated from the various European manufacturing sites and analysed using a series of Excel spreadsheets.
PSL already had longstanding relationships within various parts of this multinational company and was approached to see if they could create a database application to underpin the PSI process.

Our answer is NO!

PSL, unlike other potential suppliers, came to a radically different conclusion at this specification phase. An IT database solution was not the answer. The project was too complex and there were too many intricate requirements and interested parties – the likelihood of project failure was too high. We didn’t even consider a quotation as the cost would be prohibitive and the risks too high. We explained our reasons and wondered what might happen.

The question changes and so does our answer

After some months, Mike Cosby, the project sponsor, returned to PSL with a new request. Our initial diagnosis had been correct and others who had said it could be done had been unrealistic in the prices quoted or in their assessment of the risks involved. Now the brief was whether we could make the existing spreadsheet system better.

Again we looked and this time our conclusion was yes. The business process and the underlying IT worked, but it could work better in terms of security, stability and availability. The answer was not a horrendously expensive and radical new way of working. Instead it involved improving what was already a good system.
What PSL saw as initially being potentially uncontrollable and difficult to define could now be talked through with Mike and developed into a deliverable system that fully satisfied our customer. As Mike says, “I am happy that the system corresponds to what we originally agreed. The project has been delivered on time, in full and within budget."

Did PSL get it right? Well Mike certainly thinks so: “We have ended up with a system which has been welcomed by the users in the operations as well as at the centre. This is the true test of a successful implementation."