Bombardier is a key player in the transportation industry
and aerospace industry. In 2007 they
reported $14.8 billion in revenue; 45% in their transportation sector and 55%
in the aerospace. In the aerospace
industry, they manufacture commercial and regional aircrafts. With rapid acquisitions, they found
themselves lacking communication amongst their facilities and believed the
biggest problem to be in their inventory visibility. The implementation of an ERP system was
severely needed to maintain operations. Goal
is to seamlessly be able to share data throughout the sites.
Current Aerospace Facilities
- 6 in Canada
- 6 in the United States
- 1 in Northern Ireland
Symptoms of old Legacy System – Bombardier Legacy System
(BMS)
- Sites had become dependent
- Applying data accuracy
- No software communication between facilities
- Stand-alone user-developed databases were being used throughout the company
- Very poor data management
First attempt at an ERP system implementation was
discontinued mid 2000 at a $130 million cost due to the lack of employees
involvement, outdated vision and business processes. With this outcome, the second attempt had a
better chance as they were able to pinpoint key problems.
The Bombardier
Manufacturing Information System (BMIS) – SAP Enterprise System
1.
Creating a Vision by utilizing senior employees
to analyze, teach and create the vision they require form the new ERP system,
then propose it to the employees
2.
Establish a BMIS team to provide extensive knowledge
of their department and hands-on preparation
3.
Blueprints were mapped out utilizing Managers of
facilities in workshops in order to receive information required by them, as
well as, provide them with insight on the program.
a.
This was difficult as some Managers could not
find the time to attend and send lower-level managers, defeating the purpose of
the workshops
b.
Showed reluctance from some business units with
their involvement in the implementation
c.
This design phase ran over schedule due to
documentation of procedures not reflecting what management wanted
4.
Implementation was to be done one plant at a
time as full implementation was to take 6 years
a.
Choosing which plant to implement first was
based on which aircraft assembly plan would drive growth with their new model
b.
Implementation of a limited SAP was done in
order to decrease training time as well as focus the plants needs and
requirements on specific areas
5.
Testing phase
a.
Testing the work steps and scenarios
i.
The team found out there were many steps missed
by the appointed analysts from each plant during the blueprint phase
ii.
This was due to lack of knowledge and management
who did not send the bester qualified employee
iii.
Resulted in implementation teams and plants to
be frustrated as these had already been approved during the design phase
Addition projects
done throughout the BMIS Implementation
·
Revamping the procurement function
o
Roles and responsibilities were modified in the
Procurement functions
§
Planners – determined how much inventory was
required for an aircraft
§
Buyers – dealt directly with the suppliers of parts
o
This was believed to be beneficial as the main
problem from the beginning was inventory visibility
· Data cleansing within each plant under the
supervision of data cleansing teams
o
Once data was cleansed it was sent to a BMIS
team who will convert all the data from all the plants and prepare it to be
entered into the new system
o
Data was not cleansed accurately and had to be
cleansed after the system implementation
§
Took 9 months to correct data using new system
which no one new how to use efficiently
·
Getting rid of the methods and engineering
software and replacing it with a new one
o
Implemented a new part of SAP called SAP
Workbench
§
It showed to provide better assistance with manufacturing
information and work instructions
§
Created additional pressure on third party
consulting firm which believed it would not meet the SAP deadline as it had to
perform all previous steps on the SAP Workbench system now
Go Live Time
Even though super users were trained in the new system prior
to Go Live, which some of them weren’t even aware that their job descriptions
were changing and that a new system was even being implemented, training was as
successful as it possibly could be.
Complications
·
Super users were not fully trained as some
walked out of the courses claiming they did not need to be there
·
Some employees did not know a new system was being
implemented
·
Users became too dependent on support employees
creating backlog on help with queries
·
New help desk had to be established
·
Employees still used SAP legacy system functions
as it was still available to them
·
Roll-out problems occurred, for example
automated faxed purchased orders
o
Were sent out every time a purchase order came
through
o
Solved by putting in a pull and sent out once a
week
o
Caused some vendors not to receive any for a
month
·
Managers did not use the new system to request
automated reports
o
Instead asked employees to created them the old
fashion way
Conclusion
Bombardier implementation over all did not go as terrible as
it could have gone. All these occurrences
happened in the first launching pant, Mirabel site, which viewed it as a success. All the practices used during the
implementation were necessary to achieve success in the end.
However, a few practices should have been more enforced by
the executives. The support mainly from
the plant Manager at Mirabel, should have been their main priority. Most problems were with Management and
lower-level management not passing on the required information to their
employees in order to prepare them. Transparency
was not achieved by Management but the new System allowed for that correction.
Another which should have been addressed was the fact that
the old legacy system was still available to the users in that plant. This delayed the learning process as the users
would solve their problems using the old system instead of trying to figure out
how to use the new system.
Recommendation
- Force the users to utilize only the new system by shutting down their user access to the old system.
- Enforce participation of the Managers and mandate their staff be notified of new updates.
- Forgo with the super users and hold massive workshops. Since implementation is performed on a plant basis then train them all by department at the same time
- Create better tracking system of help requests within the help desk team
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