All posts by Mark Rockey

Mark Rockey is a Production Scheduling and Supply Chain Planning Practice Leader at Profit Point. He has spent 20+ years applying analytic techniques to solve real world problems in network design; production and distribution planning and scheduling; and capacity analysis and design.

Four Keys to Increase Production Throughput by Visualizing Scheduling Constraints

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Raw material shortages and chaotic supply chains can wreak havoc on manufacturing schedules and have planners scrambling for solutions. But with the right visibility into processes, schedulers can better assess how effectively production time is used, detect potential conflicts, and identify bottlenecks and constraints – and it can be a game changer. Profit Point recently …
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3 Steps To Turn Supply Chain Network Design Into A Competitive Advantage

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Supply chain network design is all about creating a model of your existing supply chain network and then adding in alternative possibilities to evaluate them analytically. This gives business leaders a relatively easy, fact-based way to look at how effective their current supply chain is and compare alternative configurations. When done effectively, smart supply chain …
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Don’t Wait for the Perfect Product – You’ll be Waiting for an Eternity

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Recently, I was reading the current issue of Cornell Engineering Magazine.  In it, they had a profile of an alumnus named Howard Morgan.  Mr. Morgan is a 1968 Ph.D. graduate of Cornell and a venture capitalist.  You can read the article in Cornell Engineering Magazine here. One paragraph in particular struck me.  It reads: “[Mr. …
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Advanced Production Scheduling Tools

Advanced Production Scheduling Tools
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There are many production scheduling tools available commercially. Some are more tailored to specific environments (such as a specific type of manufacturing) while others are applicable to a wide range of applications. When we talk about Advanced Production Scheduling Tools, there are certain characteristics that we have in mind including the following: 1) Both materials …
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Flexibility AND Standardization

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Frequently when we work with clients to implement decision support tools for supply chain scheduling and planning, they often have some unique constraint that is essential to model and may be unique to their environment. Some recent examples we have encountered include the following: When producing a batch in a make to order environment, the …
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Data, Data, Data!

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  Here at Profit Point, we typically put in a fair amount of effort up front to scope out a project together with our client.  This typically helps us and our client to set appropriate expectations and develop mutually agreeable deliverables.  These are key to project success.  But another key element to project success is …
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Are Your Work Processes and Systems Operating in Championship Form?

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We just finished the fall soccer season in my home.  I was thinking about watching my children play soccer when they were younger after a conversation with one of our consultants.  He had just come back from visiting a prospective client where he was doing an assessment of their supply chain work processes and systems.  …
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