Obstacles and opportunities – the rollercoaster ride of Covid-19

TO SAY that 2020 has been a challenging year doesn’t quite seem to capture the full experience many manufacturers have gone through in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Finding ourselves in unparalleled circumstances globally and with everchanging alert level restrictions impacting business operations, the ups and downs have been nothing short of a rollercoaster ride.

For RML, we found that the sudden lockdown of the country or parts of it (as was the case in August), brought with it a range of challenges, a few benefits, and many learnings.

Like many in the manufacturing and engineering industry, the first lockdown was a huge shock to navigate as we found ourselves in a position where we needed to close the workshop suddenly. However, with our design team able to complete their work remotely, we capitalised on the weeks that followed to get as much design work as possible completed ahead of schedule.

As a result, the manufacturing team were able to return to a full workload, however like most businesses, delayed production led to extending project timelines, which in turn has affected when we can invoice for certain projects and therefore, when we could get payment.

The knock-on effect of the swift Auckland lockdown also added to this. Like many others I’m sure, we again found ourselves juggling projects and moving them down the track at a time when we may have otherwise already been delivering them, and there were a couple of reasons for this.

The continued pressure on finances meant that for some customers, jobs needed to be delayed. For others based in Auckland, the fact that we couldn’t access their site to carry out the work required also impacted our ability to complete jobs or projects on schedule.

While it’s something we regularly assess as a business, the experience just highlighted precisely why business planning, managing overheads, and taking proactive steps to maintain good cashflow is key.

We’re fortunate now to be operating in a time where there are a whole range of software that can help to do this, whilst also mitigating business challenges that can be quite specific to our industry.

For us, scheduling, ensuring we have the right materials for production, improving our workflow and of course the ability to invoice quickly, have been a key focus and using a strong ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) system - we use MYOB’s Advanced Manufacturing Edition – has helped us to significantly reduce time spent on admin and systemize our approach to identify and reduce our overheads. We also have a much clearer picture of where each item is in the production and delivery cycle.

Interestingly, technology and digitising ways of working has been a beacon of business hope over the past six months, with more business operators continuing to assess smarter, more efficient ways to deliver results. It’s also this new consideration around technology as an enabler to this, which provides our industry with an incredible opportunity looking ahead.

While the next 12 months certainly won’t be rosy, I believe there is good reason for manufacturers to be optimistic about what a ‘new normal’ could bring.

We’ve already started to see a rise in the number of new enquiries from companies looking to reduce labour costs and implement more automation. There has also been a definite swing to embrace remote working and be available to customers more on a remote basis.

The latter is incredibly heartening and presents a great opportunity for businesses like ours. We’d found that previously customers were less open to receiving external expertise without us visiting their site, but this has now shifted.

The experience of Covid-19 has chartered a new course for how businesses in all sectors operate – for manufacturing, the big questions now centre around whether clients will remain open to making bold decisions about their operations like automation and of course, if they have the money available to do so.

With the growth potential for our market firmly in sight, let’s hope so.

❝ We’d found that previously customers were less open to receiving external expertise without us visiting their site, but this has now shifted. ❞