Client Context
A family-owned Canadian manufacturer with $200M in revenue, 600+ employees, and three production plants across Ontario had grown through acquisition over two decades. Each plant operated its own ERP instance, scheduling system, and quality tracking process. There was no single source of truth for inventory, no real-time visibility into production status, and customer service teams spent 40% of their time tracking orders across disconnected systems.
Margins had eroded 3 percentage points over five years despite revenue growth. The CEO recognized the problem was operational — not commercial — but prior technology investments had failed because they were led by IT without executive alignment or change management. The company needed a strategist who could connect business outcomes to technology decisions and drive execution across resistant plant managers.
What We Did
— Conducted a 3-week operational diagnostic across all three plants: mapped 47 distinct processes end-to-end, identified 12 critical failure points where manual handoffs created delays, errors, or inventory inaccuracy
— Facilitated executive alignment workshops with the CEO, CFO, and three plant managers to establish a shared digital transformation vision with measurable KPIs — not a technology wishlist
— Designed a phased 12-month transformation roadmap prioritized by ROI: Phase 1 (ERP consolidation), Phase 2 (production scheduling automation), Phase 3 (quality management digitization), Phase 4 (customer portal and real-time visibility)
— Led vendor evaluation and selection for unified ERP platform, managing RFP process with 6 vendors and negotiating a contract 22% below initial quotes through competitive leverage and phased deployment terms
— Built a cross-functional transformation team with plant-level champions, establishing weekly sprint reviews and monthly executive steering committee meetings
— Managed change resistance through structured communication: plant-floor town halls, supervisor training programs, and a "digital champion" network that provided peer-to-peer support during each rollout phase
— Oversaw Phase 1 and Phase 2 implementation directly, transitioning to an advisory role for Phases 3–4 with a trained internal project management team
Outcomes
- 35% reduction in order-to-ship time through elimination of manual scheduling and cross-plant inventory visibility — directly improving customer satisfaction and enabling same-week delivery commitments
- $4.2M in annual cost savings from inventory optimization ($1.8M), labor reallocation ($1.4M), and quality defect reduction ($1.0M)
- 99.7% system uptime achieved within 3 months of ERP consolidation, exceeding the 99.5% SLA and building organizational confidence in the new platform
- Customer service productivity improved 40% as order status became self-service, freeing staff for value-added account management
- Internal transformation capability established: trained PM team, governance structure, and change management playbook that the company used independently for Phase 3–4 execution
"We'd tried digital transformation twice before and failed both times because we treated it as an IT project. This time it was led as a business strategy with relentless focus on execution. The results speak for themselves — we've recovered five years of margin erosion in twelve months." — CEO, Canadian Manufacturer