Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Change is a good thing

...but you know what they say about too much of a good thing?


Feels like it's been years and miles away from the last time I posted on Dynalab Corp's fresh start. If we thought the management buy-out was our fresh start a few years back it was only because none of us could envision the road this company would take from that day forward.


December 1st, 2011 we went live with our new ERP system: Infor's Syteline product. We moved off our previous parent company's Mapics system that had been operated through a T1 line for many years. This was an exhausting project lasting years from information gathering, software selection then implementation. It all became reality on 12/1/2011. For any of you working at a company who has gone through this process you can imagine our feelings on 12/2/2011. As you can tell, it is almost 3 months later and I am just now settled back into my "real" job enough to be writing this blog. All in all, it's a solid software package and hopefully ongoing training and development will help our company use Syteline to it's greatest potential.


This is where the changes get crazy leading to that too much of a good thing question. 


Dynalab Corp New Fabrication Shop
Fast forward 4 days to 12/5/2011 when we started our company move. We started with the Fabrication Shop by shutting down all shop operations and moving the entire department to our new facility in the city of Rochester. Now add a week or two and product is being moved to the new facility as well. This isn't change, it's insanity. The company is operating on a new computer system with 1/3 of our staff in a different building and product being picked and shipped from two warehouses 10 miles apart! Not to mention it was Christmas shopping season so all around bad timing.



Dynalab Corp. is normally shut down between Christmas and New Year's (a benefit thanks to our previous parent company being in the UK where they take "holiday" seriously). This shut down time was used to finish the warehouse and office move to our beautiful new building. We reopened on January 2nd in a new facility - 1 month into a new ERP system. The fact that most everyone else in the country had that day off for the New Year's holiday gave us a day to get our bearings and find a pen.
Dynalab Corp. New Warehouse


The month of January could have been a disaster but the tight-knit crew that is Dynalab pulled together to make it happen. We held service levels and had a pretty successful month. Onward and upward, the changes were part of our history and the future started looking real bright. 


We are now 3 months post ERP implementation and almost 2 months at our new facility. Our focus is - as always - on our customers and servicing their needs. That has never faltered. 


Management has kept their eye on the ball through these dramatic changes and realizes right now is truly our fresh start. We are in the process of moving off our previous parent company's computer system and out of the previous owner's building. We truly control our own destiny!


Hopefully this is the first of many consecutive posts now that life is back on track. Don't worry though, life won't get boring for Dynalab as we still need to implement wireless warehouse and totally revamp the website to run on Syteline. 


Bottom line...change is a good thing!