GETRAG FORD Transmissions

Construction of a new facility in Eastern Europe to support a new product launch.

The Client

GETRAG FORD Transmissions was founded in 2001 as a joint venture between Ford Motor Company and transmission specialist GETRAG. The company develops and produces manual, automated manual and dual clutch transmissions.

The company has a turnover of approximately 1.17 Billion Euros, produces over 2.18 million transmissions and has over 4,700 employees. The customers of GETRAG FORD Transmissions are Ford, Jaguar, Mazda, Volvo, Land Rover, Otosan, Chrysler, Mitsubishi, Changan and Dodge.

The headquarters and product development teams, including the division's prototype centre and testing, are located in Germany. There is an additional product development team in Sweden and the company has production sites in Germany, England, France and now Slovakia.

GETRAG FORD Transmissions is a member of the GETRAG Corporate Group. GETRAG FORD Transmissions, GETRAG Group, GETRAG Americas and GETRAG Asia Pacific combine their strength under this umbrella and the brand name GETRAG.

The Challenge

GETRAG Corporate Group made the business decision to establish a new manufacturing location in Kechnec, Slovakia. The new facility will be used as a platform to launch GETRAG FORD Transmissions into the automatic transmission sector, with the release of a new dual clutch transmission. Once established in Slovakia, GETRAG will also take the opportunity to transfer the current motorbike transmission production from Germany to Eastern Europe, which will need to be a 'stop and start' launch.

The challenge was to manage and align multiple complex projects within a constrained timeframe (First launch : 18 months) to fulfil the successful launch of the new dual clutch transmission and maintain the continued running of the motorbike transmission production.

The integrated sub projects included the:

• formation of a common GETRAG Corporate Group manufacturing site
• construction of a new state-of-the-art manufacturing facility (40,000m2)
• transfer of the current motorbike transmission production line from Germany to Slovakia (100k units per annum)
• product development and manufacturing launch of the new dual clutch transmission (220k units per annum)
• Introduction of a new shared service organization, which included Quality, Logistics, EHS, Finance and Controlling

The GETRAG board understood the importance of such a complex project and the impact to its business growth and reputation. The success factors to meet the project needs relied on the fulfilment of budget requirements, whilst meeting all program milestones without losses to product quality and manufacturing efficiencies.

GETRAG recognised that a disciplined project management structure would be needed to ensure program success. The current Program Management Office (PMO) within GETRAG FORD Transmissions had only previously focused on Product Launch and therefore needed further coaching and leadership to ensure that the right skill sets and processes were implemented within its current organization.

Other key challenges included:

• establishment of a new Business Integration process based on SAP within the new facility, which would be used as a corporate model for future developments
• local hiring of the complete organization for the facility (First phase : 450 local personnel)

The Pcubed Solution

Pcubed was chosen to take leadership of the current PMO team to ensure successful delivery of the overall project objectives by introducing an effective program management approach which would deliver the management board's visions and strategies. The key success factors that were implemented by Pcubed to support the Program needs included:

Program Assessment and Health Check

The program was already functioning under the internal PMO team. Pcubed's first objective was to review the current governance structure and assess which processes were delivering the necessary project facts and which areas would require improvements. A formal Health Check was completed and reported to the client's management team.

Program Definition

The Program Objectives and Goals were defined with a comprehensive and practical Project Charter. This provided clear directions on program deliverables, goals and objectives, organization, roles and responsibilities and program budgets.

Team Members' Roles and Responsibilities

It was important to define the roles and responsibilities starting with the internal PMO that would be managed by Pcubed and then extending this to the complete program organization. This ensures that there is no misunderstanding when tasks are assigned.

One Team Approach

As the project was combining two organizations (GETRAG and GETRAG FORD Transmissions) it was important to manage cultural differences and achieve a "One Team Approach" through clear communications, honesty and integrity. Pcubed was central to this approach as our clear objective was to fulfil the program needs.

Pro-active PMO

Project Managers (in PMO) will be a "partner and right hand person" to each department module leader to drive key decisions. Pcubed assessed and matched the PMO experience to module requirements. If gaps were identified, Pcubed supported with proposed solutions. Pcubed ensured a pro-active approach to Issue and Risk Management across Module and Project Level. Pcubed applied Continuous Improvement process to maintain value from the PMO.

Program Governance with Structured "fact-based" Reporting

Pcubed ensured that Project Meetings were designed to manage across geographies, organizations and functions. A Structured Reporting System was implemented to provide consistent data to facilitate stakeholder decision making. All Schedule Plans were concise to allow ease of tracking and visibility of critical paths and deliverables. Each schedule plan mapped out interfaces and agreed realistic milestones between modules. Common standards and approach were driven across all the modules. This was supported by effective Change Management to validate proposed scope changes to ensure the scope remained focused on Project Objectives.