GETRAG

Launch of two new green field production sites in the NAFTA market.

The Client

GETRAG Corporate Group is the world's largest independent manufacturer of transmissions delivering an annual volume of 3 million transmissions and 1 million axles.

The GETRAG Corporate Group consists of GETRAG Group, GETRAG FORD Transmissions, GETRAG Asia Pacific and GETRAG Americas who combine their strengths under the brand name GETRAG.

The company has a turnover of approximately 2.5 Billion Euros, and has over 13,000 employees worldwide. The customers of GETRAG Corporate Group include Ford, Chrysler, Audi, BMW, Ferrari, Fiat, Renault, Porsche, Mercedes Benz, Smart, VW, Nissan, MINI and Toyota.

With 23 product development centers and production facilities worldwide the GETRAG Corporate Group is represented in Europe, Asia and North America.

The Challenge

The challenge was to launch two green field production sites to deliver high tech, fuel efficient, low emission Transmissions to the NAFTA market with a combined peak of over 1 million units per annum. This included the:

• Introduction of a process to manage a program of this magnitude as the existing GETRAG structures were not sufficient to handle such a project
• Coordination of all Manufacturing functions (Manufacturing Engineering, Quality, Environment Health and Safety, Logistics, Indirect Purchasing, Building and an internal supplier) coming from various parts of the organization and located in different sites worldwide, including the USA and Mexico
• Development of a consolidated Manufacturing timing plan - synchronized with the Product Development timing and all other Departments involved in this program - to meet the tight program requirements
• Assisting with the selection of the locations in the USA and Mexico mainly based on financial and strategic criteria
• Driving the Planning of the two new production sites, defining layouts, facility requirements, equipment needs, material flows, organizational structures and required headcount based on the varying volume scenarios

The Pcubed Solution

To meet the client's expectations, Pcubed established a Program Governance Structure that met the following criteria:

• Simple, efficient, repeatable, global
• Fact driven decision making at the lowest possible level
• Fast decision making cycle time to increase organizational throughput
• Agenda driven Meetings

This Governance structure is a Lean approach to Program Management, especially designed to handle complex, multi-site, multi-cultural projects in difficult environments.

Key elements of the solution included:

The Pcubed Lean Governance process included:

• Agreeing on a clear Program definition
• Enforcing a one Team approach, even though the members were located globally
• Empower the Module Leaders for decisions at the lowest possible level
• Defining clear structures and escalation processes
• Synchronizing the Meeting cadence to optimize time to resolve an issue, taking into account the different time zones
• Implementing standard meeting agendas and enforcing meeting discipline for efficiency
• Running a project wide Issues and Risk log allowing cross-module issues and risks to get addressed and resolved rapidly
• Administrating common data sharing, planning and reporting tools (SharePoint, RPlan), re-using and adapting existing tools and templates where possible