Setting and hitting targets to improve warehouse efficiency and productivity

Performance targets are incredibly important to warehouses. They enable managers to set goals for both individuals and the team to work towards. In many cases, forklift drivers are rewarded for meeting their targets, most commonly in the form of bonus payments based on activity rates. While providing workers with such incentives certainly has its merits, there are also drawbacks.

Where overambitious targets are set, employees often rush and accidents can follow – to the detriment of both warehouse efficiency, productivity, safety and worker morale.

Some warehouses may opt to reconsider their targets and lower them. However, in many cases these targets aren’t too high, but instead the warehouse simply hasn’t given itself the best opportunity to meet the target through maximising efficiency. By implementing an automatic data capture and identification (AIDC) system, efficiency can be improved and pallet movements sped up.

Using a unique combination of different technologies, that do not require each pallet to be tagged, every element of a pallet and forklift truck’s journey is automatically recorded and monitored. The system eliminates the time spent on data collection. This includes the time taken to scan a barcode but also the associated truck positioning time and time spent operating a terminal, typically speeding up each pallet move by 15 seconds.

Further to this, because data collection is automated, it removes the potential for human error and ensures a much greater level of accuracy. Warehouse managers therefore have access to highly reliable, valuable data which allows them to implement a continuous time and motion study, whereby targets can be monitored, analysed and adjusted so that they are more achievable and safer.

Check out our real-time warehouse solutions to learn more about how it works and its many benefits for warehouses.