Pump the Brakes

This is a crazy time of year here at My Father’s World.  We go from running full steam ahead getting orders out, with all engines at impulse power, to needing to change gears. If you listen closely, when you’re in our warehouse you can almost hear the gears grinding to lower speed. 

You see, this is the time of year where we prepare for what’s next.  Each year in the production side of the company we have approximately 3 stages as we pass through the months on the calendar.  Stage 1 is building inventory reserves as we head towards the summer and the busiest time of the year for us. Stage 2 is the busy season and the push to fulfill orders, and then stage 3 is prep for change and clearing out all old stock. 

For me stage 3 can be a difficult transition.  I am going from pushing out everything we can to meet demand, to slowing down and looking at what we have left and what will be changing as we head into the new year.  It’s complete “pump the brakes “mindset after “full speed ahead”.  But it does allow us to slow down and take stock for what is coming next.  It also gives some time to review what went well in busy season and where there were some issues that we need to address before next year. 

There are so many reasons for the changes that come every year.  Obviously, the most common change we make each year is the updating of our curriculum.  There are updates to different titles that may have gone out of print, or newer versions of titles don’t necessarily work for our needs any longer.  Other changes come as a result of reviewing the previous year and seeing what operating procedures work well and which ones need to be adjusted. 

An example of a reason for change that comes as a result of review is our transfer process.  At My Father’s World we have 3 locations that make up the book company.  We have our main shipping location, our bulk warehouse, and our print shop.  This year in our transfer process from the print shop to the shipping warehouse, we had some errors with the accuracy of those transfers.  In this “pump the brakes” time we are reviewing those procedures to see where the lapse was and how we can correct for next year. 

I have been with My Father’s World for almost 15 years now.  Through that time each year we evaluate and take stock of how things went.  We see and celebrate the successes, and we evaluate and make changes for the failures.  By doing this, this company has become very adept at running lean. That means we can produce a lot of results with the smaller size crew that we have.  This crew is the best I have been around at making adjustments on the fly in busy season, then making updates in the slower times.  I’ve said it before and I will say it again - many times, we are as successful as we are because of the people that we have and the processes that we follow.  Those processes, and the success that results from them, would not be possible without the efforts and input of each of the team members that we have.  So, here’s to getting ready for next season and when we’ll transition back to “full speed ahead”!