Project Background

Launceston City Mission provides support and assistance to people with physical, emotional, social or spiritual needs, through a range of social and other activities. Through income from their stores, along with grants and donations, Launceston City Mission supports more than 10,000 people across Northern Tasmania every year and engages over 650 paid and voluntary Tasmanians to help them achieve their mission.

Challenge

The 16 retail and resale stores run by Launceston City Mission generate approximately 45% of their income. However, they were having ongoing issues with their stock management processes, resulting in:

• Unexplainable discrepancies in the value of stock movements.
• Time in management meetings being used to discuss discrepancies.
• Finance team spending extra time tracking, monitoring and investigating stock movements.
• Additional lost resources spent on managing the problem.

Approach

The Project Lab carried out a detailed analysis of current stock management processes, which included a review of systems and data, interviewing key staff members, validating the perceived pain points and mapping the current state. This in-depth process mapping solution resulted in a robust list of recommendations to improve processes, better equip staff to perform their tasks, update data systems and develop a culture of continuous improvement within the organisation. ‍

Solution

Our process mapping solution consisted of:

• Educating team members on the importance of selling GST stock through an ongoing communications plan.
• Documenting current stock management process and providing an ‘as-is’ process map which empowers staff to develop a better process map for the future.
• Providing targeted training for key roles.
• Clearly defining areas for sorting and storing stock to reduce potential for misplacements or incorrect allocation.
• Reviewing and improving stock management systems through an integrated IT platform.
• Creating and implementing quality control systems to ensure work is performed to a documented standard.

Project Results

The Project Lab worked in partnership with Launceston City Mission, to create a solution that was ‘owned’ by the organisation and its people so that they could introduce fundamental changes to their processes:

• Through a better understanding of the process, staff took ownership of the results.
• Stock variations reduced to negligible amounts.
• Overall revenue increased due to higher quality stock reaching stores faster.

"The Project Lab really helped to clarify the challenge around procurement. I am glad we did the process work around the logistics because it helped us to understand the bigger challenges around procurement” – Brian Beswick, General Manager Corporate Services, Launceston City Mission